Letters to the Editor | 4 August 2007

Sir: Graham Lord (‘Is it a tough ask to speak proper English?’, 28 July) gives a clue to the increase in use of bad English when he points out that recent immigrants from eastern Europe speak our language much better than many of our own young people do.

English lessons

Sir: Graham Lord (‘Is it a tough ask to speak proper English?’, 28 July) gives a clue to the increase in use of bad English when he points out that recent immigrants from eastern Europe speak our language much better than many of our own young people do. The reason is that the incomers have been taught by people who think it important to use correct English. That does not apply to some teaching in our state school system today.

Jennifer Coates, Professor of English and Linguistics at Roehampton University, recently wrote in the TLS, ‘All linguistic researchers agree that it is not their task to prescribe how people should speak or write: the linguistician’s task is to describe language as it is actually used.