Blog

It seems to me that many people exhibit this tendency and I am looking for a good word to describe them. They love providing feedback but in a passive-aggressive way. They love giving their two cents but stop short of actually putting themselves in the position of having to commit to an answer. For example, I might write the following sentence: On the English Language & Usage stack exchange, certain ________ people are more ready to populate the comment section than they are to provide answers. Answer This reminds me of the difference between "involved" and "committed" being like ham and eggs (the chicken is involved, the pig is committed). "Uncommitted" sort of works, but maybe uninvested is better, as in not invested in participation. It's a usage based on one of the definitions of "invest": to involve or engage especially emotionally - M-W

I was wondering if this word is in anyway related to some ancient diety or religion, if so which ?

Is there a single word for 'blind worship' as in worshiping an actor blindly notwithstanding the bad performance?

I'm an American living in the Netherlands who is learning Dutch. There's an idiom in Dutch that describes performing a needless/futile activity, "water naar de zee dragen," which literally translates to "carrying water to the sea." My Dutch parents-in-law asked me if there was an English equivalent, but I couldn't think of one. In doing some searches online , I found that the English translation given for the this idiom is always "carrying coals to Newcastle." This was the first time I'd ever come across the phrase, and subsequent searches revealed that it was indeed of British origin , though one site I found did claim that it was an American phrase . However, neither I nor any of my culturally American friends have ever heard of this phrase. Is there an American English idiom or phrase that carries the same connotations for carrying out a futile activity? Answer "Bring sand to the beach." I have heard this many times, I am f...

Why is there a comma in the following comic? You were planning on sleeping insider the deer for warmth, too? Shit. I didn't want it to come down to this, Joseph, but we're going to have to have a dance-off. Answer The comma in this case implies that listener was planning to sleep inside the deer for warmth, as was the speaker. Without it, the sentence would imply the listener was planning to sleep inside the deer for warmth, and for some other reason. That seems like rather a lot of work for one punctuation mark, but in the spoken language the emphases in the sentence would indicate which the speaker meant.

I have a question on this sentence "It is a profitable thing, if one is wise, to seem foolish." -Aeschylus What role does to seem play in this sentence. I think it is an infinitive. But does it act as verb, adverb, direct object, subect?,noun? Answer Edit Note This answer was written before Original Question was edited. The sentence is not quite the same but this post should still provide the answer to the new question. The answer It is a profitable thing to seem foolish. The infinitive clause here is the phrase: to seem foolish Notice that this is best understood as a clause, not a verb. The grammatical function of this phrase is often referred to as Extraposed Subject. It is functioning as a Complement of the verb BE . However, we understand this as meaning: [To seem foolish] is profitable. The reason we don't like to use sentences like the one above is that it is difficult to process sentences when we have an infinitival clause as Subject. We prefer to transform the c...

With the enthusiastic question of "Who wants ice-cream?", what is the more correct response? (Not) I. (Not) me. Neither response is a sentence. The first response of "(not) I" sounds stuffy, like it should be followed with an indignant sniff. The second sounds like American idiom and acceptable for casual speech. What do you say? Answer Generally speaking, in English, accusative (also known as “objective”) pronouns (like me ) are the “default” form. That is, unless there is a specific syntactic rule requiring use of a different case, such as nominative ( I ), genitive ( my/mine ), or reflexive/intensive ( myself ), in English you use the accusative case. In the syntactic context where a pronoun is not serving a role relative to an explicit verb, such as when it is the simple answer to a question, or if one is labeling something, such as a photo, accusative pronouns are standard. “Who wants to come?” “Me.” Nominative pronouns are impossible here—you cannot answer th...

Can anyone give a cogent, simply described explanation of why the verb BE in: What is it? ... doesn't seem to be able to be contracted with the subject: What's it? * Compare the sentences above with: What's this? What's that? These are perfectly fine. In fact, the contractions here should be expected in almost all examples of spoken English. Bounty edit note: Any answer with any references to authoritative vetted sources will be strongly favoured. Answer (1) The word "it" doesn't like to be stressed. (2) Normally, a sentence has its strongest stress on the last thing that can be stressed, which in a simple subject-verb-object sentence will the object, since that is the last thing. Principles (1) and (2) interact to give the strongest stress on the verb of a sentence, in case the object is "it" -- since the stress can't go on the "it", the last eligible thing for stress is the verb. Compare "I like yoghurt " with "I...

What is the difference between talk with people and talk live with people ? I think all kinds of talk is live . If so, why we would say talk live with people?

If I want to introduce a “pause” between lines of dialogue from the same person by inserting a spacing line, how should I use the quotation marks correctly to indicate continued dialogue? I really don’t want to write it in a gossipy “he said, she said” way! I have noticed that closing quotations aren’t always placed on the end of a line. What are the rules? Answer When you are quoting multiple paragraphs, closing quotations go only at the end of the entire quotation. Beginning quotes should be placed at the beginning of each paragraph, though; otherwise it would be hard to tell at a glance that the quotation was still ongoing. Common Errors by Brians (one of my new favorites) says it this way: When quoting a long passage involving more than one paragraph, quotation marks go at the beginning of each paragraph, but at the end of only the final one. Dialogue in which the speaker changes with each paragraph has each speech enclosed in its own quotation marks.

A Brazilian friend speaks English very well, but has a very unique habit: it seems often that she needs to use "for" but she instead uses "to", and vice-versa. For instance: The present is to Thomas. (should be "for") Say hello for your wife. (should be "to") I have tried looking in the dictionary to specifically determine which definitions she's confusing, and it seems that she's mixing up using "to" as a consequence and "for" to indicate a purpose. How can I help her find a way of remembering to use them correctly? Edit: We recently ran into a better example: You started working on a fix to that problem. (should be "for") Answer One possibility, understanding that prepositions have very slippery and often idiosyncratic meanings ... have her think of to as indicating a destination: I sent the present to him. I gave the present to her. Whereas for can indicate or "for the good of": I did it fo...

Are the two adjectives completely interchangeable, or is there a distinction between them? Does it matter which I choose?

What word best describes a person who is deceitful and very complicated to understand? As they say, he wears several masks.

What part of speech is there in the sentence “There is a book on the table?” Also, while typing it out, another question pops up vis-à-vis punctuation. In my complete first sentence above, I ended it with a question mark since my main sentence is a question. The quote is not a question, but it looks like it because of the question mark. Is this the right way to punctuate? Answer The phrase "there is" indicates the presence of the object of the sentence, without making the object the subject. The similar sentence "A book is on the table" would mean the same thing but restructures the statement to have a subject. Usually, when using the indefinite article "a", the statement will more often use "there is" to emphasize the presence of the book over the book itself. The construct comes from the French term "il y a", literally translated as "that there has" but thought of by native French speakers as identical to "there is...

The words listen , shout , etc. are intransitive verbs, but why are they used in passive sentences with preposition to , at , etc.? e.g: she was never listened to. I don’t like to be shouted at. When intransitive verbs are used with preposition, are they considered as transitive verbs?

This is a frequently thrown-around term on Internet forums in general and Stack Exchange specifically. Although it conveys a lot of meaning, I'd much prefer a phrase with a less offensive origin. Urban Dictionary defines a "rep-whore" as : A person who is obsessed with their status on an internet forum so bribes/ does favours for members of that forum in an attempt to achieve higher rep points. Is there a nicer alternative phrase? This is not a Help Vampire , who is more concerned with having others solve their problems. It's not merely What do you call someone who is addicted to a Q&A website? . I'm not interested in how to deal with "rep-whores" , but what to call them. Answer If you want to put a positive spin on it without straying too far from the sound, try rep-hound. From hound n 1.1 [with modifier] A person who avidly pursues something: 'he has a reputation as a publicity hound' (see Oxford Dictionaries: hound )

What do you call someone who lives for himself? If someone lives his life solely to achieve his own life goals and not want to associate his life with others', what would you call him? I know some of you would probably give answers such as A) hedonist, B) narcissist, but I disagree. Because: A) A hedonist is someone who lives in pursuit of pleasure, and hedonism is a doctrine that the pursuit of pleasure is the highest good. This person in question neither lives for pleasure, nor places pleasure as an important factor. B) A narcissist is someone who is vain, or derives erotic gratification from admiration of his or her own physical or mental attributes. The person in question is also not a narcissist because he does not admire himself; he merely lives for his own good, as mentioned in the question. So once again, what do you call someone who devotes his life solely to achieving his own life goals? Please, he is not a hedonist, not a narcissist, and most certainly not selfish. Assum...

Is there a difference in the meaning or the usage of the verbs understand and comprehend ? Which one would fit best in the following sentence? In order to speak and understand/comprehend a language, there has to be a representation of the words.

When people don't know how to pronounce a word in English, they can look it up in the dictionary. However, lots of proper nouns usually can't be found, for example, English names. Here are my questions: When people want to read some English texts out loud, what do they usually do when they get a proper noun that they don't know how to pronounce? Are there any general rules of thumb for such a situation? Are the students in English-speaking countries required to read English texts out loud in elementary school? And how are they told to deal with the problem I mentioned above? Answer The general rule of thumb is to read it as you would any other word, i.e., follow normal rules of pronunciation. It'll work most of the time, and when you're off, you'll be told the correct, "unorthodox" pronunciation. I can't speak for all Americans; however, in my elementary school we did read texts aloud, but rarely. And I don't remember specifically being taugh...

I have a system (software) that do topolygical analysis. How would be more correct to name it: "System of topological analysis" or "Topological analysis system" ? And what rules should I know to correctly speak in such situations? When better to use each form? Answer If topological analysis explains what the system is about, what it consists of/in, what it is , use of . If it is the purpose of the system, in a broad sense, use for . In many cases, both would be possible and correct, in which case of is usually preferred. Sometimes one of these prepositions would be incorrect for no apparent reason, even though it should have been possible if you consider its meaning: a cup of tea ? a cup for tea — [sounds odd: it's just that we're too much used to "tea-cup" in this sense] Topological-analysis system (you need a hyphen) looks acceptable but a bit less stylistically pleasing than the other two. I'd use such noun adjectives mainly with short w...

I have met such sentence in my tutorial text: "Today my brother has announced that he is going to enter the university next year. I wondered if he had thought it over properly. He would be able to pass all the exams providing he studies at full speed, wouldn't he?" I wonder if we can use "would" with present tense in the conditional clause. I feel that it may have something with subjunctive uncertainty, but I'm not sure. All grammar rules I've found prescribe to use "will" instead of "would" in this example, as it is 1st conditional. Can you tell me, please, if such usage is ok and how can it be explained grammatically? Another example I've met on this forum while trying to browse the answer to my question (It was a part of the answer to a related question, but it didn't clarify the usage rules): "If you are a mathematician, and understand the conjugal relationship between real and imaginary numbers, you would see th...

I once read a story about a Navy man who, due to a bad childhood, never learned what emotions were. To him, there was no "angry", "happy", or "sad" — it was just "intense" and "not intense". Although most of us can differentiate between our feelings, there are many other such events in our daily lives that we experience, but don't necessarily have the language to talk or think about. For example: Someone who doesn't know much about cooking might not know that their food is undersalted. To them, it would simply taste "bland". Or, for a more frequent example, someone who doesn't know about the taste of astringency might find that some cups of tea taste worse than others, but not be able to describe why. One more: how about beer? I only started drinking beer recently, and it used to all taste the same to me. Now I can differentiate between vastly different styles (IPA and hefeweizen, for example), but all IPAs still t...

I may not be coming in tomorrow... I might not be coming in tomorrow... When should I use "may" and "might"?

I've seen many people make reference to LEGO as Legos. e.g. "I enjoy playing my Legos". But from my understanding this is incorrect and should be referred to simply as LEGO (in capitals as per company standards) i.e. "I enjoy playing with LEGO". There is no reference to the terms Legos on the official LEGO site at http://www.lego.com . Although there are hundreds of mentions in LEGO's official message board (search site:lego.com +legos). I also don't want to accept that individual pieces of a LEGO set can be referred to as Legos as the official site refers to these as "parts" (see http://us.service.lego.com/en-US/replacementparts/default.aspx ). Also a collection of LEGO sets can't be referred to as Legos as these are also referred to as "sets" by the LEGO company. Is it correct to refer to LEGO in any denomination as Legos? Answer Owners of trademarks are free to make whatever pronouncements they like regarding how people should...

I was reading a book called Bigfoot vs. Chupacabra in which this issue was raised. I suspect it derives from Tolkien, per the Proudfoots vs. Proudfeet dispute. What is the proper plural of the colloquial American term for Sasquatch ? The book also touches on Yeti , which seems to be both singular and plural, although "Yetis" is proposed as a correct, if less graceful, alternative. I mention it because there may be a plural usage for Bigfoot: "Stay away from the crick--there's a herd of Bigfoot down there eatin' blueberry bagels." As I am regularly accused of assaulting the English language, I though I'd bring it to the experts. This question on "mouses vs. mice" provides some very good insight, but I'm also interested in these specific terms, and the idea of the plural use of the singular form, thus Yeti/Yeti/Yetis. (In other words, it also relates to deer and deer (singular and plural, respectively.)

I read the following on abcnews, but couldn't convince myself to accept the past perfect form the sentence. What is the action before which the 'had mailed' part has occurred and completed? And why would he use had given up? "Abdulfattah "John" Jandali, a Syrian man who fathered Jobs, had emailed his son a few times in a tentative effort to make contact. The father never called the son because he feared Jobs would think the dad who had given him up was now after his fortune."

I hear this all the time, and often from writers, but it never sounds right . I found myself using it in something I was writing. For example: "Just because I stopped eating doesn't mean I'm full." Just the "just because A, doesn't mean B" sentence structure in general. Is it grammatically correct? If not, why not?

What do you call this pose/ position that we adopt when we are very sad or depressed? (For example; when we feel heartbroken or have lost someone or something important.) P.S. I know that some people sleep in the " fetal position" that is kind of similar to this sitting position, can I use "sitting in the fetal position" too? Fetal position (British English: also foetal) is the positioning of the body of a prenatal fetus as it develops. In this position, the back is curved, the head is bowed, and the limbs are bent and drawn up to the torso. [Wikipedia] Update: We Iranians use a single word and also a (figurative) expression for referring to this position/ pose. I don't know how to translate that single word, but the expression literally says "to hug the knee(s) of sadness". For example: "Why have you sitted in this corner and hugged the knees of sadness like this? Has the world come to an end?!!, Come on, pull yourself together,...". I do...

As you saw in the title, parentheses inside parentheses don't look too good. But, gramatically speaking , is it correct to do this? For example: Go to this site (you should probably check it out, it's great (in case you didn't already notice) and gives you great information) to find out more about the solar system. Answer Welcome eshansingh - I second Drews answer. Although you can do that (put parens inside other parens (realizing that it starts to get very ugly (the structure, not the meaning) quickly)), your poor readers (mentally poor, not financially) will soon develop a real (not hypothetical (though perhaps parenthetical)) head(ache). (Oops that last one (head(ache)) was incorrect usage.) ugh where is my aspirin bottle? Go to this site (you should probably check it out, it's great (in case you didn't already notice) and gives you great information) to find out more about the solar system. [How about:] In case you didn't already notice, this site is grea...

I was taught at school that the following expression is not grammatically correct: Who is there? It's me. The correct one is: Who is there? It's I. Can you let me know which one is accurate? Here is a good explanation about both forms. Answer As reported from the NOAD: me /mi/ pronoun [first person singular] 1. used by a speaker to refer to himself or herself as the object of a verb or preposition: Do you understand me? Wait for me! • used after the verb to be and after than or as : Hi, it's me. You have more than me. • informal to or for myself: I've got me a job. It's then correct to say it's me .

For example, person A states something. Person B says "And pigs fly" to imply person A was wrong. If there's no term for it, what could you call that that sounds smart? Answer This is diasyrmus , which, according to the Silva Rhetoricae definition is "[r]ejecting an argument through ridiculous comparison." In this case the comparison is implied: person A's statement is as false or absurd as the notion of flying pigs.

I am currently working on -ing nominalizations and I've noticed that some grammar books refer to verbal nouns as deverbal nouns. Do you (English native speakers) make the difference or do you consider these two types of nouns as being the same ? The only thing I'm sure of is that both verbal nouns and deverbal nouns derive from verbs. I just want to be sure that these two concepts exist in English and that a difference exists. Thank you, because I'm starting losing my mind!!

A: Is Mr. Bob at home? B: Sorry, he isn't at home. He_ _ _to Hong Kong for vacation? A. went B. has gone C. is going Which one is correct answer? and why it is not the other ones?

Yesterday my boss called our design person on the phone and asked her about designing a / fave-eye-con /. She asked him to repeat it a couple of times, and then finally (after a convoluted explanation about favorites and icons), the lightbulb came on and she said, "Oh! you want a / fav-ee-can /!" Now, presumably the design person is the one more likely to have encountered the accepted pronunciation of favicon - she gets to actually make the things, while the rest of us only notice them if they're missing. However, / fav-ee-can / just... doesn't work for me. Is there any sort of consensus on how this word ought to be pronounced? Answer I usually pronounce it /fav- eye -con/ or / fav -ih-con/ , but I've never heard anyone else pronounce it (at all). Consensus also seems to be / fav -ih-con/ :

Sentence: The manufacturer promises to repair or replace the product if necessary within warranty period I want to convert the above sentence into passive. Is either of the following sentences the correct passive form? The product was promised by the manufacturer to repair or replace if necessary within warranty period The product was promised to be repaired or replaced if necessary within warranty period by the manufacturer I feel like sentence 2 is the right one, but that is my feeling as I am not sure. For sentence 1, I only changed "promise" to passive form while for sentence 2, I changed all of "promise," "repair" and "replace" into passive form. So, can you tell me what is the right way to change the above sentence to passive form? Answer The manufacturer promises to repair or replace the product if necessary within warranty period. Here, the manufacturer is the subject of promises , repair and replace . If you only change one verb to th...

When a person talks about something, s/he doesn't get to the point but starts with a pun, intending to let us figure out its purpose. Someone told me I could use reserved to describe that person, but I checked ODO which says this means slow to reveal emotion or opinions . I guess it's not quite correct here. Is there any better word for such a person? Answer If he speaks in a way that hides the meaning of his intentions, he is being cryptic . You are right that reserved is not the right word as that would mean he is shy .

What is the proper spelling: St Matthew's or St. Matthew when not followed by the word "Church". * "There will undoubtedly be tradeoffs that I will have to make if I stay with St. Matthew’s." * My contention is that when St Matthew's is written as plural possessive without the word "Church" following it, then Church is understood to follow.

When someone is away from you and wants to be where you are, do they tell you I want to come there or I want to go there ?

I am looking for a term or and idiomatic expression to convey the concept of "empty, irrelevant" talk. I am thinking about those situations in which people want to express their ideas on facts about politics, economics, religions etc, but they have no real information about what they are talking about so they often repeat phrases they heard on TV programmes or comment using set phrases like: "that's the way things are". He is always commenting on the US election campaign but what he says is just....(the expression I am looking for) Answer Similar to another answer, I'd suggest "blather". Consider: What are you blathering on about? and your He is always commenting on the US election campaign but what he says is just blather !

I marked a student down for using the word chillax as I believed it to not be a word. Later on they approach me on the issue and show me that it is indeed in the dictionary. Every fiber of my being screams that it shouldn't be used. Even this site underlines the word saying it's not correct. According to all dictionary entries I've seen it's not even listed as slang, only informal. What is a valid reason that chillax shouldn't be used? Perhaps because it's informal but that doesn't seem like a valid reason as there are plenty of informal words that are quite common and I wouldn't think to mark them down for words such as phone or kids.

I was under the impression that all Americans pronounced aunt like the insect, ant ( /ænt/ ), or relatively similar sounding variants such as the southern aint ( /eɪnt/ ). According to both Webster and ODO , some Americans pronounce it as ah-nt ( /änt/ , /ɑnt/ , or /ɔnt/ ) which is pretty close to the British ah-nt ( /ɑ(:)nt/ ). Webster offers a similar alternative for the contraction, can't . Who are these Americans who favour the British pronunciation? Answer The Northeast. This US dialect splatter chart shows that just over 75% of Americans pronounce aunt and ant (the bug) the same. It’s broken down further, but the ~ohnt pronunciation is primarily from the Northeast.

I've seen this a bunch of times before, largely in TV/movies, where someone will be looking at a job posting and it will say "X need not apply". Does this mean as in "there is no reason for X to apply", or does it instead mean "X MAY NOT apply"? Answer "X Need Not Apply" is a discriminatory message that essentially means "If you're X, don't bother applying because we won't hire you." For example, "No Irish Need Apply" signs were part of a wave of discrimination against Irish-American immigrants. That's probably the most well-known instance of it, and most "X Need Not Apply" signs in fiction are probably a reference to it. For example, a short about how automation is replacing human work was titled "Humans Need Not Apply."

I recently had somebody tell me that a mutual friend of ours who is genderqueer prefers that people refer to him/her using the gender-indefinite pronoun they . In some cases, this almost seems okay: Kris left their umbrella at our house. On the other hand, if Kris is sitting right next to you, it feels very odd to say They (meaning just Kris) would like more cake. Or even odder, Kris would like some more cake, can you please pass it to they/them?" Are these usages grammatically correct? Are they in the process of becoming grammatically correct? Are there more correct alternatives? Answer I think the reason for your friend's preference is that using either the male or female pronouns implicitly pigeon-holes the person in question as either one or the other. However, all of the examples you give seem to me to be forced, and to shout out loud "Hey, look at how sensitive I'm being! I'm not calling Kris either male or female!" There are sensible alternatives to ...

The title says it all. Should one use Theroux's works or Theroux' works ? Answer Different sources say different things. Wikipedia sums it up as follows : The English possessive of French nouns ending in a silent s , x , or z is rendered differently by different authorities. Some prefer Descartes' and Dumas' , while others insist on Descartes's and Dumas's . Certainly a sibilant is pronounced in these cases; the theoretical question is whether the existing final letter is sounded, or whether s needs to be added. Similar examples with x or z : Sauce Périgueux's main ingredient is truffle; His pince-nez's loss went unnoticed; “Verreaux('s) eagle, a large, predominantly black eagle , Aquila verreauxi,...” (OED, entry for “Verreaux”, with silent x ; see Verreaux's eagle ); in each of these some writers might omit the added s . The same principles and residual uncertainties apply with “naturalised” English words, like Illinois and Arkansas . F...

How do I know when to use lay and when to use lie , and what are the different forms of each verb? I'm always getting them confused. Answer The verb lay is transitive. You lay something on the table. The verb lie is intransitive. You lie on the table when you are operated upon. The confusion comes because the past tense of lie is lay : He lay on the table for two hours before he was operated upon. Few native speakers get this right. Most people would say, "He laid on the table for two hours." Bill Clinton constantly made this mistake in speeches.

I just came across the phrase "Two are better than one", but I had always heard it in my head as "Two is better than one". This is partially due to the Boys Like Girls song. Which one of these is actually correct? Answer TL;DR: Usually choose are . The question asks which of these two “ is actually correct”: Two is better than one. Two are better than one. Unfortunately, there can be no answer to that question. It’s a leading question. The problem is that the question by its nature forces the answerer to concede that only one of them is “correct”, necessarily leaving the other in some “incorrect” category. But that isn’t how English works: English isn’t a multiple choice quiz with one “correct” answer. Both versions occur in print by native speakers, and so both versions (can) have their place. The clearest case for choosing the singular is when one is talking about the numbers themselves, such as saying: Two is greater than one. Then you really must use the si...

I find myself confusing 'physician' and 'physicist' occasionally. While I know what they both mean, I am a little confused as to the use of 'physics' in 'physician'. How did the term 'physician' come to be used the way it is meant today? Lucky coincidence? Answer Perhaps the easiest way to understand the emergence of physician is by looking at the allied term physic , which Merriam Webster's Eleventh Collegiate Dictionary (2003) defines and derives as follows: physic n [ME physik natural science, art of medicine, fr. AF phisique , fisik , fr. L physica , sing. natural science, fr. Gk physikē , fr. fem. of physikos —more at PHYSICS] (14c) 1 a : the art or practice of healing disease b : the practice or profession of medicine 2 : a medicinal agent or or preparation; esp : PURGATIVE 3 : archaic : NATURAL SCIENCE So a physician (derived from "ME phisicien , fisicien , fr. AF, fr. phisique medicine" according to MW) was sim...

What's the best idiom/phrase/word to describe someone who has a great potential to do something while he/she is not aware of that potential. For this reason, (s)he underestimate her/his capabilities and asks others to do so for her/him. Update: There is a huge difference between my question and What would I call my friend's personality? In my case, they are not aware of their abilities but in the mentioned question, they lie about themselves. So, this is another question. Answer A person who does not utilize the talent/brains/charm they are perceived to have (by others) - whether due to insecurity, or other neuroses - is usually referred to as an "underachiever" .

I've read carefully this question posted 4 years ago: Adding "re" prefix You can't use the prefix re- in any verb. Rebe, rebelieve, rehave, etc. However there are plenty of verbs that use such a prefix. The dictionaries do not help: Relearn does not appear in online dictionaries such as: Macmillan ( http://www.macmillandictionary.com/spellcheck/british/?q=relearn ) or Cambridge ( http://dictionary.cambridge.org/spellcheck/english/?q=relearn ). Unlearn , for instance, appears in both :) It seems a trivial issue for a native speaker but sometimes is hard for an English learner to guess whether verbs can have the re- prefix or not.

I've never been certain of the rules surrounding the use of the -i suffix for pluralizing a word. I had thought that it was used for any word whose singular ended in an 's', but that doesn't appear to always be true. For example, the plural of octopus can be written octopi . But the plural of chorus seems to always be choruses , never chori . When is it proper to use an -i for pluralization? Answer Use "-i" for plurals when the word is borrowed from a Latin word that used "-i" for plurals. Note that in Latin not all words that end in "-us" are made plural by changing the "us" to "i". For example, in Latin the plural of "locus" (place) is "loci", but the plural of "fructus" (fruit) is "fructus". Octopus comes from Greek and not Latin, and so does not follow the Latin rules.

Why is the team from Germany called "Germany National Team", not "German National Team"? On official Internet sites, it is the same for every official national team; Germany National, France National, Poland National, Russia National etc. etc. What truthfully bothers me is why not German , French , Polish , Russian etc?

I have come across a number of expressions (both...and..., if...then...) which are named as "correlative" in different grammars (namely Quirk et al.). The question: What makes an expression a correlative one? Do you know any definition in the Literature?

I have always assumed that Bill and Hillary Clinton's name is pronounced Clin-tun. But during this year's election coverage, I noticed that a great many people pronounce it as Clin-uhn, with no "T" sound at all. Is there a correct way?

Is this a grammatically correct sentence? "Programming language has a four methods. Each method has features in which context to use it." Answer No, it is not grammatical. The antecedent of which seems to be features . If we separate the sentence into two clauses, we get Each method has features. In those features context to use it. That clearly makes no sense.

"Sounds like a plan (, Stan!)" ( idiom, used to agree to a suggestion that you think is good : OxfordLearnersDictionariesOnline) It seems to be of relatively recent origin, if there's really a sound origin, that is. Main Q: What is the etymology of the expression? Also, How well-received (understood and appreciated) is it as an idiom? Is it a regionalism? Is it slang? UrbanDictionary gives no etymology; nor does OLDO cited above.

I'm sensitive to the fact that in light of recent events, the example discussed in this question may be unsettling to some. For that, I apologize, but I cannot think of an effective alternative. In a Modern Marvels documentary on The History Channel, the narrator says, "[...] bombs have evolved into devices that can literally blow mankind off the face of the earth." It's difficult to tell whether "literally" is appropriate in this instance. On one hand, the narrator likely uses the word literally to emphasize that although it may have been common for many years to talk about bombs as being powerful enough to blow up the world, in the modern age of weaponized hydrogen fusion it really is possible to eradicate all of mankind. On the other hand, bombs don't blow people "off" the planet, they merely destroy them and leave their scattered remains. With that in mind, my general question is this: when using the word literally, is it important that ev...

I know the use of "existential it" is frowned upon, but I'm not entirely sure how to rephrase the following sentence to remove it: It is hard to tell what would have occurred if the battle had been lost. Is something like this really all that bad? How can I rephrase this to remove that "it"? Answer That sentence is not using the "existential 'it'" that's frowned upon; it's just using an ordinary, unexceptionable feature of English grammar. The "existential 'it'" that's frowned upon is the it that can be replaced by there ; see e.g. http://www.odlt.org/ballast/existential_it.html , which gives the example of "It was nothing I could do" meaning "there was nothing I could do." But obviously your sentence cannot be changed to *There is hard to tell what would have occurred if the battle had been lost.

Context - One might use it in the following situations: "An employee has an argument with her boss and a dispute follows." (she gets fired a few weeks later) "A student having an argument with his teacher over his grades takes the problem to the headmaster." (the headmaster doesn't want to get into it and says the teacher is right) "Workers go on strike for a week, get no raise and are considered absent from work." You can say it to your son/daughter as a prediction: “Be careful mate, remember…(the saying)… And you can also say it when he/she comes to you for comfort and support: “I told you, mate, they say that........(the saying). Answer The house always wins is a proverb that comes out of gambling, where the house, the people running the gambling establishment, are setting up the rules so that they themselves are favored.

What is the difference in meaning when the catenative verb “like” is followed by an infinitive, or by a gerund? For example: Do you like ski jumping? vs. Do you like to ski jump? Also, what is the difference between: My brother taught me to read and write. vs. My brother taught me reading and writing.

This is a follow-up question to this one and I understand the difference between "there" and "here". I understand "there" functions differently from the adverb "here", but it leads to another question. It might sound too basic, but I believe it is relevant to why there could be some uncertainty in accepting there as a subject. If you Google search "There is a dog in the house" and "There is my dog in the house", there is not a single hit for the latter, zero, nothing, nada while I get 738,000 hits for the former. You get 258,000 hits for "My dog is in the house". If you Google search "There is a cat in the house" and "There is my cat in the house", still you get no hit for the latter and 358,000 hits for the former. You get 767,000 hits for "My cat is in the house". You don't find any results for "There is my dog in his/her/our/their house", either. Apparently, there doe...

I have been learning English for many, many years now and think I have acquired quite some mastery. Yesterday I saw just another English (American) flick and thought it was a different language, but definitly not English. I had to turn the (English) subtitles on... :-( Why is it so very hard to understand movies - and do you have a panacea to it? Answer I'm a native English speaker (American) and have trouble with American movies. The younger the actors, usually the worse it is. I believe it has to do with mumbling and slurring and rapid speech (sometimes dependent on the way the actor does the character, rather than the actor's natural speech patterns). It also has to do with hearing loss that comes with aging (I'm past the middle of life). It further has to do with the content, if it is a topic I am not familiar with, or if the dialog has little lead-up (if I'm anticipating what's going to be said based on the plot or the visuals, it's easier to comprehend. I...

I'm working on a story, and I find myself faced with something of a quandary. Specifically, I need to know the proper style for the following: “I have thousands of them,” the commissioner answered, “but I’ll start with ‘What do you need?’.” Is it proper form to have both the question mark and period, or should one of them be dropped?

"My friends are mostly non-smokers." Is "mostly" a focusing adverb that modifies "non-smokers"?

The meaning of "in the offing" I guess is "something that is likely to happen in the (distant) future" Is there any phrase that describes something that is likely to happen soon?

Sentence Construction: “Just Because … Does Not Mean” “just because… doesn't mean…” I'm wondering if "Just because X doesn't mean Y " is a grammatical construction. I tend to say, "Just because X , it/that doesn't mean Y " , because I don't think "because X " is a nominal phrase. If this is correct, then "The reason why X is because Y " must also be correct.

I want you to go and ask him the price, but don't tell him I sent you. Is this a main clause followed by a coordinating clause (imperative)? Pour the vodka into the glass, and add orange juice. Here, should the two following imperatives be separated by a comma?

If I am Rita's coach, is Rita my *coachee? (yikes) Is that even a word? Would it be correct instead to say she is my ward? What about terms for people at the other end of a mentor, sponsor relationship?

Yes, historical context is important, but forget it for a moment. Taken at face value, what does the text mean? A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. Is the leading clause an essential modifier or an absolute phrase? This is not a political question! Justify your answer with appeals to rules of English usage. What say you, grammarians? Answer The only interpretation that would make sense at all would be taking the first two parts as an absolute construction, and the the other two as the main clause. With modern punctuation, it would look like this: A well regulated Militia being necessary to the security of a free State , the right of the people to keep and bear Arms shall not be infringed. The part in italics is an absolute construction , as it is still used in modern English, to be paraphrased as because a well regulated militia is necessary to the security of a free state .....

I saw the phrase “put somebody's pants on’ in today’s ‘Quote of the Day” of Washington Post (July 17). It quotes the following remark of DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital in an interview Monday (July 16) morning: You know, this is a campaign for president of the United States. Mitt Romney is running for president of the United States, and he and his campaign leadership need to put their big boy and big girl pants on and defend his record. No English online dictionaries of Cambridge, Oxford and Merriam-Webster carries ‘put one's pants on.’ Google Ngram registers ‘put one's pants on” neither. I found an example of ‘Put Pants’ in the heading of the following text in Google: “Put pants on before you "hangout" with President Obama on Google+ Google+, impervious to the teasing of tech-bloggers, marches on. Now with more than 90 million users, they just picked up a rather prominent one.” I don't know what the writer is ta...

In the case of the proper noun Ross , which of the following would be correct? Ross's Ross'

I know similar questions have been asked before, but I'm having trouble reconciling the following sentence, received in an email: Can we ask whomever is your contact there to email us a job so we can check backward compatibility? I could understand using objective case if the sentence were "can we ask (him) to email...", but I get tripped up considering "whomever" to be the subject of "(he) is your contact there". Answer The part that tricked the original writer is that "whomever is your contact there" is a noun clause that is collectively the object of "can we ask...". The rule is that, in a situation like that, you're supposed to look inside the clause for your objective/subjective case, though, so actually the sentence should use "whoever", as you suspected.

In the sentence: "I didn't know she had a son," Can I say "I didn't know she has a son" instead, because he is a teenager now? Or are both correct? Answer If she currently has a son, then you can use either version #1 or #2: 1.) "I didn't know [(that) she has a son]." 2.) "I didn't know [(that) she had a son]." For that situation, where she currently has a son, the #2 version happens to use a backshift preterite. (Note that "preterite" is the same thing as a "past-tense verb"). As to which version is preferable, well, that depends: which one do you prefer? That is, which one sounds better to your ear? One of the reasons why a subordinate clause -- like your "(that) she has a son" -- can be backshifted into "(that) she had a son" is that the matrix clause is headed by a preterite (the verb "didn't"). Backshifting in a subordinate clause can occur when either one of t...