Language, Literature and Culture  
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Focussing on Revealing English Grammar’s Conceptual Unity Amidst Its Operational Diversity
Language, Literature and Culture
Vol.3 , No. 2, Publication Date: Oct. 28, 2020, Page: 8-14
706 Views Since October 28, 2020, 186 Downloads Since Oct. 28, 2020
 
 
Authors
 
[1]    

Dennis Michael Bryant, Faculty of Arts, University of Canberra, Canberra, Australia.

 
Abstract
 

This paper is the first and only successful attempt at identifying and illustrating clearly the underlying nature of English. The thesis presented herein is that English is obsessive in its thrust to sacrifice conventional constraints in order to maximize its operational flexibility. Operational flexibility is defined as a modest set of procedures that enables speakers of English to facilitate their communications, with ease. In other words, blind adherence to societal or grammatical constraints is not congruent to the nature of English. In fact, English operates in a manner not unlike the Artful Dodger character in Dicken’s Oliver Twist novel. While both parties (the Dodger and English) adhere to accepted conventions, there are times when both parties can be seen to undertake breathtaking divergence from those norms, turning their divergences into an art form. For its part and not seeking to pick a pocket or two, this paper reveals that the English determination to maximise operational flexibility drives it to Repackage — at all grammatical levels. These are syntactic (sentences), morphemic (words), phonemic (letters) and morphophonemic (word with attached letter) levels. Repackage is defined as giving its structures multiple uses. Because repackaging has remained undetected for so long, it would seem to infer an almost hidden subtlety of English. The methodology used herein is to provide an across-the-board suite of uncluttered exemplar sentences, which cover all grammatical levels. These exemplars are accompanied by inline explanatory commentary which is intended to fully inform ESL Teachers about the nature of English. But English is not secretive. The exemplars show that the nature of English was always hidden in plain sight, awaiting recognition and identification.


Keywords
 

English Grammar, ESL Educational Practice, ESL Curriculum Redevelopment, ESL Teaching, Second Language Acquisition


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