PROPORTION
In language-study as in any other branch of activity we must observe a
sense of proportion; we must pay due attention to the various aspects
of the question in order to ensure a harmonious whole. It is possible
to devote too much time and effort to a given aspect or branch; this
is the case when such time and effort are spent at the expense of an
aspect or branch of equal or of greater importance. It is necessary,
for instance, to give much attention to the understanding of the
language as spoken rapidly and idiomatically by natives; but if this
occupies the whole of our time we shall be able to do nothing else, and
shall neither learn to speak, nor to read, nor to write. This would be
an obvious violation of the principle of proportion. It is necessary to
know something of the grammar of the language, but if we devote every
lesson of a three years’ course to the study of grammar we shall again
be offending against this principle.
We tend to give too much attention to things which interest us, and too
little to those things in which we are not particularly interested.
Such inequality of treatment is more particularly apt to occur in these
days of specialization; the intonation specialist thinks of little but
intonation, and tends to think that everything else is of secondary
importance; the phonetician is so keenly alive to the immense
importance of ear-training and of correct articulation that he may tend
to dismiss all other things as trivialities; the grammarian grinds away
at declensions and conjugations regardless of the existence of such
things as sounds and tones; the semantician is so intent on meanings
that all has to be sacrificed to his special branch.
The most typical example of disproportionate treatment is, of course,
that afforded by the orthographist of the old school; for him language
is nothing but a set of spelling rules; pronunciation for him is the
interpretation of spellings; grammar is a branch of orthography,
and meanings themselves are largely dependent on the way a word is
spelt. In the present-day reaction against the orthographist we may
expect a swing to the other extreme, and we may find schoolmasters
welcoming spelling mistakes as the signs of a healthy tendency towards
phoneticism.
Already the reaction against the over-use and abuse of translation
exercises has resulted in an almost equally grave over-use and abuse of
the ‘direct’ method.
There are, however, times when a seemingly undue proportion of
attention should be directed to certain things, notably when we have
to react against a vicious tendency. If our student is too keenly
interested in orthography and oblivious to the importance of phonetics,
we may be justified in excluding orthography from his programme.
If he is morbidly interested in grammar and analysis, we may find
it necessary to give him overdoses of semantics and unconscious
assimilation in order to re-establish some sort of equilibrium. With
the student who refuses to learn a word until he sees it written we
must for some time make an exclusive and seemingly disproportionate use
of oral work and phonetic writing.
The principle of proportion, then, does not necessarily imply
_equality_ of treatment nor even a fixed standard of ratios; it simply
means that all the items in the whole range of subjects and aspects
must receive an appropriate degree of attention, so that the student’s
knowledge of them may ultimately form a harmonious whole.
It is impossible to observe the principle of proportion without having
in view the ultimate aim of the student. If his sole object is to
become a master of colloquial expression, our sense of proportion
will tell us to exclude in a very large measure the study of the
conventional orthography.
The ultimate aim of most students is fourfold:
(_a_) To understand the language when spoken rapidly by natives.
(_b_) To speak the language in the manner of natives.
(_c_) To understand the language as written by natives (_i.e._ to
_read_ the language).
(_d_) To write the language in the manner of natives.
Each of these four aspects requires special methods of teaching. A
method or device which will rapidly enable the student to understand
the language when spoken will be inefficacious as a method for teaching
him to produce a written composition. No amount of composition work,
on the other hand, will teach him how to understand what is rapidly
uttered by natives. If (as is freely admitted) a command of the spoken
language is a great help towards acquiring command of the written, the
converse is not the case; proficiency in written work does not imply
progress in oral work. To pay too much or too little attention to any
of these four aspects is a violation of the principle of proportion.
The principle may also be violated by paying too much or too little
attention to any of the five chief branches of practical linguistics:
phonetics, orthography, word-building, sentence-building, and
semantics. Let us pass them in review in order to make quite sure that
we understand the scope of each and have properly discriminated between
them.
_Phonetics_ teaches us how to recognize and how to make the sounds of
which the language is composed; it teaches us the difference between
two or more sounds which resemble each other, and between a given
foreign sound and its nearest native equivalent.
_Orthography_ (with which we may associate orthoepy) teaches us how to
spell what we have already learnt by ear; it also teaches us how to
pronounce what we have learnt by eye from an ordinary orthographic text.
_Word-building_ (accidence and etymology) teaches us inflexions,
prefixes, and suffixes, and how to use them, how to form plurals
from singulars, accusatives from nominatives, finite tenses from
infinitives; most of the mysteries of declension and conjugation are
included under this heading; the collecting of word-families pertains
to this branch.
_Sentence-building_ (syntax and analysis) teaches us how to combine
words into sentences, how to form compound tenses, phrases, and
clauses; it teaches us the places of the various sentence-components,
the nature and use of concord or agreement; it shows us the differences
between regular and irregular sentences. When properly systematized
(according to a special science to which the name of ‘ergonics’ has
been given) this particular branch of linguistics shows us how to form
the largest possible number of sentences with the fewest words.
_Semantics_ teaches us the meaning of words, of inflexions, and of
compounds; it shows us how to transform our thoughts into language, to
select the most appropriate word or form, and to interpret correctly
what we hear and read. It is more especially this branch which teaches
us the differences in style and dialect, and enables us to distinguish
the colloquial from the classical and to keep either from contaminating
the other.
If we are to judge by the average teacher and the average
language-course, the principle of proportion is usually violated by
teaching:
(_a_) No phonetics at all.
(_b_) Too much orthography or orthoepy.
(_c_) Too much word-building.
(_d_) Too little sentence-building.
(_e_) Practically no semantics.
The principle of proportion may also be observed or violated in the
selection of vocabularies and of grammatical material. To include in
early lessons words or forms which are comparatively rare, archaic, and
useless, while excluding some of the commonest and most useful items
of language-material, is an offence not only against the principle
of gradation but also against the principle of proportion. Too
little attention also is usually paid to ensuring a just proportion
between the various parts of speech. There is a fairly well defined
series of laws which determine the relative number of nouns, verbs,
and adjectives occurring in a given vocabulary radius, and with the
growing attention which is being given to this sort of statistical
work these laws are standing out more clearly and are coming to be
better understood. We have also to note a regrettable tendency to
give preference in vocabularies to words of special utility (such as
names of plants, animals, parts of the body, tools, implements, and
such-like semi-technical words) and to neglect unduly words of general
utility, words which may occur in any context and which are common to
any subject. This is a particularly grave case of disproportion when we
consider that the bulk of any given text (probably from 80 per cent. to
90 per cent. of it) is made up of these general words.
Proportion must be observed in determining the respective quantities
of drill-work and free work, of translation-work and ‘direct work,’ of
intensive reading and extensive reading, of chorus-work and individual
work needed; throughout the whole range of the subject there are
possibilities of good or of bad proportion. It is for the teacher or
for the designer of language-courses to see that the principle is
reasonably well observed.