A mysterious email

[George Thompson]

Below is the beginning paragraphs from a baffling email I received earlier this week, and a couple of paragraphs from further into the message.

It all has an oddly paranoid tone to it.  Assuming it to be on the level, if anyone supposes that they can help, I will send them directly or post to this list the full text.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern Univ. Pr., 1998.

This is not an advertisement. This message seems rather long, but its size is just a few bytes, much smaller than that of a small picture. We've spotted your address in a web page and now write to you for help. Unfortunately, our previous websites were shut down by their hosts, so we may have lost contact with you. I didn't know why they did it. We were just talking about the ABC of English. Is it even a taboo? We have now built our own web site, and we hope to receive your message, again.


To the one who may help us

Teachers of English in need of help: A discussion over a concealment

We are a group of English teachers in Hong Kong, with Chinese as our first language. We are in a very embarrassing situation that grammar books have created for us, and we hope that you may lend a hand. We will sleep much more easier at night if we can solve this problem, which has long existed but we didn't quite take it seriously. These years, however, the question or scandal has been passing around fast and it is difficult for us to handle. Please allow us to explain the situation here.

It is well known that, according to grammar books, we don't use present perfect tense when there is a past time adverbial mentioned:
e.g. *I have seen him yesterday. (ungrammatical)
Nearly every grammar book reminds us of this important rule, so we have accepted it without question. It is the essence from their experience.

Because of this rule, however, we Chinese usually use simple past tense with "in the past few years", for this time adverbial is as past as you can possibly define what is past:
e.g. He worked there in the past few years.
We cannot interpret the adjective 'past' as referring to present or future time, can we? From schools to even government departments, we usually choose only simple past tense for such time adverbials as within the past four years, during the past three weeks, etc. It is as simple and logical as can be.

However, gradually, English native speakers strongly reminded us we shall use the present perfect essencewith such time expressions:
e.g. He has worked there in the past few years.
At first we didn't believe this. We argued ferociously against them how possibly could present perfect tense stay with past time expressions? They told us frankly that they actually don't know much better than we do. In teaching, they use last instead of past, to bypass the embarrassment. But if so, I think it is more than an embarrassment. It is still cheating, deliberately.

Their arguments were weak (for example, explaining "past has a relation to present, so it is present"). Most important, they couldn't even show us a grammar to support themselves. There wasn't any grammar book that has talked about this kind of examples, bearing time adverbials like in the past few years. At last, we thought they were irrational and pulling our leg.

But as we carefully read foreign newspapers and magazines, we notice that it is true that time adverbials like within the past five years, during the past four weeks are permissible to stay with present perfect tense. With searching machines on Internet, we also know it is predominately so. On the other hand, past is as common as last. Surprisingly, however, no English grammar sources whatsoever on the web have ever reminded us of this exceptional use. How could this happen? Now the trouble is, how can we explain to our class? As you see, a teacher cannot tell his class that "I heard someone said this strange usage on Internet and I believe in him. But I have not any grammar book to support me, and the usage violates our common knowledge in using English tense." Put it simply, we need a grammar book saying so and supporting us. Is this asking too much?

***

The whole thing is a scandal. We trust in grammar books and they're all cheating us. Most important, it is not about a trivial point. The thumb rule in English tense is valid only by hiding away the unflavored evidence. Now according to their grammars, we have to cheat our students in return, and some of us don't even know it. Woe comes to those teachers who know this concealment silently.

Our jobs as English teachers are now at risk. What if our schools find out that we don't even know the basic part of English -- tenses? We suggest you post your answer to the following free forum:

http://fine.serveftp.org/forum

***