Forget politics. Anyone who’s interested in clarity should study this post on Slate.com by author Kitty Burns Florey: “Diagramming Sarah: Can Palin’s sentences stand up to a grammarian?”
In her post, the novelist and copy editor says:
“There are plenty of people out there — not only English teachers but also amateur language buffs like me — who believe that diagramming a sentence provides insight into the mind of its perpetrator,”
OK, it’s political, since she’s taking on Sarah Palin’s tortured sentences from interviews blamed for a drop in her approval ratings. But a return to the lost grammar school torment of diagramming sentences — illustrated by sentence maps that look like an incomprehensible equation — is an enlightening journey.
