16.2551, Review: Textbooks/English Lang: Huddleston&Pullum (2005)

[LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-16-2551. Sun Sep 04 2005. ISSN: 1068 - 4875.

Subject: 16.2551, Review: Textbooks/English Lang: Huddleston&Pullum (2005)

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1)
Date: 01-Sep-2005
From: Ingrid Mosquera Gende < ingrid at udc.es >
Subject: A Student's Introduction to English Grammar 

	
-------------------------Message 1 ---------------------------------- 
Date: Sun, 04 Sep 2005 00:28:46
From: Ingrid Mosquera Gende < ingrid at udc.es >
Subject: A Student's Introduction to English Grammar 
 

AUTHORS: Huddleston, Rodney; Pullum, Geoffrey K.
TITLE: A Student's Introduction to English Grammar
PUBLISHER: Cambridge University Press
YEAR: 2005
Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/16/16-630.html 

Dr. Ingrid Mosquera Gende, Department of English Philology, University of 
A Coruña, Spain

INTRODUCTION

The authors of this book are both distinguished linguists. Huddleston is 
well known for his numerous publications in the fields of English grammar 
and linguistics, as well as for many distinctions; Pullum is Professor of 
Linguistics and Distinguished Professor of Humanities at the University of 
California, Santa Cruz; his publications cover many different areas of 
linguistics.

This book is aimed at undergraduate students with little or no background 
in English grammar. It could be very useful for a first year student at the
university level, as a first introduction to English grammar. Moreover, it also 
could be very useful for a general audience who will find answers to many 
questions related to grammar, since it does not require previous knowledge 
of linguistics. Apart from that, professionals can get excellent support 
for their classes including explanations. 

SYNOPSIS

The book begins with a due section devoted to the enumeration of Contents: 
Notational conventions; Preface; 1. Introduction 2. A rapid overview 3. 
Verbs, tense, aspect, and mood 4. Clause structure, complements, and 
adjuncts 5. Nouns and noun phrases 6. Adjectives and adverbs 7. 
Prepositions and preposition phrases 8. Negation and related phenomena 9. 
Clause type: asking, exclaiming, and directing 10. Subordination and 
content clauses 11. Relative clauses 12. Grade and comparison 13. Non-
finite clauses and clauses without verbs 14. Coordination and more 15. 
Information packaging in the clause 16. Morphology: lexemes and their 
inflectional forms; Further reading; Glossary; Index. After this, there is 
a page devoted to 'Notational conventions', in which the authors present 
the abbreviations they use, as well as other main features used in the 
text. 

In the Preface, the authors explain the aims of the book. Firstly they 
indicate the potential audience of the book. Secondly, they enumerate 
several reasons why an "educated person ... should know something" (vii) 
about English grammar. Thirdly, they also explain the foundations of the 
book, which is the much larger volume, The Cambridge Grammar of the 
English Language. [Reviewed in http://linguistlist.org/issues/13/13-1853.html -
Eds.] Fourthly, they examine the process of writing itself. 

The body of the volume comprises sixteen chapters that have already been 
mentioned. Each of these chapters is divided into subsections whose titles 
are very explicit in content and ideas, so that with just one quick look 
it is possible to get an idea of the themes dealt within each of them, 
which makes it easy to read and follow the text. At the end of every 
chapter there is a selection of exercises, both related to the text itself 
and to its content, therefore making the reader reread what he/she has 
just had a look at. In some of the chapters, we can also find some charts 
in blue, devoted to different grammar notes, in order to underline their 
importance. Apart from this, the book is full of examples, diagrams and 
charts that together with the numerous exercises provide a rapid way of 
understanding the text. At the same time the chapters include footnotes 
when necessary instead of notes at the end of the book, a correct 
arrangement since the potential audience of the book is mainly young 
people who, unfortunately, would not bother reading notes at the end of 
the book. Also these footnotes, of which there are not too many, do not 
discuss fundamental content, but simply provide exemplifications of some 
of the points treated, or deeper explanations.

The relatively extensive 'Further Reading' section is divided into books 
for the general reader and bibliography for linguistic students, including 
many titles recently published. It is not a mere enumeration of titles; 
the readings are thoroughly described in order to show their content and 
relevance.

The seven page Glossary defines technical linguistic and grammatical 
terms, and the Index can be used to easily find references to relevant 
themes and concepts dealt with in the book.

EVALUATION

On the whole, the book is a quite original and novel approach to English 
grammar studies.  The informal style of the book will appeal to its main 
intended audience, making the density of the content easier for potential 
students.  The deeply entrenched tradition of English grammar is revised 
and corrected in many of its points, highlighting new linguistic 
approaches to grammar.

One possible drawback could be the structure of the book, because it 
differs from other grammar manuals. However, this is only a first 
impression, since the book's organization makes sense as a whole. Another 
possible complication is the density of some explanations and terms but, 
since these are very well introduced, explained and widely repeated, with 
the help of very good and easy-to-follow charts and diagrams, at the end 
one has accumulated a large amount of specific new vocabulary. Chapters 1 
and 2 provide a very good introduction to the book, which points out that 
much of the apparent complexity of the material derives from the fact that 
a new linguistic approach to English grammar, distinct from the manuals to 
which students are used to, is being taken. From my point of view, far 
from being a drawback, this is one of the most important achievements of 
the authors, because it forces students to open their minds and to 
understand English grammar from a fresh perspective.

>From the titles and section headings of the chapters, one can see how 
syntactic features are mixed with word types throughout, with morphology 
entering at the end, reversing the order in which these matters are 
typically discussed.  Overall, this book is a very well structured manual 
on English grammar.

Rodney Huddleston and Geoffrey K. Pullum effectively describe English 
grammar using a linguistic approach, with the exact degree of complication 
needed for the potential audience of undergraduate students: not too much 
as to make them give up, but also not too little as to get bored or as to 
not learn anything new. 

ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Ingrid Mosquera Gende teaches at the University of A Coruña, Spain. Her 
Ph.D. is in English Philology; her Doctoral Thesis is about Edwin 
Muir: "Early Poetry of a Late Poet: Analysis of First Poems". She has had 
several research stays in Canada, Germany and Scotland, among others, 
supervised by specialists such as Professor Cairns Craig and Robert 
Crawford. She is a researcher of projects related to Translation Studies, 
Literature and Education. She has many publications and contributions 
about Translation, Scottish Literature, as well as other fields of study, 
including Education, Irish Literature, and Spanish Literature. She also 
teaches courses via the internet in collaboration with The University of 
Islas Baleares, Spain, and is a reviewer and translator for various 
universities.





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