disadvantages of the

There are disadvantages to the term grammar.

Places are not linguistic. Actions in places are not true or false in the linguistic sense, though like linguistic performances they can be judged successful or not, honest or not, appropriate or not.

Also, the term grammar can suggest an isolated and complete set of rules, whereas the texture of possibilities in a place may range from an explicit set of rules to habitual expectations that have never been seriously averted to. Our practical living is not stamped out by complete formalized systems of rules. Daily elisions and tactical decisions within the current places both reproduce their grammar and introduce changes. Neither the process nor the structures exist without the other.

So should we use the term?


Index
Place grammar outline

(c) David Kolb, 1 August 2001