The reason for some proper English grammar rules

[khusnick]

I learned something new in an English traditional grammar course that I felt like sharing with everyone.

A lot of our proper grammar rules, such as not ending a sentence with a preposition, have no real reasons aside from a scholar in the 1600's deciding that English should be more like Latin. So even though we have the ability to do things like splitting infinitives, it became a rule that we shouldn't do that because infinitives are one word in Latin and cannot be split.

Some of the rules sound really weird because with the way English is naturally structured, the rules don't make much sense. They started because someone wrote a book to make English grammar more like Latin's grammar, and we have been following some of these rules against our natural language instincts essentially just because of that.

All information on this came from my professor who has a PhD in linguistics, but if you know more about this or have information that disagrees, please feel to add!

[clairedonne]

I tried Grammarly on my computer to see what my english was like and it told me I couldnt end sentences with "to". Is that what you mean by preposition? sorry, dont know the term.

[khusnick]

Yes, that would be a preposition. Word such as to, about, in, and beneath are all prepositions. There are a lot of them.

[Cate winslet]

I leant that the is a big problem on where to place a comma and a full stop. Also apostrophe.

[khusnick]

I'm not sure I understand what you mean.

[Penchick007]

Thank you for this information. Within my various English classes, this particular subject was never addressed. Now I'm curious to see if these archaic rules will be broken, and we can apply what was once a 'no-no, to be acceptable grammar. Will be watching for trends as new best sellers come off the press.

[khusnick]

Interestingly enough, the change of those rules have actually been something I've had the opportunity to discuss in that class. My professor says those rules are often broken in our speech because they are not natural to our language, and in often cases, you will see the most awkward rules broken in books.

Take the example of not ending a sentence with a preposition. We do that all the time. No one is going to write "About what are you talking?" nowadays. For any native English speaker, it will be "What are you talking about?"

She mentioned the use of "whom" is another grammar rule that is on its way out, at least to the full extent it is supposed to be used. If I hear of any other examples, I can share in the future as well.

[Nicola Bigwood]

I leant that the is a big problem on where to place a comma and a full stop. Also apostrophe.

There are differences between British and American usage, which can cause confusion, but otherwise it should be fairly straight forward! There's a lot of info on correct punctuation on "http://en.oxforddictionaries. com/grammar/punctuation" (I can't post the URL - remove the space before .com and it should work )

Hope that helps!