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<section id="gmail-top-content" class="gmail-col-xs-12 gmail-layout"><div class="gmail-moat-trackable gmail-pb-f-theme-normal gmail-pb-f-dehydrate-false gmail-pb-f-async-false gmail-full gmail-pb-feature gmail-pb-layout-item gmail-pb-f-article-article-topper" id="gmail-fCrHcs1q61ZjSq"><div class="gmail-border-bottom-off gmail-border-bottom-100-pct"><div id="gmail-article-topper" class="gmail-article-topper"><div> <div id="gmail-topper-headline-wrapper" class="gmail-col-xs-12 gmail-col-sm-8 gmail-col-lg-9"> <h1>Trump sent a retired teacher a letter about gun policy. She fixed the grammar and sent it back.</h1> </div> <span id="gmail-slug_tiffany_tile" class="gmail-hidden-xs gmail-right" style="margin:auto"></span> </div> <div class="gmail-clear"></div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="gmail-pb-container"> </div> </section> <section id="gmail-main-content" class="gmail-col-xl-9 gmail-col-lg-8 gmail-col-md-8 gmail-col-sm-12 gmail-col-xs-12 gmail-col-xs-offset-0 gmail-col-sm-offset-0 gmail-col-md-offset-0 gmail-col-lg-offset-0 gmail-layout"> <div class="gmail-moat-trackable gmail-pb-f-theme-normal gmail-pb-f-dehydrate-false gmail-pb-f-async-false gmail-full gmail-pb-feature gmail-pb-layout-item gmail-pb-f-article-article-deck" id="gmail-f0XFUCsq61ZjSq"> </div> <div class="gmail-moat-trackable gmail-pb-f-theme-normal gmail-pb-f-dehydrate-false gmail-pb-f-async-false gmail-full gmail-pb-feature gmail-pb-layout-item gmail-pb-f-article-article-body" id="gmail-f0Kf5Rhq61ZjSq"><div id="gmail-pb-article-body-author-modals"></div> <div id="gmail-article-body" class="gmail-article-body gmail-content-format-ans"> <div class="gmail-pb-sig-line gmail-hasnt-headshot gmail-has-0-headshots gmail-hasnt-bio gmail-is-not-column"> <span class="gmail-pb-byline"><span class="gmail-byline-role">by </span><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/people/cleve-r-wootson-jr/"><span>Cleve R. Wootson Jr.</span></a></span> <span class="gmail-pb-timestamp">June 1 at 7:11 AM</span> <span class="gmail-pb-tool email"><a href="mailto:cleve.wootson@washpost.com?subject=Reader feedback for 'Trump sent a retired teacher a letter about gun policy. She fixed the grammar and sent it back.'"><span class="gmail-fa gmail-fa-envelope"></span><span class="envelope-label">Email the author</span></a></span> <span class="gmail-pb-bolt"></span> </div> <article class="gmail-paywall"> <div class="gmail-inline-content gmail-inline-video"> <div class="gmail-wpv-wrap" style="width:100%;height:0px;background-size:100% auto;background-color:rgb(245,245,245);background-image:url("https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://www.washingtonpost.com/player/prod/img/wp_grey.jpg\000026w=800\000026h=450");padding-bottom:56.25%"> <div class="gmail-wpv-fixed" style="width:100%"> <div class="gmail-posttv-video-embed gmail-powa gmail-powa-processed gmail-small gmail-wpv-sticky gmail-ad-playing" id="gmail-powa-8d2aee64-650a-11e8-81ca-bb14593acaa6-0" style="background:rgb(0,0,0) none repeat scroll 0% 0%;height:0px;overflow:hidden;padding-bottom:56.25%"> <div class="gmail-powa-pane" id="gmail-powa-8d2aee64-650a-11e8-81ca-bb14593acaa6-0-powa-pane"></div><div id="gmail-powa-8d2aee64-650a-11e8-81ca-bb14593acaa6-0-powa-sell" style="width:100%;height:100%;display:block"><div class="gmail-powa-ad-bar" id="gmail-powa-8d2aee64-650a-11e8-81ca-bb14593acaa6-0-ad-bar" style="width:100%;height:22px;font-family:Helvetica;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0.7);display:block">
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<span class="gmail-powa-tease gmail-franklin-light">Yvonne Mason taught English
for 17 years, so she couldn’t resist correcting President Trump's
grammatical errors when she received a letter from him.</span>
<span class="gmail-powa-byline gmail-franklin-light">(Allie Caren/The Washington Post)</span>
</p>
</div> </div> <p>When Yvonne Mason first opened the
letter, she read it all the way through. It did, after all, have the
president’s seal at the top and his signature at the bottom.</p> <p>But
sometime around the third read, something began to irk the retired
teacher, who had spent 17 years of her life refining the English skills
of middle and high school students:</p> <p><em>Look at all these unnecessarily capitalized letters, </em>she thought<em>. </em></p> <p>“Federal”
and “Nation” and “State” and “States” — common nouns capitalized as if
they were proper nouns. And too many of the sentences began with the
ninth letter of the alphabet: “I signed into law” and “I also
directed.”</p> <p>The letter, with her name on it, was
written on heavy, official-feeling paper. Some would see such a letter
from the president as suitable for framing. But for Mason, there was an
itch that could not go unscratched.</p> <p>She took out a purple pen and did something she had done countless times with countless papers.</p> <p>She started circling.</p> <div class="gmail-inline-content gmail-inline-photo gmail-inline-photo-normal gmail-horizontal-photo"> <a name="VISPP4BBFU7XNKNZVC4PY3HNIU"></a> <img src="https://www.washingtonpost.com/resizer/PLyLAxRHtPPN-SMJ9mY3W5cjNNI=/1484x0/arc-anglerfish-washpost-prod-washpost.s3.amazonaws.com/public/VISPP4BBFU7XNKNZVC4PY3HNIU.jpg" class="gmail-_3-to-2 gmail-hi-res-lazy gmail-courtesy-of-the-lazy-loader" style="cursor: zoom-in;"><br> <span class="gmail-pb-caption">Yvonne Mason received this letter after writing to President Trump. Then, she started to edit. (Yvonne Mason)</span> </div> <p>It
began with those pesky capital letters. But by the end she had scrawled
several notes, crossed out a few punctuation marks and asked whoever
wrote the letter a question that may or may not have been rhetorical:
“Have y’all tried grammar and style check?”</p> <div class="gmail-incontext-insert gmail-show gmail-v2">
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</div><p>A scrawl at the end of the paper was
aimed at one sentence but seemed to sum up Mason’s opinion of the whole
thing: “OMG this is WRONG!”</p> <p>“If I had received
this from one of my students,” she told The Washington Post, “I would
have handed it back without a grade on it and said ‘I hope you left the
real one at home.’ ”</p> <p class="gmail-interstitial-link"><i>[<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/elected-to-lead-not-to-proofread-typos-spelling-mistakes-are-commonplace-in-trumps-white-house/2018/03/21/092cd086-2d16-11e8-b0b0-f706877db618_story.html?utm_term=.bb7b808f1cb6">‘Elected to lead, not to proofread’: Typos, spelling mistakes are commonplace in Trump’s White House</a>]</i></p> <p>She
mailed the letter, now bleeding with purple ink, back to the White
House. But first, she snapped a photo and posted it on her Facebook
page, hoping to draw smiles from friends or former students who have
been on the business end of her crusade to protect the English language.</p> <p>Days
later a friend persuaded her to make the post public, and by the end of
May, it had been shared more than 4,000 times, the latest piece of
evidence for critics who believe the president and his administration
play fast and loose with the English language.</p> <p><a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/elected-to-lead-not-to-proofread-typos-spelling-mistakes-are-commonplace-in-trumps-white-house/2018/03/21/092cd086-2d16-11e8-b0b0-f706877db618_story.html?utm_term=.bb7b808f1cb6">As The Washington Post’s David Nakamura wrote</a>
in March: “The constant small mistakes — which have dogged the Trump
White House since the president’s official Inauguration Day poster
boasted that ‘no challenge is to great’ — have become, critics say,
symbolic of the larger problems with Trump’s management style, in
particular his lack of attention to detail and the carelessness with
which he makes policy decisions.”</p> <span style="margin:15px auto" id="gmail-slug_inline_bb_2" class="gmail-wp-inline-bb gmail-pb-centered-bb"><div id="gmail-google_ads_iframe_/701/wpni.local/education_4__container__" style="border:0pt none;display:inline-block;width:100%;height:auto"></div></span><p>It’s
a message Mason tried to drill into the minds of public school students
for nearly two decades: How you speak, the words you choose and your
mastery of the English language all convey something about you, whether
you’re a high school sophomore or a junior senator.</p> <p>Mason,
61, who taught English rhetoric and composition in Greenville, S.C.,
and recently relocated to Atlanta, regularly writes to her elected
officials and has turned the practice into class assignments — a civics
lesson and a writing lesson all wrapped up in one.</p> <p>She
frequently told students they weren’t allowed to simply spout opinions;
their arguments had to be grounded in logic and backed up by facts.
“They rewrote them until they were correct and they put forth a good
argument,” she said.</p> <p>To guide them, sometimes
she would show copies of letters she had written, criticizing or
praising a vote or urging a particular policy stance.</p> <p>But her Feb. 15 letter to Trump was about saving lives. She wrote it a day <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2018/05/30/parkland-shooting-suspect-detailed-plans-in-videos-im-going-to-be-the-next-school-shooter/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.09b66ad6f429">after 17 people were shot and killed at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High</a> School in Parkland, Fla.</p> <span style="margin:15px auto" id="gmail-slug_inline_bb_3" class="gmail-wp-inline-bb gmail-pb-centered-bb"><div id="gmail-google_ads_iframe_/701/wpni.local/education_3__container__" style="border:0pt none;display:inline-block;width:100%;height:auto"></div></span><p>“I
wrote urging the president to meet with every single family of a victim
individually,” she told The Post. “And to hear what they had to say and
to assure them that something was going to be done about gun control in
this country.”</p> <p>But she knew that she was one
of many voices on the topic and “I didn’t expect to hear back … After I
mailed it, it was over for me. I had expressed my opinion.”</p> <p class="gmail-interstitial-link"><i>[<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/teachers-shelling-out-nearly-500-a-year-on-school-supplies-report-finds/2018/05/14/af2affae-57b8-11e8-b656-a5f8c2a9295d_story.html?utm_term=.350ba21bee3a">Teachers shelling out nearly $500 a year on school supplies, report finds</a>]</i></p> <p>Like
many of the letters she has received from politicians, she figured
Trump’s was written by someone at the White House trained to mimic the
president’s writing style, like a speechwriter. She insists that whoever
wrote the letter doesn’t need a new job, maybe just a new stylebook.
She hasn’t received any word from the White House about her suggested
edits.</p> <p>Mason told The Post that her catchphrase for students was “language is the currency of power.”</p> <p>“If
you can’t communicate what you want or what you need … You’re not going
to get what you want,” Mason said. “Writing clearly and consistently
gives you power.”</p> <span style="margin:15px auto" id="gmail-slug_inline_bb_4" class="gmail-wp-inline-bb gmail-pb-centered-bb"><div id="gmail-google_ads_iframe_/701/wpni.local/education_2__container__" style="border:0pt none;display:inline-block;width:100%;height:auto"></div></span><p>Mason said that the attention she’s received since her letter went viral has given her a new opportunity to share that message.</p> <p>She
gave up teaching English after her grandson was born. He’s 4 now, and
while he’s been talking for some time, he’s reached the point where he’s
forming complex sentences.</p> <p><em>Perfect</em> sentences.</p> <p>He hurt himself a few days ago while playing with the dog, Mason said.</p></article></div></div></section>
<br clear="all"><br>-- <br><div class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature">=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+=+<br><br> Harold F. Schiffman<br><br>Professor Emeritus of <br> Dravidian Linguistics and Culture <br>Dept. of South Asia Studies <br>University of Pennsylvania<br>Philadelphia, PA 19104-6305<br><br>Phone: (215) 898-7475<br>Fax: (215) 573-2138 <br><br>Email: <a href="mailto:haroldfs@gmail.com" target="_blank">haroldfs@gmail.com</a><br><a href="http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/" target="_blank">http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/~haroldfs/</a> <br><br>-------------------------------------------------</div>
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