H. L. Mencken

Name: The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition
Author: H. L. Mencken

The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

Summary

“The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition”, published in 1919, is a work by H. L. Mencken. It explores elements such as American, localism and dialect.

Quotes from The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (H. L. Mencken)

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ Worse, they must deal with phrases that no two individuals utter precisely alike. Thus grammar begins to ground itself on phonology, as it once grounded itself upon etymology, and the grammarian can no longer lock himself in his study with his books, but must go among men and women and listen attentively to what they say. The old-fashioned science of grammar was almost helpless in dealing with such a thing as the American vulgate; the new science, as I say, demands a wide and accurate knowledge in fields wherein my own knowledge is sadly imperfect. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ A great many persons, I find, are strangely deaf to the dialect that they hear every day from humble lips. When their attention is called to a peculiar word or grammatical form they are first disposed to deny that it is used, and then to argue that it is a localism. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ At home the National Council of Teachers of English has begun to make propaganda for better instruction in the mother-tongue---though often without due discrimination, I fear, between what is in the books and what people actually speak---and a great many discussions of living philological questions, sometimes very penetrating, have appeared in the magazines and newspapers, and even in some of the more daring philological journals. The American Dialect Society continues its work, and still looks forward to the publication of its dictionary. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ In the face of such earnest assaults it becomes difficult to hold to the thesis that there is any American dialect at all, but nevertheless I have managed to do so. Here, fortunately, exact evidence is often procurable, for the locutions in question enter into the written speech. Whenever I have found a contemporary English journal referring to a given form as an Americanism I have thought it quite safe to accept that view of it. True enough, almost every imaginable Americanism is heard now and then in England. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ I observe that Englishmen, when they settle in the United States, quickly lose their sense of difference between the two dialects, and are thereafter apt to argue that every American locution they encounter has been borrowed from England. Various correspondents, for example, have sought to convince me that such typical American verbs as to steam-roller (in the political sense) and to joy-ride are actually English. Others have maintained that various well-known American spellings, lately begun to be imitated in England, originated there. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ In many cases, after inquiry, I have felt it necessary to reject the suggestions of correspondents; in other cases observers of equal authority have revealed such a conflict of opinion that I have had perforce to fall back upon my own judgment. ”

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Source: Wikisource

H. L. Mencken, The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (1919)

“ They show that what are accepted as localisms in Vermont or Connecticut are often also localisms in Texas or Nebraska---in brief, that the common speech of the different parts of the country differs a good deal less than superficial observers usually believe. ”

H. L. Mencken

Summary

Quotes from The American Language — Preface to the Second Edition (H. L. Mencken)

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