I’ve generally made it clear that I’m a big fan of understanding, and then strategically breaking, rules. I’m a fan of rules that make sense and contribute to smooth operational goings-on, and I hate arbitrary rules that don’t have an accompanying rationale. (If even you can’t explain why a rule is in place, why should I have to follow it? Get bent, arbitrary rules.)
That’s why it’s interesting that the grammar rules that entertain me the most are the most arbitrary ones. They’re the ones we don’t even bother parsing for rationale, because we don’t even realize there’s a rule there to begin with. They’re the rules you’re not even going to try to break strategically because why would you want to? Why would you want to talk about a “rubber, red, big ball”? It sounds weird because…
… Because it just does.
So here are four seemingly arbitrary grammar rules I actually love — ones you love, too, judging from the fact that you follow them every day without even thinking about it. And now that you are thinking about it, try not to, because it’ll throw you off in conversation, let me tell you.
Order of adjectives
I took French in high school and college (six years of it, in fact, and have I ever been able to speak French fluently? Mais non. Désolé, Madame Mion), and I was tickled by the fact that, while adjectives usually come after the noun they’re describing, that’s not always the case — sometimes, they come before the noun, and either way they have to appear in a specific order. And I was even more tickled to later learn that we do exactly the same thing in English.
Opinion — size — age — shape — color — origin — material — purpose, and if you want to do it otherwise, off you go, there are plenty of other languages for you to speak.
We don’t have to know the rule to hold ourselves to it every day, automatically. Weird, tiny Italian sports car. Cute little baby. Big Fat Greek Wedding. The movie could have been called My Big Greek Fat Wedding, except it couldn’t, because it couldn’t, because if you don’t know why, I’m not going to tell you. (We also tend to naturally keep it to three adjectives before the noun, because… we do.)
No rule is without its exception, of course (big bad wolf, new wooden tiny house), but they’re few and far between, and we know this because we seldom if ever break them. And I’m not gonna be the one to start. You get a pass on this one, Arbitrary Rule About Adjectives.
Order of vowels
A politician will never flop-flip. The video app would never have been TokTik. This post will never be a mashmish of grammar rules, and I didn’t dally-dilly in writing it. Why? Because of ablaut reduplication, not that you care about that, because you just do it without thinking, and you don’t have to know what “reduplication” is to just do it without thinking.
I’m going to tell you anyway: Reduplication is when you repeat a word, sometimes as it is, sometimes changing a consonant (fuddy-duddy), and sometimes changing a vowel (tip-top). And if you change a vowel, it’ll always be in the same order. Otherwise, it just sounds weird. If it’s three words, the vowels will go I-A-O (ding, dang, dong), and if it’s two words, they’ll go I-A or I-O (hip-hop, Tic Tac). It just works that way. It sounds right that way, and it doesn’t sound right the other way, so we just I-A-O/I-A/I-O and that’s that. If you don’t believe me, try sitting down for a chat-chit and see how that works out.
Placement of contractions
Contractions are handy. Dropping letters and squishing words together saves time and characters, and it’s how we naturally talk anyway. (Did you catch that? “It’s”?) Contractions separate us from the androids.
As long as they’re in the right place.
Tacking a “not” onto a word usually works. If they’re the main subject/verb clause of the sentence, they usually work, and sometimes they work at the end of a sentence, and sometimes they don’t, and there isn’t a lot of rhyme or reason to whether or not they’ll.
Why is that? Why “it’s confusing” but not “that’s how confusing it’s”? Why “we’ll figure it out” but not “yes, we’ll”? “He’d not” or “he wouldn’t” but never “he’dn’t”? “You aren’t,” but never “that’s not who you’re”?
How do English speakers know where they fit and where they don’t? We just… know. It feels right, or it doesn’t. Rhymeless, reasonless, we do it naturally. It’s just a talent we’ve.
Phrasal verbs
It sounds technical, but a phrasal verb is just a verb that’s made of multiple words. “Blow up.” “Take out.” “Calling” has a different meaning from “calling off,” and “turning” is very different from “turning down.” But just because the words, by necessity, have to come together doesn’t mean they have to stay together. Sometimes.
Sometimes you can split them up (“blow up the air mattress” or “blow the air mattress up”) and sometimes you can’t (“pick on the weird kid” vs. “pick the weird kid on”). Sometimes, you can put adverbs where you want (“work out the new proposal” or “work it out”) and other times you can’t (“work out it”). Why? I DON’T KNOW. And you don’t know. We just do it.
Rules of engagement
(Incidentally, any time you hear someone going on about how easy it is to learn English, and how everyone should be able to do it right away, and how if they don’t, they’re probably just lazy or not that bright, feel free to tell off them. And then don’t care how angry they’re.)
Start a sentence with a conjunction? Split an infinitive? Continue getting bent, arbitrary grammar rules, you can’t tell me what to do. My infinitive, my business.
So yes, I tend to bristle at arbitrary rules. Except when I don’t. I demand explanation before I obey. Except when I don’t. I contain multitudes.
That’s just the kind of writer I’m.
One last reminder:
I just wanted to drop one final reminder that the Weepy Awards are upon us — the gala ceremony will be held next week, by which I mean there will be a regular blog post and not any kind of actual ceremony, because I don’t even know how that would work but I certainly don’t have the budget for it. If you’ve encountered any particularly tearjerking holiday ads over the past few weeks, send them my way in comments or via social media or whatever, let’s say by Monday, and then watch this space to see if your favorites make it onto the red carpet.