Caribbean Examination Council, regional ministries of education, and the ‘that-which’ rule

This will be an exercise in the usefulness of the internet.

I am curious about the position of regional ministries of education, as (presumably) expressed in the Caribbean Examinations Council syllabi, on the ‘which-that’ rule.

A few more folks now visit this site than did before (thanks, bredren and sistren, guys and dolls) but I am also shouting out those whose sites carry a lot more traffic with the request that they circulate our dilemma because it is an important question and one for which we need an urgent answer. I’ll say why in a minute, but first a little story.

Not long ago, I had a phone call from an academic from the region, distressed because the American publisher to whom this person had submitted a MS was insisting that a host of ‘which’s’ in the MS be converted to ‘that’s’. Of course I had, sadly, to say the publisher was right, and to invoke the ‘which that rule’.

Consider!

You are working in MSWord, grammar function on. You type this sentence. The pot which had a hole in the bottom had to be thrown out… Behold! The wriggly green line appears under “pot which had a hole in the bottom” and you are advised that this is in need of correction, and you are told what your options are: insert comma after ‘pot’ so clause becomes a descriptive clause, or use ‘that’. This will always happen with sentences in which the word ‘which’ introduces a definitive clause.

If you check the style books, or the newspaper guides, they will say either that the word ‘that’ must introduce such a clause, or, more gently, as does the London Times style guide below, that ‘that’ is usually better that ‘which’ for introducing definitive clauses. (A definitive clause says what the thing being identified is. A descriptive clause merely ascribes a characteristic to it.)

According to the Times, then:

that ... That is almost always better than which in a defining clause, eg, “the train that I take stops at Slough”. As a general rule, use which for descriptive clauses and place it between commas, eg, “the night train, which used to carry newspapers, stops at Crewe”.

And indeed, if you say the sentence, it will indeed roll more pleasingly off the tongue, be more sensible-sounding with ‘that’.

But, by sweet serendipity, this is not the way we learned it in the Caribbean as children. And old habits die hard, especially if you are not in the daily grip (came out as ‘drip’ – Kamau would like that!) of authoritarian software – hence the dilemma of my academic friend.

I’m assessing a book which… oops, no, a book that has been in use in the region and that is replete with infractions of this rule. So I need to know, and would be glad of any help in discovering what the judgment of regional expertise in this matter is.

Thank you, then, on behalf of children and new learners of English in the Caribbean!

On the matter of the Wikileaks, and further to yesterday’s post: Here’s Haroon Siddiqui in today’s Toronto Star on the Wikileaks. His position is not unlike that of the Canadian ex-diplomat whom I quoted yesterday (well, he’s a Canadian, but not a Canadian ex-diplomat)…

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/article/900100--siddiqui-what-the-wikileaks-documents-fail-to-tell

Till soon.

Bon chance, President Obama! Here's hoping!

But you see my dying trial! In an age of three card sharkism, celluloid, animation, videotape, holograms, all kinds of Anansi webs and nets, smoke and mirrors, in other words lie and 'tory raised to de infinite power, the man wants transparency! Barack, dost though know where thou sittest down to sup? Hast thou thy long spoon?

I can’t hold a watching brief where the 44th president is concerned. I have to believe that the fact that 50 million people voted for this man means that a creature, Decent America, evolving by some unearthly grace, has stirred and is struggling to its feet. I must trust that it will get up, must will it up, and even if it’s wobbly at first, hope that it will find firm feet, then walk, and perhaps even in due course, trot along. I’m refusing to be detached, distant, world weary. It's not my style, and it's such a tired pose.

What Americans do, how they and their government behave, materially affects us all. This Earth, which North Americans (Canadians especially) pollute with their abuse of energy resources, is my planet, our planet. This World, which Americans have felt is theirs to mess with as they wish, is my world, our world. And Jah (who has a sense of humour, BTW — how else to explain a man named Hussein being president of the USA at this hour?) occasionally puts his foot down. S/he has just done exactly that.

If you mess where you please, when you want, because you feel like it, eventually you will foul your own backyard. If you are greedy and nyam up everything in sight, then your bowels will be full, and the excrement you deposit will be (1) trillions of mounds high, (2) stink to heaven and (3) require a large number of backs and buckets to move it. I will resist obvious remarks about who have been history’s hewers of wood, drawers of water and movers of night soil. What's the point at this point? As Obama says, Americans had all better “pick themselves up, dust themselves off, and start remaking America”. Much the same applies to the rest of the world!

The Toronto Star published a feature http://www.thestar.com/news/uselection/article/572960 about Barack Obama when he was elected the first black president of the Harvard Law Review in 1990. Read it and you’ll see that he isn’t a product of the last three years, a media artifact, a 'spun' fiction. Who he is now is pretty much who he was then. I find that encouraging. Cool is not something he learned last year. Nor is entertaining other people's opinions, especially those that diverge from his. There is, after all, very little point in ideology that works our undoing. We don't need the help of ideology – we're managing our undoing quite well otherwise!

I cannot think what madness has possessed this man to want to do this thing, for the job of President of the USA is not one anybody in their right mind should want at this moment. Let it be said, though, that God is good, and makes provision. History, blood, sunsum, intellect, temperament and character (for they are different) and broughtupcy have uniquely equipped Obama. He says ‘Thank you’ constantly; he and Michelle applaud other people all the time.

And he uses "we" a lot, so when he says "I," you listen up.

So here's to all of us. Here’s to good will. Here’s hoping! Perhaps we should all pause at midday, or midnight, or just every now and then, and wish Barack Obama and his administration well, wish one another well, wish all earthlings well, and bless the planet itself. It wouldn’t hurt and it might just make a difference. Selah!