Recent Questions - English Language & Usage Stack Exchange |
- What are some starting phrases to present the table, similar to "Table 1 shows that", "As we can see the result from Table 1"
- Google's and Facebook's Privacy or Google and Facebook's Privacy?
- How do American speakers use the present subjunctive in a less formal way on American-English?
- Use simple past or present?
- Use of 'Few and far between' [closed]
- (Proverbs 4 of the bible ) In poetry, what is the terminology for major/key stanzas that are sort of a basis for some of the subsequent stanzas? [closed]
- Does my Adjectle game make sense? [duplicate]
- Phrase expressing the notion that good luck often is no mere coincidence
- Is "I'm glad you were able to make it" often used sarcastically? Ambiguous? Help understanding something that happened to me
- Does ‘affinity’ have any connection with not being infinite? [closed]
- What pronoun to use for transgender people? [duplicate]
- Which word is suitable? " so is?", "it is?", "that is?", "this is? [migrated]
- "She" or "her" for describing a character's point of view [closed]
- Rustle up, cook up, google up—what’s up with phrasal verbs?
- What do you understand from this? Is this person a football player?
- Is there an idiom for "it was just an example"?
- Is it proper to use a period after an abbreviation within a sentence?
- What's the origin of the phrase "into the weeds"?
- What is the meaning of not in "as often as not" and "as likely as not"?
- "emmet-butt" - Westcountry dialect
- What is “Who are ya?” and whence it came?
- Collective nouns and subject-verb agreement: general rule or arbitrary, looking at 'police' specifically?
| Posted: 05 Feb 2022 12:16 PM PST I am writing a journal paper, and I have many tables of results to present. Currently, I am using those phrases to describe the result in the table. "Table 1 shows that xxxxxx" "As we can see the result from table 1, xxxxxx" "Table 1 indicates that xxxxxx" "As illustraded in Table 1, xxxxxx" What are some other phrases that could be used to start presenting results on the table. Thanks. |
| Google's and Facebook's Privacy or Google and Facebook's Privacy? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 12:02 PM PST Which title is accurate when I am trying to cover the privacy implications of each company individually?:
or
|
| How do American speakers use the present subjunctive in a less formal way on American-English? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 06:54 AM PST Although we don't use present subjunctive often, there are some kind of times you practically need to use it. For example, in British-English you usually use "should" in the present subjunctive clause. Let's take a look: "I insist that he study for the test." British people would usually say "I insist that he SHOULD study for the test." instead; otherwise, they know it would sound too formal. But I just found how to make present subjunctive LESS FORMALLY in British-English by using "should". But I didn't find anywhere in internet a teacher explaining how we can use the present subjunctive in a less formal way the same thing we do in British-English (since people say "should" is not used in present subjunctive on American-English). Thanks in advance for those who can help me! |
| Posted: 05 Feb 2022 09:30 AM PST Between these sentences:
Which one is correct when telling a story if the bridge still exists, if the bridge no longer exists, and if i don't know whether the bridge still exists or not? |
| Use of 'Few and far between' [closed] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 06:21 AM PST Most often, I see this phrase following 'are', as in:
However, is the construction below also grammatical?
|
| Posted: 05 Feb 2022 05:49 AM PST Sorry if I sound naive about some basic concepts behind poetry but I'm Not a literature expert or a literature major. However, in poetry, what is the terminology for major/key stanzas that are sort of a basis for some of the subsequent stanzas?
To elaborate by example, in Proverbs 4 of the bible,
and the following subsequent stanzas are sort of supplementary/supportive to the Proverbs 4:14 stanza verse Proverbs 4:15 to Proverbs 4:19 Furthermore, Proverbs 4:20 stanza verse is another example of a kind of major/key stanza because the following Proverbs 4:21 to Proverbs 4:27 stanza verses are sort of supplementary/supportive to the Proverb 4:20 stanza verse. Therefore, in poetic literature, what is the term given to major/key stanzas like Proverbs 4:14 and Proverbs 4:20 stanza verses? |
| Does my Adjectle game make sense? [duplicate] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 04:03 AM PST I've made a grammar game at https://adjectle.com It is based on adjective order in a sentence; there is a puzzle once a day, and everybody gets the same puzzle. Spoiler alert (if you were planning on playing the game today, 5th February 2022): the correct answer (according to me) is "The sleek, old, black, Egyptian, furry, hunting cat". Is this correct? Is the order of adjectives in a sentence strictly defined in English? Perhaps it is a bit late for me to ask now, after the game has been produced, but it would be great to get some feedback to help me make some more daily challenges or to adjust the scoring logic a bit if necessary. Thanks in advance! |
| Phrase expressing the notion that good luck often is no mere coincidence Posted: 05 Feb 2022 07:38 AM PST I'm looking for an English version of the German
Literally:
It refers to the observation that opportunity seemingly out of a random alignment of stars is often the result of a person giving themselves the best chance by skilfully creating favourable circumstances. In particular, can we say "makes a master" for "macht den Meister"? The most common use of this phrase in German would be "Uebung macht den Meister", "Practice makes perfect". Which word would one use for "Zufall" in this context? "Coincidence", "luck", "opportunity", ...? |
| Posted: 05 Feb 2022 07:11 AM PST I've lived in the US for 17 years and I thought I had a good grip on the English language, but something interesting happened to me and it has bothered me for a while. I am hoping someone with deeper insight can help me. I had been organizing an event for a few months, and it was game time. There was a task that needed to be completed around 4 am, and so I built a team of volunteers to help me. The person I had the issue with is American. He had finished an over-night work shift and driven a while to come help. I genuinely felt SO grateful for all of their help. At one point in the night, I said to him: "Hey man, I am so glad you were able to make it" "Why?" he responded This response caught me by surprise as I expected something like a "You're welcome". Plus, the "why" was pretty darn obvious given how much all the volunteers were doing. So I reiterated my statement, thinking that he misheard me. "Why?" "Well, you guys are doing so much and I am extremely grateful for your help" Then another American guy stepped in on my behalf and said, "I think he really IS glad you were able to make it. And they laughed some. I smiled back, but I was very confused. I mean, obviously I would NEVER want to slight a volunteer and thank them sarcastically. So my question is: Is "I'm glad you were able to make it" often used sarcastically? Has this flown over my head all of these years? |
| Does ‘affinity’ have any connection with not being infinite? [closed] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 03:02 AM PST
Does 'affinity' here have any connection with being finite or infinite? |
| What pronoun to use for transgender people? [duplicate] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 05:16 AM PST As a common norm, it is better to refer with pronouns they/them/their when you're not sure if the person to refer is transgender or not. What would be correct form of the following sentence then?
I was thinking to use like
Now it sounds weird to me to use a plural pronoun with singular verb. Is that grammatically acceptable or not. What would be the proper pronoun to use instead of "himself/herself"? |
| Which word is suitable? " so is?", "it is?", "that is?", "this is? [migrated] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 12:35 AM PST This is an entrance examination. I want to know the answer. Which words are suitable for (1)?
|
| "She" or "her" for describing a character's point of view [closed] Posted: 05 Feb 2022 01:57 AM PST I'm editing a book. The book starts with the following phrase:
It then goes on to narrate from the female character's point of view.
After a few paragraphs from the female character's perspective, it switches to the main male character's point of view.
My question concerns the initial pronoun. Isn't it correct to use object pronouns in this context? For example:
When I put it in the first person, it sounds more natural to say
Rather than
I imagine it's like pointing at someone in a photograph or looking back at someone you know and saying, "Oh yeah, this was her when she still didn't know who she was." All thoughts and feedback are welcome. |
| Rustle up, cook up, google up—what’s up with phrasal verbs? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 02:07 AM PST I was reading Why is "rustle up" different from "rustle"? which I came across as I was looking for a duplicate for google up meaning on ELL, and it made me realize how little I know about phrasal verb even though I use them all the time. The answers and comments talk about phrasal verbs and the exact meaning of these phrases specifically, but I'm wondering about the limits on cooking up phrasal verbs. My understanding is that a phrasal verb is a verb combined with a preposition or adverb (or both) into one semantic unit. Is there any limit on the types of verbs we can use or is it a science the shit out of it situation where almost anything goes? I guess that there would be limits to what prepositions or adverbs would combine with different verbs and still "make sense" or not be awkward. I could "google up some answers" but I probably wouldn't "grab some grapes and stomp up some wine". That isn't a very strong example, but I hope it's good enough to figure out what I mean. Are there any "structural" or other limits when we're whipping up phrasal verbs? I read over Topography of phrasal verbs but I'm not looking for a list; I'm asking if there might be some verbs that are excluded from being used in a phrasal verb for a particular reason. I realize this may be a little broad due to my ignorance, and realize that not every verb that sidles up to a preposition is necessarily a "phrasal" verb. Maybe the answer is just "you can mash up whatever words you want to if you don't mind the strange looks". I'm hoping it's more interesting than that though. |
| What do you understand from this? Is this person a football player? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 06:05 AM PST "I have always wanted to be a footballer. I am very happy because my dreams have come true. I don't see football as a job for me. I used to enjoy it, I still do." This is not the full text but this part is probably the most important part. Is this person a football player? Because while reading this I thought this part had some kind of "contradiction"(idk if I am using the word correctly) in it. And I thought that the person didn't become a football player but still enjoyed playing football in his free time??? To be honest, the text was full of grammatical mistakes and one sentence had five "then"s in it. I am not fluent in English yet, however I can recognize some grammatical mistakes too. And instead of using "ball" or idk maybe "football ball" the person who wrote this chose to use "football"=> "I always wanted a football, then my dad bought me a football as present" this was in the text too. I am confused???? |
| Is there an idiom for "it was just an example"? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 12:00 PM PST Are there any idioms or succinct ways of expressing your resignation when you
…but your intention was for the example to be interpreted metaphorically? "It was just an example." |
| Is it proper to use a period after an abbreviation within a sentence? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 11:02 AM PST For example in the following list: "Technology Entrepreneurship, and Advanced Leadership" simplified to "Tech Entrepreneurship, and Adv. Leadership" |
| What's the origin of the phrase "into the weeds"? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 10:09 AM PST In(to) the weeds is a common way of saying there is unnecessary or too much information or detail about a particular subject. Where did this phrase come from? |
| What is the meaning of not in "as often as not" and "as likely as not"? Posted: 04 Feb 2022 10:26 PM PST Am I failing to get a point here?
Considering the meanings of these phrases, to my eye, they come to have connotations not in line with their real meanings. Before consulting my dictionary I envisaged that as often as not would most probably mean just about never rather than quite frequently, and that as likely as not would be associated more with impossibility than with high probability.In short, I expected not, in the phrases above, to have the same implication as nothing does in, for example, as good as nothing. Do you think not in these phrases is of some connotation different from what its commonplace definitions convey? Do you ever believe the component words preserve their meanings after these phrases are broken down and thus, are we supposed to treat the phrases the way idioms are treated? I found one answer, but with no reference so far. |
| "emmet-butt" - Westcountry dialect Posted: 05 Feb 2022 08:48 AM PST My grandfather's family were from Somerset in the southwest of England and one of his favourite pieces of Westcountry dialect was 'emmet-butt', which apparently meant/means a 'mole hill'. However, I can't seem to find any reference to this term online. The closest thing that I have found is 'emmet-batch', which apparently is an 'ant hill' (Dialect of the West of England) Is it possible that my grandfather got confused? Or maybe I have made a mistake in my recollection? Any Westcountry dialect specialists out there? |
| What is “Who are ya?” and whence it came? Posted: 05 Feb 2022 06:25 AM PST "Who are ya?" seems a popular chant or taunt with English football fans, both on and off the stands. Is it a fair assessment that it means to diminish the opposition as unknown and insignificant? What are the guidelines to its usage? I understand why it is being chanted when the opposition is announced before the match, but I've also heard it being used when someone on the opposing team stumbles, or makes egregious error, or otherwise fails conspicuously. Is there specific reason for this, or it was somehow adopted just because it is neat chant? Can it be used against officials? Can it be used against unpopular management (e.g. if the coach or club president present at the game is announced) or players (that had angered the supporters' community) of own club? Where did it come from? Is it used by football fans only, widely used across different sports, or it varies? Was this used somewhere outside of football/sport context? Is there any date to its origination or when it started to be used profusely? |
| Posted: 05 Feb 2022 08:20 AM PST A newspaper ran this headline recently:
Why did it not read:
I have found instances of "police cracks" in newspapers: "Police cracks whip" and "Chesterfield police cracks down on drunk drivers". However, Google's Ngram Viewer suggests that "police cracks" is significantly less frequent:
I think that the difference between "Police crack down" and "Police cracks down" is influenced by subject-verb agreement and that the difference in this example reflects the grammatical number of the verb's subject. Here, "cracks" is inflected for singular number, which implies that its subject is singular, and "crack" is inflected for plural number, which implies that its subject is plural. E.g.:
The confusing thing about (1) and (2) is that the subject, "police", looks like it is singular; the plural form would be "polices", but I have never heard this form (for the noun). It sounds like police fits the definition of a collective noun, which Wikipedia says is "the name of a number (or collection) of people or things taken together and spoken of as one whole. For example, in the phrase 'a pride of lions', pride is a collective noun." Police fits this because it refers to (i) some relevant police force or (ii) some relevant group of police officers, which are both collections of people taken as wholes. It does not refer to a single police officer. So one might conjecture that verbs whose subjects are collective nouns are inflected for plural number. However, it sounds like group also fits the definition of a collective noun because it refers to a collection of individuals taken as a whole. And I think that both of the following sound acceptable.
The above conjecture also doesn't explain why it is sometimes okay to use "police cracks". My preliminary questions: Do (1), (2), (3) and (4) all sound acceptable to everyone else? Are police and group both collective nouns? My main questions: If (3) and (4) are both acceptable and police and group are both collective nouns, then why does (1) but not (2) sound acceptable, or at least why is "police crack" better than "police cracks"? How do you determine the correct conjugation for a verb whose subject is a collective noun? Is there a general rule, or does it vary from case to case? My secondary questions: Does the behavior of (1) and (2) have to do with synesis? Is using police to refer to the police force more like a synecdoche or other kind of rhetorical trope? Does it matter if you add "the":
I ask these secondary questions because I find it interesting that policeis, to me, a near synonym of police force, but police force (Ngram verb comparison) behaves oppositely to police (ngram verb comparison) when it comes to subject-verb agreement:
[Note: the question mark at the beginning of an example indicates questionable grammaticality.] |
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