Question:
I am an ESL educator working in an EFL environment and my fellow
non-native staff almost daily ask me very detailed questions about
English grammar, often from university entrance exam or english
proficiency tests. I don't subscribe to such a "prescriptive" view of
grammar myself, but when faced with these questions, my colleagues
expect answers that they can explain in their L1 usually, to the
students.
That being said, I humbly request any people with suggestions in the internet to post a message to the board with advice on how to explain
the following sentences to my colleague.
1"I have never known such a wonderful teacher such as Mr./Ms.Smith."
2"I have never known a wonderful teacher such like Mr. Ms. Smith."
3"I have never known such a wonderful person as her/him."
4"I have never known such a wonderful person like her/him."
5"I have never met a person like her/him."
6"I have never met a person as her/him."
I have looked up collocations and came up with "such as" and "such
a....as".
There is a debate in the grammar world about the substitution of such
and like....
Any help on why the above statements are correct or incorrect or the
difference in nuance of them would be really appreciated. Currently,
I am questioning my own English ability after living in a non-English
speaking country for a few years....
And if you have any personal favourtie grammar reference books, whose
glossaries are particularly good at looking up vague references such
as this one, please pass them my way!
Answer:
Reading between the lines, I think you fail to
grasp an important nuance.
1. Victorian and later books (up to the period
of Fowler and Gowers) do indeed offer prescriptive
rules that would probably cover the cases you cit.
2. Modern scholarship agrees that, chronologically,
standard practice emerged (i.e. one particular usage
predominated and edged out other usages) before
anyone proposed grammatical rules for the English
language. So modern scholarship now disavows
rules.
3. This does not prevent your nowadays telling
your students and colleagues there are standard
or preferred usages for cases like those you cite.
But no rules can (nowadays) be cited that
justify such usages, so far as modern grammarians
have abandoned the concept of rules.
4. But demand and supply is as legitimate in
language as predominant usage (cf. #2 above.) So you
are free to respond to your colleagues by inventing rules
that satisfy them (or by citing Fowler or other
premodern scholars.)
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