Question: Are the following sentences correct?
My brother is taller than I (am) .
I study as hard as he (studies) but my grades aren't as good as his (grades are).
He is older than me and yet he is shorter. Why is it me and not I?
This has been an area of controversy fought between those who follow prescriptive grammars and those who follow descriptive grammars.
Prescriptive grammars represent what some people think ought to be the case. (This is sometimes based on the rules of old languages such as Latin.)
Descriptive grammars are based on the usage of educated people.
There are some who say that the third sentence should be:
He is older than I and yet he is shorter.
However, many find this awkward and prefer to use 'me'.
Where there is a clause (a subject and verb) following 'than', we generally use 'I', 'He', 'We', etc (known traditionally as the nominative case). 'Than' is then a conjunction (like when).
Where there is no verb, 'than' is then considered to be a preposition (like 'at', 'over', 'to', etc) and is followed by 'me', 'him', 'us', etc. (known traditionally as the accusative case).
Thus we say
My brother is taller than I am
but
My brother is taller than me.
and
I study as hard as he does.
but
I study as hard as him.
What is the difference between while and whilst; amid and amidst and when do you use them?
There is no difference in meaning between the two items in each pair. The second item in each case is more formal. Some might find them old-fashioned.What is the difference in the use of the words some and any in these two sentences?
Do you want any tea?
Would you like to have some lemonade?
Would it be possible to change the sentence to "Do you want some tea?" and "Would you like to have any lemonade?"
Traditionally, teachers have taught that we use 'some' in positive statements and 'any' in negative statements and questions:
There is some tea in the kitchen. (Positive statement)
There isn't any tea in the kitchen. (Negative statement)
Is there any tea in the kitchen? (Question)
Modern research, however, has shown that this distinction is not actually followed and the two are used fairly interchangeably as the question suggests. However, there does appear to be a slight difference in meaning.
'Some' seems to refer to a more specific item; 'any' to something less specific. Thus, if the tea has already been made, the speaker would probably say: 'Do you want some tea?'
However, this is not a hard and fast rule.
To do it well, we need to pronounce "th" properly when saying thank you. To get the "th" sound right, stand in front of a mirror, stick the tip of your tongue out between your teeth and then say the word.
If you cannot see your tongue tip, you're probably pronouncing "th" wrongly and thank you becomes "tank you" and three becomes "tree".
So don't be shy, stick your tongue out and be right.Do you know how the phrase 'true colours' came about?
If you show your true colours, you reveal to others your intentions, aspects of your personality or behavioural traits that were hitherto hidden from them. The phrase can be used as praise but more often tends to be used in a snide and negative way.
E.g: 'When Harry bought the local badger hospital, then burned it for the insurance money and sold the land for a tidy profit, he really showed his true colours!'
The phrase derives from an early use of 'colours' to mean flag, pennant or badge. Warships often carried the flags of many nations on board so that they could craftily mislead and elude the enemy - the accepted code of conduct in so-called 'civilised' warfare was for ships to hoist their national flags before entering into battle. If a ship carried many flags, it could deceitfully hail another ship by flying one flag and then hoisting their own once they were in firing range, thus showing their true colours and catching the enemy off guard.
Extracted from March Hares and Monkey's Uncles by Harry Oliver.
What's the meaning of...?
What's the meaning for...?
How should the above sentences be used?
A quick poll gave variations of the following: It should be "What's the meaning of...?" because there's no such thing as "What's the meaning for...?".
If one were to key in "What's the meaning for this?" at www.reference.com, one would get 11,100,000 results [Accessed 27 June 2007]. Going through the first 24 "pages" totalling 240 entries, one would find only one entry for "What's the meaning for this?"; the remaining entries are for "What's the meaning of this?".
The same search string on Google turned up only four entries, none of which give an indication of a credible explanation.
Thus, "What's the meaning of...?" is more appropriate.
Do you know how the phrase 'bull and bear markets' came about?
This phrase describes markets in which share prices are, respectively, rising and falling. It is easy to understand how a bull market has come to mean a market whose price is on the up: the bull, an aggressive animal, is a great metaphor for that which is confident and agressive.
However, it is more difficult to see how bears come into the scenario. After all, bears are ferocious and predatory. The origin relates to their skins. A hunter would often recieve payment for a bearskin before he had hunted and killed it. This type of sale, where the price is fixed before the goods are received, is now called short selling, and it is this kind of sale that is most common during a bear market: if a trader can fix a price before the shares are sold, it is likely that, by the time the shares are handed over, the price will have dropped.
Extracted from March Hares and Monkey's Uncles by Harry Oliver.
We normally describe the height of a building and mountain as follows:
The tallest building.
The highest mountain.
Can we say the tallest mountain and highest building?
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English explains the use of high as "the distance above the ground" and tall as "the length from top to bottom". The word tall is commonly used to describe objects that are not only high but also narrow, such as people, trees, buildings and other objects of the same sort of shape.
Do you know how the term 'boycott' came about?
Boycott means to abandon dealings with a person or organisation, or to refuse to buy a product , usually as a means of protest. It is a commonly used word born out of a moment in nineteenth-century Irish history. It is based on one Captain Charles Cunningham Boycott, an Englishman who was serving as an estate agent on the farming properties of Lord Earne in the late nineteenth century during a period of upheaval in the landholding system. He was a deeply disliked man, and campaigns organised by the Irish Land League, led by Charles Stuart Parnell, sought to force Boycott to heavily discount their rents. But Boycott was a stubborn character, and was having none of it. Parnell decided that there was only one way to persuade him to reconsider: refuse to deal with him!
Amazingly, everyone in the region agreed with Parnell and began to treat him like 'the lepers of old'. Soon enough, Boycott could not get anyone to do anything for him - shops would not sell to him, and his workmen quit. Any help he got came from those drafted in from elsewhere in the country. Boycott stood firm, but rapidly the practice became known as boycotting, and a new verb was born. His name became an instant word for mass abandonment - before life boycotted Boycott, he saw his name enter into the language as a standard term.
Extracted from March Hares and Monkey's Uncles by Harry Oliver.
What is the difference between spicy & hot? Can they be used interchangeably?
'Hot' has at least two meanings. One of those is the same as 'spicy'. Unfortunately, it also refers to temperature, so a meal can be 'hot' (temperature) without being 'hot' (spicy). Sometimes it is necessary to indicate which of the meanings is intended and then you might hear someone say:
'This chicken is spicy hot.'
Did you know that clouds float upwards when there is gravity but feathers can't?
A cloud is made out of jillions of tiny water droplets. Each droplet is pulled toward the earth just like anything else. But tiny particles have lots more surface area compared to their weight. That gives a lot of friction in moving through air. Because of that, they fall very slowly. In addition, upward- blowing drafts of air keep these cloud droplets from falling to the ground. If you have watched clouds, you have noticed that they are always changing in shape. They are always moving in those gusty winds that hold them up there.
Dove is pronounced DUV (u as in huff) not DOHV (which is the past tense of dive).
Their is pronounced exactly the same as THERE, and not thi-ar.
Flower has the same pronunciation as FLOUR. That's because "w" is not pronounced.
Word - Incorrect - Correct
Bread - brayed - brehd
Bed - bade - behd
Red - raid - rehd
Head - hayd - hehd
Dead - dayd - dehd
Take care how you pronounce those 5 small words. The correct vowel sound makes all the difference between good and bad speech.
May this Christmas BRING or BRINGS? If it is BRING, why?
Can John eat or Can John eats?
The best way to explain this is for us to start with your sentence about John. Notice there is no need for ‘s‘ at the end of ‘eat‘ in the sentence ‘John can eat‘. The verb that agrees with the singular subject here is ‘can‘, which doesn‘t take ‘s‘. If we turn it into a question, we get: Can John eat?
Your sample sentence is not a question. It is a wish but it follows a similar rule. The verb that should agree with the singular subject is ‘may‘, which also does not take ‘s‘. Thus the correct form is: May this Christmas bring you great happiness.
Often when somebody tries to justify something, I hear them say, "The reason is because ....."
My question is: Is the word "because" needed in such cases?
You are correct. There is no need for the word 'because' in this sentence. In fact, this would be considered an error in schools. We can simply say:
The reason is there are already too many products on the market.
Did you know how the term "blockbuster" came about?
Today, the term "blockbuster" is used to describe a movie that is extremely popular. This term, however, originated during War World 2. It was a slang of the Royal Air Force for an extremely large type of bomb that can destroy an entire city block. After the war, the advertising industry picked the term and used it to mean "astounding", "incredible" and "revolutionary"Most mispronunciations are made because people often stress on the wrong syllable. Here's a rule to help you know which syllable to stress. Words ending in "tion" or "sion" have their stress on the penultimate syllable, like:
resoLUtion
occuPAtion
mediCAtion
teleVIsion
corRECtion
eduCAtion
conFUsion
qualifiCAtion
examiNAtion
proFUsion
See if you can add other words to the ones given. Remember, the main stress is on the second last syllable for words ending in "tion" or "sion".
Did you know how handshakes came about?
When you shake hands with someone, you are performing a symbolic act that goes back thousands of years. Of course, the ancient symbolic meaning has long been forgotten and we all shake hands today without giving the act much thought. But here's what it meant to primitive man:
When a man met someone with whom he didn't want to fight, and with whom he might want to establish a good relationship, he dropped his weapon to the ground. Then he held out his right hand - the weapon hand - as a symbol of friendliness. And shaking hands is still a symbol of friendliness today!
Did you know how did wedding rings came about?
Nobody really knows when or where the idea of having wedding rings began. But the first records we have of wedding rings being used in marriage vows occur in ancient Egyptian literature. Why a ring? In hieroglyphics, the circle represents eternity. So a ring was a symbol of the marriage tie, which is supposed to be binding throughout eternity. (How sweet.)
Do we say:
"if he were to know" or "if he was to know",
"if I was an alien" or "if I were an alien"?
This is a more difficult question to answer briefly. Traditionally in 'if' sentences we have used the 'subjunctive' verb forms:
If I were you, I would sell the house and rent somewhere cheaper.
'I were' is a subjunctive form. However, the subjunctive is disappearing from English and more and more people are substituting the past tense form 'I was' which is now considered acceptable.
If I was you, I would sell the house and rent somewhere cheaper.
Thus both forms are now acceptable.
What is the difference between assume and presume?
That is Jacqline, I assume?
The use of assume implies a guess awaiting confirmation.
That is Jacqline, I presume?
The use of presume implies a confident belief.
The past two years have seen many old buildings and flats torn down to make way for new development. We call this "en bloc". There are many such words of French origin beginning with "en".
As long as you don't pronounce it as "EN" but pronounce it as "ON" you'll be close to the original pronunciation. Look at these words:
En bloc - on BLOCK
All together as a single unit, rather than separately
En garde - on GAHD
On guard; starting position in fencing
En route - on ROOT
On the way
En suite - on SWEET
An en suite bedroom has a bathroom joined onto it
Entree - ON tray Appetizer; right or freedom to enter a place or join a social group
Entrepot - ON truh poh
A place where goods are sent for distribution
It's been said that English is an illogical language. When you consider that many words are not pronounced the way they are spelt you cannot agree more with that statement.
Take for example words ending with "...age". The words should not be pronounced with an "..age" sound but instead should be pronounced as "..idge" as in bridge. Apply this rule to these words:
| Hostage | Hors tidge |
| Manage | Ma nidge |
| Damage | Da midge |
| Package | Pa kidge |
| Village | Vil lidge |
| Image | I midge |
| Mortgage | Mor gidge |
| Luggage | Lar gidge |
| Courage | Kar ridge |
| Carriage | Kare ridge |
| Message | Meh sidge |
Multi-syllabic words always pose a problem. Which syllable does one stress, for example, in four-syllable words ending in "..er"? Very often people tend to stress the first syllable, e.g., PHO tographer, which of course, is wrong. The rule to remember for such words is to stress the second syllable.
| Photographer | fuh TOR gruh fuh |
| Calligrapher | kuh LI gruh fuh |
| Adventurer | ad VEN chuh ruh |
| Barometer | buh ROM i tuh |
| Thermometer | thuh MOM i tuh |
| Perimeter | puh RIM I tuh |
| Geographer | ji OG ruh fuh |
The term first appeared in print in Sir Walter Scott's 1828 novel, 'The Fair Maid of Perth'. Sir Walter Scott was an inveterate coiner of phrases. This phrase clearly alludes to the facial expression created by putting one's tongue in one's cheek. This induces a wink (go on - try it), which has long been an indication that what is being said is not to be taken seriously. 'Tongue in cheek' is the antithesis of the later phrase - 'with a straight face'.
Many words in English double up both as a noun and adjective as well as a verb. When used as a noun the stress is usually on the first syllable and as a verb the stress shifts to the second syllable.
Look at how the word "contract" is pronounced in these two sentences:
I did not sign a contract with them.
Metals expand with heat and contract with cold.
Now take care where you place the stress in the following words:
| Noun | Verb |
| Record | record |
| Contest | contest |
| Export | export |
| Perfect | perfect |
| Permit | permit |
| Progress | progress |
| Survey | survey |
"Annex" or "Appendix"
When there is information relating to a topic but could distract the reader if it is placed in the discussion or body of a report, such information is normally placed at the back of the report as attachments. Do we refer to these attachments as "Annexes" or "Appendices"?
According to one source on the Internet, the terms are synonymous. Whether one word is used over the other depends on the house style adopted by the organisation. However, there is also a site on the Internet where the information is listed by main geographical areas as annexes, and each annex has information for the various towns located in that geographical area as appendices. In other words, the appendices are a sub-category of an annex.
Do we say "he don't know" or "he doesn't know", "if he were to know" or "if he was to know", "if I was an alien" or "if I were an alien"
"He doesn't know", "if he were to know" and "if I were an alien" are grammatically correct and used in formal contexts whereas the others are informal and not acceptable in serious speech or writing.
Can I say 'good nite' to my colleagues when leaving the office 5.30pm in the evening?
Yes, we can say 'Good night' although it is a little early. 'Good night' signals a parting.
'Good evening' is seen as a (formal) greeting and is often used in speeches and on television and the radio but is not usually used to greet friends and colleagues. We can avoid the problem by simply saying, 'Bye. See you tomorrow.'
At the close of the email, normally the sender will used "Regards, Best regards, or Warmest regards".Would it appropriate to use the word "Cheers"?
Despite what some popular writers have suggested, email is no different from other types of communication in that the formality of what you write will vary depending on who you are writing to and the circumstances in which you are writing. Thus, if you are writing to a friend, it might be quite appropriate to close with the word 'Cheers'. However, if you are writing to a new customer, you will probably need to be more formal and use a closing such as 'Regards' or even 'Yours sincerely'.
I was told by my native speaker friend that it is wrong to use "join" as follows:
"Those who are interested in joining the buffet dinner should let Alice know by Saturday".
Many of the short, commonly used adjectives have special forms of comparatives (more) and superlatives (most). Some, have alternative forms. 'Stupid' is one such adjective.
These are usually practiced in tables at school as follows:
| Good | Better | Best |
| Bad | Worse | Worst |
| Rude | Ruder | Rudest |
| Stupid | Stupider | Stupidest |
| Stupid | More stupid | Most stupid |
| Comfortable | More comfortable | Most comfortable |
| Established | More established | Most established |
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