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Descriptive linguistics, how stuff is actually used, is a lot more useful in practical real-life communication vs prescriptive. Da Vinci is a shorthand that ev
by cma 1y ago
Descriptive linguistics, how stuff is actually used, is a lot more useful in practical real-life communication vs prescriptive.
Da Vinci is a shorthand that everyone will understand vs just calling him Leonardo. Writing Leonardo da Vinci will be more explicit but will come off much more formal and stilted.
- kragen 1y agoNobody who knew Leonardo called him "da Vinci", any more than you would call Jessica "from church" ("Hey, is From Church coming over tonight?") or Venezuelans would call Hugo Chávez Frias "Mr. Frias". "Descriptive linguistics" is not a magic trump password that makes all erroneous utterances correct. If you haven't studied 16th-century Italian, you're going to make errors when you name 16th-century Italians.
- cma 1y ago> any more than you would call Jessica "from church" ("Hey, is From Church coming over tonight?") That's not in common use, so wouldn't fall under descriptive linguistics. No English speaker was puzzled at whether Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code was about someone else from Vinci's code. It's an established convention at this point.
- kragen 1y agoThe established convention is to use the given name "Leonardo", just as with Raphael, Michelangelo, and little Donato ("Donatello"). Dan Brown is also not an authority on the descriptive linguistics of 16th-century Italian.
- cma 1y agoThe Dan Brown mention was about descriptive, showing it's popularly understood using a popular book, not prescriptive.