This section deals with prescriptivism – the idea that some forms of language are “correct” and others are “wrong”. This view is propagated by people who feel that they have some kind of entitlement to prescribe how other people should speak and write – which is most often how they speak and write themselves. They feel – quite unjustifiably – that they have some kind of authority which enables them to instruct the rest of us that certain of the grammatical forms which are used by ordinary people in their everyday lives are “incorrect”.

Prescriptivism in English has usually been levelled at three different types of grammatical phenomenon. First, prescriptivists dislike nonstandard dialects: they believe that nonstandard grammatical forms like I done it are “wrong” even though they are used by a majority of English speakers around the world. Secondly, they object to normal Standard English forms which are at odds with the grammar of Latin, such as It's me and I've got a new car I'm very pleased with – prescriptivists think we should say It is I and I've got a new car with which I am very pleased. And, thirdly, they protest about new forms and usages: in the 1970s, prescriptivists railed against the new usage of hopefully as a sentence adverbial as in hopefully it won't rain today; now nearly everybody says this. Prescriptivism is based on a false premise, and it is a waste of time: it does not work, and all it succeeds in doing is making speakers and writers insecure and inarticulate.

Anyone wanting to read more about informed, rational and analytical arguments against prescriptivism might like to look at the Language Log, which comes out of the University of Pennsylvania http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/, and in particular at the category called “Prescriptivist Poppycock”.