Language descriptivist, checking in.

Interesting thoughts. Let me be clear by saying that I absolutely love grammar rules, spelling, and all that jazz, but I have to point out that the acid test of language should be pragmatic; did the message get across?

Other than what other, older people have written down and claimed was ‘standard’, there is no concrete reality behind what is ‘correct’ in terms of language and word usage. And once you accept that the ‘rules’ are ever-changing based on the general usage by the speakers, I think you get a picture of language that’s much more beautiful, alive, and interesting.

People probably wrote down ‘authoritative’ rules for grammar, spelling, etc. for English a couple hundred years ago. Why aren’t we using those rules for defining what’s ‘correct’? It’s much more interesting to talk about what language *is* than what it *should be*.