Discussion Forum
This is a forum to discuss the gray areas of the English language for which you would not find answers easily in dictionaries or other reference books.
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This is what I’d like to have engraved on a memorial brick, but the last line doesn’t look correct with the word “it” after “known”.
I’m glad most
folks let me know
they’re religious.
By their actions,
I wouldn’t have
ever known it.
I was challenged by a colleague of mine with the subject question to me the other day.
I turned to several resources but failed to find a satisfactory and convincing answer and PainIntheEnglish is my last hope.
Can anybody help me?
Thanks a lot!
I’ve noticed in the past that the BBC News Web site seems to be rather hit-or-miss with its use of acronyms and abbreviations. One I see repeatedly is its use of “Nasa” for “NASA,” and another I noticed today is “Farc” instead of “FARC” for the Colombian guerrilla group. At the same time, UK, TV, PM, US, and even BBC are treated as I would expect. Can anyone explain this beyond “the editors are twits”?
The abbreviation which prompted me to post this, though, is their habit of abbreviating “Sri Lanka” as “S Lanka.” Why would anyone think it necessary to drop those two characters?
By way of introduction, my name is Mike, and I was born and raised in southern California. I’m a survivor of public schools through high school graduation in 1978. I know full well that my command of the English language is far from perfect, and I do not attempt to correct errors in others’ informal writing or speech, but journalists, authors, and others who write for public consumption I hold to a higher standard, and are therefore considered fair game. :-)
My wife is a non-native speaker and came up with the phrase above. Rightly or wrongly - I gently suggested that I’d use OR instead of AND ie
“I didn’t sleep last night AND the night before”. --> “I didn’t sleep last night OR the night before”.
That’s based on the sound of it (I’m no expert). The second sentence sounds better to me, but makes no sense really. Why is it “OR”.
In fact I’d probably use a slightly difference sentence in written English (after multiple hacks), and don’t really care re verbal use.
But that’s not my my question. I’ve been wondering about the use of ‘AND’ and ‘OR’ in similar contexts. For example:
“I don’t like chocolate OR ice-cream” “I don’t like chocolate AND ice-cream”
“I don’t like chocolate OR vanilla ice-cream” “I don’t like chocolate AND vanilla ice-cream”.
I think there’s two issues here... the grouping of words, and the way in which OR somehow acts like AND.
The AND vs. OR bit particularly bothers me... Can somebody explain this? In math/logic they are opposite terms.
Could you please tell me what it means if someone calls you “green eyes”, but you don’t actually have green eyes.
We’re trying to figure out if it means envy/jealousy, being temperamental, or something else?
I was wondering if Curriculum Vita is indeed the usage for a single CV. Is Curriculum Vitae not used in both the plural and singular formats?
My local Public transport company has started delivering recorded messages on the train platform “Please be advised that patrons must wait till the train has come to a complete stop before crossing the yellow line”. I find this message completely grates on me, and I suffer it each time I wait on the train platform for my train.
“Please” is a polite request for me to take some form of action. I have a choice. I can comply with the request or I can refuse the request.
If an instruction is given to me with the precursor “Please be advised” then I am presented with a fait accompli and have no opportunity to decide whether I will comply with the request or not. It is not, in fact, a request in any form and does not provide the recipient with any capacity to dismiss or refuse the request. For this reason, I consider it to be manglish.
Can you confirm that “Please be advised” is manglish?
When completing forms that ask for my personal information, I find that many forms ask for “Street Address.” I dutifully fill in my home street address. When I do this I find that, a couple of weeks later, I get a phone call asking me if I’ve moved because a mailing addressed to me was returned marked “unable to deliver.” I explain that I don’t receive mail at my home address, and that I have a Post Office Box for that purpose. The frustrated caller then corrects the information that I provided on the form. I calmly explain that I provided the correct information that was asked for. But this wins me no points with the caller.
On other occasions, I have been able to ask someone, “Do you really want my “street address,” or would you rather have my “mailing address?” On many of these occasions I have been told, “No. We have to have your physical street address.”
So it appears that when a form says “street address,” sometimes they really want a “mailing address,” and at other times they really do want a “street address.”
Is there a general rule of thumb to decipher what people really want?
How do you refer to two people with the last name Valdez. Is it “the Valdezes” or “Valdez’s” are coming for dinner?
How do pronouns function with a collective noun? Today I was in my College Prep class and we read a sentence that used the pronoun “they” after the word class. The sentence was “The teacher, who was angry, told the class to do whatever they wanted to.”
Would ‘it’ be a better pronoun than that and if not, why?
