"Monitor size matters, Quigley. This way I don't have to see YOU."
While the American media has been busy excoriating Sarah Palin for her gaffes in grammer, her sentence constructions have vindicated those of us who cannot claim English as our first language or mother tongue. Palin has freed us from some of those ghastly regimens of "proper" English and overthrown the shackles of colonial, linguistic hegemony. First it was the gansta rappers who freed us from the taboo of dangling prepositions with their diction. Now, Palin comes in with an unbridled, dumb-as-you-wanna-be version of the language that had been regimented to exclusivity by linguists and grammar-nazi's in the same manner that the Catholic priests guard the rights to holy communion.
Conjunction, hell...what's your function? Why can't the Verb agree to disagree with the Subject? What's the tension between the past, the present, and present perfect? Why can't we just speak Palinese...Apparently, 26 per cent of the Republican conservative base had no trouble understanding her. Imagine that -- a base of supporters who believe that we should return to the sanctity of a 2000-year-old book to live our daily lives and yet they rejected the rigid syntax of a 1000-year-old language, English, by accepting Palinese. We're on to something -- a new language, a new vernacular, a new way, a new day. Viva Palinese!
Case in point...start your day with this:
Two gems of Palinese from Sarah Palin in an interview with Katie Couric, CBS News, Oct. 1, 2008. Notice that you get the gist of it without wallowing in the messy details...It's the gestalt, baby!
"As Putin rears his head and comes into the air space of the United States of America, where– where do they go? It's Alaska. It's just right over the border." --Sarah Palin, explaining why Alaska's proximity to Russia gives her foreign policy experience, interview with CBS's Katie Couric, Sept. 24, 2008
"Well, let's see. There's ― of course in the great history of America there have been rulings that there's never going to be absolute consensus by every American, and there are those issues, again, like Roe v. Wade, where I believe are best held on a state level and addressed there. So, you know, going through the history of America, there would be others but ―" --Sarah Palin, asked by Katie Couric to name a Supreme Court decision she disagreed with other than Roe vs. Wade.
Coming Soon to Amazon:
"Better Grammar? You betcha!" by Sarah Palin
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