I’ve just posted a lesson plan on teflclips called Can you say that grammatically?. The aim of the activity is to introduce students to variation in English.

Part of the activity involves getting students to identify the non-standard grammar in a series of sentences such as:

1. I’ll give it you tomorrow
2. What would you do if it would happen to you?
3. It don’t sound right

This last example is discussed in Larry Trask’s book Language, The Basics. In chapter 9 (Attitudes to language), Larry wrote:

In the region of western New York State in which I was brought up, as indeed in a huge part of the English-speaking regions of the world, the form doesn’t scarcely exists in vernacular speech. Where I come from, almost everyone says It don’t matter and He don’t need that - and these forms are surely very familiar to you as well, no matter where you come from.

Naturally, my high school English teacher, Mrs Breck, took strong exception to this usage, and she relentlessly waged her own little war upon it. I well remember sitting in class one day when her campaign was in full swing. Having heard my classmate Norman say, for the seven hundredth time that day, something like ‘He don’t know that’, she decided to strike: ‘He doesn’t know that, Norman’. ‘Yeah, that’s right,’ replied Norman, ‘he don’t.’ ‘Not don’t, Norman’, reiterated Mrs Breck, her face turning an interesting colour, ’say “he DOESN’T know that”. ‘But … but …’ A look of perplexity suffused Norman’s face. ‘But it don’t sound right!’