More than a century ago, Henry Sweet wrote The Practical Study of Languages and through it, criticized the existing methods of the day, much as we still do now. The book's myth-busting objectives reviews phonetics, alphabets and pronunciation issues before diving into methods, grammar, vocabulary and texts.
In fact, while scanning through the text, I honestly couldn't help but think I bet he'd have been a blogger if he were around today. His prose is tight, easy to read and the language direct.
His obvious annoyance at the 'insufficient knowledge of the science of language' (1899:3) like my own, literally jumps off the page. Given that this post is part 2 of No Evidence for a Fixed Aquisition Order, I'll hone in on this one quote which I wanted to share with you, for reflection, as it neatly wraps up the debate on authenticity vs manufactured texts:
...the dilemma is that if we try to make our texts embody certain definite grammatical categories, the texts cease to be natural: they become either trivial, tedious and long-winded, or else they become more or less monstrosities' (1899:192).
Really sounds like he was describing Headway long before it ever arrived to influence all the other copy-cat productions from then on and into today. The question is though, will it influence tomorrow's or can we teachers at least try to stop it before it does?
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