On Feb 24, 2004, at 11:51 PM, Ray Saintonge wrote:
Peter Jaros wrote:
Giving a recipe for a particular chocolate cake
would not serve to
describe chocolate cake. If one recipe was particularly famous,
however, it might merit its own section (or possibly article; I'd
like to try *that* cake) where the recipe *would* be descriptive.
It's a subtle distinction, but an important one. It comes through
to readers, if only in terms of a sense of the style.
That's very patronizing of you.
Sorry, I worded that poorly. What I meant that the distinction may
not jump out at casual readers, but it sounds better nonetheless. As
analogy, using the wrong word in a sentence and making the sentence
meaningless is obvious to even a casual reader, while using casual
language in a formal setting is often "felt" while not directly
noticed. It can take a bit of working with a sentence to figure out
what in it sounds too casual (or too formal, or awkward, etc.).
I do get a little hot over these deletion issues. :-)
The expression that I found most patronizing was "it might merit its
own section". I suspect that the subtleties between descriptive and
prescriptive or between imperatiuve and indicative might not be
meningful to the casual reader who wants to find out about a food and/or
how to make it. The technical detailsof chocolate cakes are not
inherently controversial. If different ways exist for making such a
cake, the results of which is better can be entirely subjective.
Using a wrong word that gives the sentence a different meaning, rather
than just making it meaningless can launch a discussion into a very
different direction. I confess to being quick to notice this kind of
thing as I did with the earlier part of your previous post.
"Proscriptive" and "prescriptive" have almost contradictory meanings,
but grammaticaly can fit equally well into the same context. I couldn't
pass up the opportunity.
Ec