The Phenomenology of Error

A few paragraphs into reading "The Phenomenology of Error", I could tell that it was a scholarly article and that it was meant for writing teachers. For me this reading selection was almost somewhat difficult for me to read and fully understand because of the way it was worded. At some point I found myself re-reading in many spots because after I would read a few paragraphs I would stop because I was not fully sure about what I had read because it almost was written too well for me to comprehend. Also it may just be me, but the selection sometimes seemed a little repetitive when he was trying to make his points.

I am not sure if this was his main point but he did state "The point is this: We can discuss error in two ways: we can discuss it at a level of conscoiusness that places that error at the very center of our consciousness. Or we can talk about how we experience (or not) what we popularly call errors of usage as they occur in the ordinary course of our reading a text". The way he worded this, in my opinion seems that he is saying that he can discuss where the origin of the error comes from, from our own knowledge and what we think is correct. Or he can discuss errors that occur in writing and why they are errors.

"The Phenomenology of Error" made me realize how common errors in writing are. He even makes it a point to show examples of grammarians making errors in their writings. It made me realize how easy it is to make errors while your writing, even when what your writing is on errors that other people make in their writing and how to correct them and then making the error a few sentences later. I think he shows these examples to show that even people who's job it is to check for errors and make corrections still miss some of them. There are so many rules for writing that it is hard for one person to remember all of them all the time, and that some errors sound gramatically correct or do not look wrong and these errors are just passed and not corrected.

I think that Williams locates the error in the reader and the writer but at the same time neither. The reader may be at fault because they might not be looking for specific errors while they are reading and therefore may miss some errors. Or the reader may just not know every single rule or be able to look for every kind of error that could be made while they are reading. The writer could also be at fault because when they are writing, they are writing their thoughts and even though something might be an error, it sounds correct.