Poison sniffers

Christopher Johnson says “prescriptivists” or “Cute Curmudgeons” — people who are interested in only policing usage and grammar rules — are “linguistic poison sniffers.” They turn language into “a source of potential embarrassment rather than pleasure.”

Johnson sees his job as getting people to love and appreciate language by being curious about and paying attention to “what makes language delicious.”

This reminded of Olivia Laing’s distinction between identifying poison and finding nourishment.

Everywhere you look these days, there are lots of poison sniffers, but very few cooking a delicious meal…

  1. ​Finding nourishment vs. identifying poison​