Re: Subject / Object / ?

From:    Elliott Lash <erelion12@...>
>  I really think this depends on the school and the
> state and the specific teacher. I hate the way the
> Europeans on this list seem to think that ALL American
> schools will be horrible, no matter what.
I sympathize; but to be fair, there are only a few such people on
the list, particularly of a Gallic nature, and there are other
Europeans who've openly criticized that reasoning. I mean, it could be
worse.  I just came back to the States from three weeks in Germany,
where one particularly obnoxious German directly and explicitly
said I was personally to blame for the firebombing of Frankfurt and
other cities during the War. But not all Germans are bigots like that,
and not all Europeans make hopelessly superficial generalizations about
other countries.

(Please forgive me if I sound bitter.  I'm particularly sick of meeting
people from abroad who think they know a lot about America but can't
even get Bush's name right -- virtually every American knows you can't
be called "Jr." if your father's middle names are not identical!)

> Both my
> Elimentary School, Middle School and High School
> English classes spent time talking about Grammar. And
> I knew about Subjects, Objects and all the essential
> before I became a conlanger and a linguist. I'd
> appreciate a little less broad generalizations.
I second that.  Based on the descriptions I have heard of some European
highschools, most are far worse than the one I received from my
public school in Houston, where 95-100% of all graduating
classes go on to some form of higher education, overwhelmingly four-year
universities. For most people, their junior and senior years were
spent in various kinds of college-level courses in the sciences and
humanities, and by passing advanced placement tests, we received
credit as if in college.

 =========================================================================
Thomas Wier	       "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics    because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago   half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street     Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637