When we learn about grammar or linguistic science, we will also learn about the prescriptive and descriptive linguistics. So, we will talk about it more in this article. Let’s find out what are their differences and their examples.
What is Prescriptive linguistics?
The definition of prescriptive linguistics is about how a language should or should not be used instead of how showing how a language is actually used. Prescriptive linguistics also talks about the prescriptive for the ‘correct’ phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics.
With that being said, we know that prescriptive linguistics is regarded to what the linguists think to be correct or not, right or wrong, that can be determined from the difference between good and bad language users.
- Characteristics
- The prescriptive linguistics is taught in school
- Is considered by language academies
- need more effort to understand about, in order to apply and remember
- Examples
- I am not leaving
He is not at the store today
They are not playing soccer
The word in bold sometimes is replaced by ‘ain’t’ in informal term, but that is considered as the incorrect or bad English. So, the
- The kid whom I just met looked very happy
The word in bold sometimes is replaced by ‘who’ which considered wrong because in prescriptive linguistic, who is used as an object, instead we should use whom for a subject.
What is Descriptive linguistics?
Descriptive linguistic learns about how a language is actually used, based on our daily informal conversation instead of how the correct way of a language should be used.
Nowadays, descriptive linguistics is being examined by linguists to get find out about what actually means by the language in our communication using the language on daily basis. The purpose is not to differentiate the good or bad language user, but to understand the exact meaning of the communication although it doesn’t fulfill the prescriptive qualification.
- Characteristics
The main purpose is to model mental game.
- Examples
- Jessice don’t want an ice cream.
- Brandon is older than he.
We can conclude that those sentences are grammatically wrong. But in descriptive linguistics, that’s just okay.