A Grammar for Reading and Writing

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How the Language Really Works:
The Fundamentals of Critical Reading and Effective Writing

Reading / Writing

Critical Reading

Inference

Choices

Ways to Read

Grammar

Speaking Constructions, Not Words

Reading and Writing Constructions, Not Words

Ambiguity

Structure and Meaning

Slots, Constructions, and Meaning

A Grammar for Reading and Writing

We do not read words, one by one. Meaning is contained not so much in individual words as in collections of words conveying broader or more specific ideas.

Readers thus make sense of a sentence by breaking it into meaningful chunks and examining their interrelationships. Skillful writers focus not so much on individual words, as on creating and rephrasing larger phrases and clauses.

The topics covered here describe the "meaningful chunks" of English sentence structure. In so doing they examine key grammatical principles underlying effective reading and writing.

Speaking Constructions, Not Words

When discussing speech, we say we know something when we can repeat it "word for word." Yet, when we speak, we do not really speak "one word at a time." We break the flow of words into chunks. And we do not do this randomly, simply to take a breath now and then. We insert pauses to break the flow into meaningful chunks. We do not say

I left my raincoat on the chair.

We say:

I left my raincoat on the chair.

When we break a sentence into portions, whether by pauses or intonation, we are actually doing grammatical analysis. We break the sentence into chunks to facilitate understanding.

Reading and Writing Constructions, Not Words

Words appear on a page one word after another. Yet readers do not read word by word, one word at a time. As with speech, we find meaning by grouping words into larger units.

You might think that you read the previous sentence word by word:

As with speech, we find meaning by grouping words into larger units.

Yet meaning becomes apparent only when you see the line somewhat as:

As with speech, we find meaning

by grouping words into larger units.

It makes little difference whether we call these units chunks or use more technical terminology (such as phrases and clauses , or the more general term constructions ), the point is the same: We read chunks, not individual words.

The observations above suggest a test: Listen to someone read a passage aloud. You can gauge their understanding by how easily they group words into meaningful chunks as they read.

Ambiguity

The mental process involved in finding meaning in a string of words is most apparent when various alternative readings make sense—that is, in situations that are ambiguous.

She did not marry him because she loved him.

Are they married? It depends on how you read the sentence:

She did not marry him because she loved him.

They are not married.

She did not marry him because she loved him.

She married him for other reasons.

We find meaning by deciding on a meaningful way to analyze the sentence. In so doing we often attempt to recreate the natural pauses and emphasis that might indicate structure were the words spoken.

Try another one.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday

Who was hit? How? Do we know the gender of the driver? Do we know the nature of the accident?

In an effort to make sense of the sentence, we analyze it various ways.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday

We find meaning by finding ways to break the sentence into meaningful chunks. In the first, the driver's own head is injured on a specific day. The driver is female.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday

In the second instance, the driver hit a female in a head on collision.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday

In the third, and more improbable, alternative a drunk driver somehow hit a female's head.

The drunk driver hit her head on Wednesday

Maybe she was leaning over into traffic! Should we come upon such a sentence within a text, we would look to the context to decide which reading is appropriate.

Structure and Meaning

Finally, consider the following three sentences:

1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.

2. The boy ate the apple in the summer.

3. The boy ate the apple in a hurry.

At first glance, the three sentences seem to have the same structure.

1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.

2. The boy ate the apple in the summer.

3. The boy ate the apple in a hurry.

As we try to find meaning in the sentences, however, we discover that their structure is different:

1. The boy ate the apple in the pie.

2. The boy ate the apple in the summer.

3. The boy ate the apple in a hurry.

how we break a sentence up.

Punctuation often helps in this effort, but punctuation marks only certain boundaries. There is the story of the English teacher who wrote the following words on the board and asked the students to punctuate the sentence:

Woman without her man is nothing.

Students came away with different meanings, depending on how they grouped the words. (Reach an understanding of the sentence yourself, then see the footnote for the results.) (1)

Slots, Constructions, and Meaning

Once we recognize that we actually read chunks, we might then ask:

· How do we recognize chunks? What do they look like?

And that leads to two other questions:

· Where in a sentence do these chunks normally fall, and

· What meaning can we attach to a particular chunks—that is, to a particular grammatical construction occurring in a particular position in a sentence?

Complete Reference: The Noun Phrase looks at the most common construction in English sentences. Other sections identify particular positions or slots within a sentence and the meaning attached to the various constructions appearing in those positions.

(1) Some read the words as:
Woman, without her man, is nothing.
Others read the same words as:
Woman! Without her, man is nothing.
We find, to a great extent, what we want to find!