To say that the Modern Gal is a grammar nerd would be an understatement. I love proper grammar. I adore it.
I squealed out loud when I saw a diagram of one of President Obama's sentences on the Grammar Vandal's website. I seriously dug diagramming sentences in school, though I'm not sure I could do it anymore if I tried.
The sentence:
“My view is also that nobody’s above the law, and, if there are clear instances of wrongdoing, that people should be prosecuted just like any ordinary citizen, but that, generally speaking, I’m more interested in looking forward than I am in looking backwards.”
The diagram:
That's one of the most intense diagrams I think I've ever seen.
(Cheers to Kate @ the Grammar Vandal)
UPDATE: Just reiterating what I said in a comment below: Welcome Instapundit readers. Glad you're here, but please know that The Modern Gal is a politically neutral and friendly place. This post is about grammar, not politics. Please treat it as such and save your political discussion for Instapundit or another blog. Thanks, and welcome again.
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Monday, March 23, 2009
Anatomy of an Obama sentence
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27 comments:
Thanks, MG! :-)
Ok, now I really feel self conscious about you reading my blog.
Wow, diagramming sentences. I haven't done that since 9th grade.
I am a such a diagramming nerd! It was one of my favorite school activities in elementary school!
During the campaign, someone diagrammed Sarah Palin's sentences, but for some reason couldn't exercise herself to diagram those of any other candidate. She claimed that a sentence with a wandering diagram was an indicator of a shallow mind.
http://organicbabyfarm.blogspot.com/2008/10/worst-criticism-ever.html
Gee, I wonder if she's seen this sentence of Obama's.
In fairness to Palin and Obama, I think there's a big difference between sentences spoken extemporaneously, especially in response to a question, and those written in an essay, or a speech. [Maybe a comment to a blog posting is somewhere in between.] A little wandering is perfectly normal.
A wandering diagram only indicates a shallow mind when it is a Republican/conservative speaking. For Democrats/liberals/progressives, it demonstrates what deep thinkers they are.
Dear Instapundit readers: Thanks for visiting. Please understand that we like to keep things politically neutral and friendly here at The Modern Gal. It's all in good fun. Thanks for reading.
Sister Florita would've bashed me on the head with her English book if I wrote a sentence like that. That's not a diagram, that's a new species of tree!
Its worse than diagram indicates. According to my spellchecker in Word, the sentence above has a reading grade level of 20.3 . That means the reader (or listener) needs to be at the PhD reading level (20 years of school, k12+BA+MA+Phd).
I keep bashing my students (grad and undergrad) for "writing like I speak." They evidently are taught this in K-12.
I try to hold them to 15 words per sentence precisely to prevent this sort of thing.
I also point out to them that in face-to-face speech you can use your face, your tone, your arms and hands, you posture and so on to fill out your meaning. When writing you can't wave your hands!! (Well, you can, but your reader almost certainly can't see them.)
Thus, emoticons.
Anyway, extemporaneous speech *should* be very different from thoughtful writing.
Just my 2 cents.
I remember diagramming sentences. That was way back when we were taught things.
The way it's done, however, is a carryover from the Old Days. The way it should be done is as a tree: main verb at the top, subject off to the left, object to the right, and under each of those, their qualifiers.
I'll go off to GrammarVandal now.
Interesting sentence that contradicts itself. In the first half: you do the crime, you do the time. In the second half: let's just move on cuz the thing happened in the past.
The obvious is that everything that happens immediately belongs to the past. So, by Obama's "reasoning," if you do the crime, you don't do the time because the crime happened in the past.
That is wonderful. I'm linking to this if that's ok with you? (Please don't diagram any of my sentences. I'm comma challenged but have a hubby to act as editor - thank goodness!)
Agree with Anon 1:20.
I used to love diagramming too, but if one listens for content, Obama's sentence is just a string of bromides that cancel out. Boiling it down without diagramming we have:
My view is also that CLICHE_1, and that CLICHE_2, but that, generally speaking, CLICHE_3.
Not impressive. Obama sounds great but when one listens closely, not much is said.
Diagramming should fill one with a sense of wonder and delight, like a balloon animal or confectioner's creation made out of sugar. Totally strange and totally wonderful.
My view is also that Barack Obama was elected the President of the United States, and, if the President speaks to the nation, that people should consider what he is trying to say, but that, generally speaking, people listen more when the President speaks than when someone else does.
I hope I said something of comparable gravity and substance.
Mrs. Hampton, my first and second grade English teacher, loved her some sentence diagrams.
I feel as though this diagram would make her especially happy, given its clear attention to detail.
That diagram is very different from the way we were taught in the sixth grade. Our diagram of this sentence would be much more linear with a few clauses and prepositional phrases. The diagrammer made it look worse than it is. It's a perfectly reasonable sentence.
But then, we were being taught on an AFB in a foreign country by a foreign national, if that means anything.
I remember this from 8th grade. This one makes my head hurt.
He appears to have gotten it grammatically correct despite the complex structure, and as an oral answer it's certainly indicative of a solid thinker. However, any editor would laugh at that sentence in print as it's needlessly wordy and complex.
It would be much more concise if Obama had said something like, "Generally I'm more interested in looking forwards than backwards, but if there are clear instances of wrongdoing the people involved should be prosecuted. Nobody's above the law."
But being a lawyer, Obama puts the strong statement first, "Nobody's above the law," then lays out the caveats and codicils.
BTW, there are way too many commas as well in the sentence, although I assume that's the transcriber's mistake. The only comma needed is before "but".
Pat said: "But being a lawyer, Obama puts the strong statement first, "Nobody's above the law," then lays out the caveats and codicils."
I'm no Obama fan, but I thought that the superficially incomprehensible diagram misrepresented his perfectly understandable sentence.
But Pat's nailed it - I'm a lawyer...
I'm no Obama fan, but I thought that the superficially incomprehensible diagram misrepresented his perfectly understandable sentence.
Which was?
To me it still stands as a sequence of cliches that everyone agrees with but combined mean nothing. Which is exactly how Obama got where he is today, but will be insufficient to get us out of where we are now.
I liked diagramming too. It beats studying Chomsky's transformational grammar any day.
I shall say this one more time: This is not a forum for an Obama political discussion. Please take it elsewhere or I shall delete all such comments. Thank you.
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