Dawkins IWA

"Teaching Punctuation as a Rhetorical Tool" by John Dawkins

Pre-reading Exercise
     All my roommates said that they didn't think that grammar rules are "bendable," though they did admit that some rules are more important than others. I agree that it's easier to remember some rules and ignore the rest. One roommate is appalled that we instructors are not grading for grammar or punctuation because she does not know when else they are supposed to learn. But these kids are only 4 years younger than I am, and I had a ton of grammar lessons in K-12. I figure that they know the rules that matter so the rest is not as important. Then again, I haven't read any of their formal writing yet, so maybe I too will be appalled.

Summary
    In his text "Teaching Punctuation as a Rhetorical Tool," John Dawkins, while providing numerous examples from professional "good" writers, argues that punctuation can be a stylistic choice that writers employ for rhetorical purposes, either to clarify meaning or add emphasis. Dawkins designs a "Hierarchy of Functional Punctuation Marks" that he ultimately proposes instructors begin teaching students to help them with their writing. Students can choose to either raise or lower their sentences by selecting punctuation (zero, comma, colon, semicolon, or period) thus altering or revealing their intended "connection between words, phrases, or clauses" (152).

Synthesis
    Dawkins's article is similar to Bill Bryson's piece "Good English and Bad" because they both argue against traditional grammar rules. While Bryson addresses many grammar rules and other conventions about language, Dawkins focuses specifically on independent clauses. Dawkins argues that some writers choose grammatical choices (so-called "incorrect" usages) as a rhetorical device- for emphasis, clarity, etc. According to Dawkins, the rules for punctuation within sentences change depending on the intended rhetorical situation, which also recalls Margaret Kantz's discussion of how to identify the rhetorical situation and attend to it.

QD
1. Dawkins challenges the notion that handbook's have all the answers for how to properly write a sentence. He also challenges the notion that "good" writers follow punctuation rules by showing professional writers- writers who are considered very "good"- who ignore punctuation or specifically choose a punctuation tool in order to emphasize or change a sentence's meaning to fit his/her rhetorical goal.
5. I didn't know that you don't have to put a comma between two independent clauses when there is a coordinating conjunction already separating the clauses. I have always been taught that you always insert a comma between two independent clauses- but only if there is a coordinating conjunction; otherwise, it becomes the dreaded comma splice. For the longest time, I didn't actually know what a comma splice was, because the idea that I just mentioned had been so drilled into me, that I also used a comma to separate two independent clauses when there was an "and" "but" "so" between them. I think commas cause a lot of trouble, so it was nice to hear I could mess up and blame it on a stylistic choice. Although this seems more appropriate for creative writing than more academic writing.
6. Grammar like Bryson talks about in his article comes more naturally for me, so I do tend to fixate more on punctuation. Like I mentioned early, I still sometimes get tripped up on commas, especially in more complex sentences. Reading Dawkins has not really changed my thinking, though I did enjoy the piece. I think I write for a discourse community (Porter) that expects particular punctuation. I don't think they would care what rhetorical choices I was trying to make if it means I have a comma splice or no comma separating an independent clause from a dependent clause where there is a coordinator.

MM
I think it is very useful to see the examples of what Dawkins is speaking about. We need to see the examples so we can see how we would "properly" punctuate a sentence; then we can compare how it reads with another type of punctuation and see the differences in meaning. It is also helpful to see professional writers- writers who are considered excellent writers and masters of grammar- to play with sentences and grammar rules in this way. It directly subverts the notion of how "good" writers write. We can see that what makes a good writer is his/her ability to convey their intended meaning to an audience, not that they used proper grammar or punctuation.

Thoughts
   Like the Bryson article, I also enjoyed Dawkins's piece, though maybe to a lesser extent. While I think the examples are helpful, I also think my students might get tired of them, and it doesn't help that they probably won't be familiar with most of the author's Dawkins uses. I do like that Dawkins offers a new pedagogical method- the hierarchy- as a new way to teach students. I'm interested to hear their thoughts on raising and lowering and how well they think they'll be able to adopt a method like this for other genres besides creative writing.