Foundations Newsletter

One way or another, grammar seems to be a part of each and every lesson we teach. Some of us are ‘prescriptivist’ an d commit ourselves to loyally following the rules. Others are ‘descriptivist’, and believe that grammar rules are whatever common usage shows them to be.

And sometimes, prescriptivists are stanning for rules that aren’t even rules! For example: ‘Never start a sentence with and or but’, or ‘Never leave a preposition hanging’. But as Alexander Pope said, ‘a little learning can be a dangerous thing’! In this article, I’m going to  brazenly stir up some trouble, and discuss whether or not it’s OK to split infinitives.

Blame the Victorians

Until the Victorian era, this ‘rule’ didn’t even exist.  Shakespeare split ‘em (‘that pity may deserve to pitied be’), Burns split ‘em (‘who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride’), Byron split ‘em (‘though it be my lot to strongly, wrongly, vainly love thee still’) and even Dr Johnson split ‘em (‘Milton was too busy to much miss his wife’). In fact, it’s a really long list!

Where are we now?

According to Merriam-Webster, the objection to the split infinitive has never had a rational basis. Some suggest that it was wrongly transferred over from Latin or even German, but it is increasingly difficult to find any authority willing to support it nowadays. Fowler describes the ‘rule’ as ‘a curious superstition’, and Collins’ Grammar and Punctuation suggests that it is ‘a matter of personal preference’, and that ‘there is no good reason to regard the split infinitive as a error’. Corpus studies indicate that people everywhere are splitting their infinitives, although this does occur less  frequently in more formal registers. These studies have also found that there are some infinitives that are routinely split. Consider the following: ‘The manager requires us all to really pull our weight’, ‘He is expected to completely and utterly fail’, ‘to better understand’, ‘the airforce is planning to secretly test …’, or even ‘writers should learn to not split infinitives’.

What to do?

The Economist Style Guide does not recognise the split infinitive rule, but suggests that it may be better to avoid its use in formal registers, just in case someone is offended. Personally, I find that a bit weird because it seems like pandering. But on reflection, I  would suggest the following: If we are writing from a position of strength, then we should split our infinitives as we see fit. We should be guided by style and clarity. However, if we are writing for submission to others (a thesis, for example) then it may be better to cautiously avoid censure (or low marks!) by keeping those infinitives unsplit.  As a teacher, I would never teach this false rule, or correct it in a student’s writing. Perhaps it’s better to calmly turn a blind eye than to awkwardly stir up trouble?

Stay tuned …

So, you better watch out “will and going to’ future.  Next time, I plan to boldy come for you …