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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After the last post, I was thinking where is “Jack ass” coming from. Who’s the “Jack” in this case?
I’ve read it here: “and the president (Bush, of course) kind of, as he’s inclined to do, says ‘Nice try, but that isn’t gonna sell Joe Public. That isn’t gonna convince Joe Public,’ says Woodward.” Is “Joe Public” just an indirect reference to the public or this Joe has some more to do with some specific “Joeish” thing?
I just wonder how does one say this phrase: “Let me know the 411″. Do we say “Let me know the four-one-one” or “Let me know the four-hundred-eleven” or what? Note: I know that 411 is information number, just don’t know how one says it.
What do you in grammar terminology call a word that is not compound?
Which one is correct: “I sent a SMS” or “I sent an SMS”? Do we pronounce the letter S, “ess” or what? I also wonder if it is correct to say “I took an Xray photo” or “... a Xray photo”.
Silk is made from thread of silkworms. The fact that the word “silkworm” contains the word “silk” would imply that the worm was named after silk, but without the worm, we would have no silk. Does this mean that when they first made silk, they had no name for the worm, and they named the worm after the fact?
It occurred to me last evening that I pronounce the word ‘totalitarian’ with a major stress on all three [t] sounds. It seems as well that any people I have heard use the word say it that way.
I cannot think of any other English word that has triple major stress. Even double major stress is rare - I can’t think of an example just offhand.
Are there other words in English that have triple major stress?
I was under the impression that this is wrong, that you do not say, “no such a thing”, that the proper way is “no such thing as.” But, I recently came across a few instances of this used by professional writers with the article ‘a’. Does this mean you could technically have the article?
What’s the defference between hyphens and dash?
What are these things called and when do you and do you not use them? I seem to see a great deal of overuse in advertising.
