A tragically misguided ideal from 1974.
Linguistic forms, it is said, are not God-given; they are the conventional products of social/cultural habit and therefore none of them is naturally superior or uniquely “correct.” It follows (according to this argument) that any claim of correctness is political, a matter of power not of right. “If we teach standardized, handbook grammar as if it is the only ‘correct’ form of grammar, we are teaching in cooperation with a discriminatory power system” (Patricia A. Dunn and Kenneth Lindblom, English Journal, January, 2003).That's so appallingly well-meaning of them.
