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I am not a coffee drinker, but I just drank some coffee. I said to my Hispanic friend, "I am WIRED!" and had to explain what the slang term means. However now that I think about it, that's an awfully strange term for "very very awake." Where did the word come from? Answer If you've ever had an electric shock, you're well aware of the jolting effects of a live wire. It didn't take too long for the term live wire to enter the vernacular: Probably everybody likes to be known as a "live wire." The First National Bank, of Ashland, Ala. thinks so for they recently used an advertisement which read as follows: "Every live wire has a bank account. Are you a live wire?" ( The Bankers magazine, 1921). If, however, you accuse yourself of being a live wire and capable of acting without the sound of a gong or the beck of a boss (from a 1922 ad) More recently, from the realm of music: Don't touch me, I'm a real live wire (Talking H...

In an indirect speech back shifting of tense is optional if what is said is still true. For example -- Kate said that she is not well. ( Here non change in tense because Kate is still not well at the time of reporting.) My question is -- Is back shifting optional in non reported speech as well ? Such as "Kate found that the shop is closed." (Is this sentence correct if the shop is still closed at the time of reporting. ?)

In speech when making comparisons we can say: It is far better than It's way better than It's miles better than It's worlds better than For instance, British restaurant food is far/way/miles/worlds better than it used to be 20 years ago. In the case of miles and far we can invert the order and say It is better by far It is better by miles But the phrase: "It is better by way/worlds" sounds off key. British restaurant food is better by far/miles than it used to be 20 years ago . YES British restaurant food is better by way/worlds than it used to be 20 years ago . NO In the superlative form, the dissonance no longer occurs with way . Of all the ice-creams we've tasted, Italian is by far the best Of all the ice-creams we've tasted, Italian is the best by far Of all the ice-creams we've tasted, Italian is the best by miles tfd ?Of all the ice-creams we've tasted, Italian is by way the best (dubious) But the dissonance continues with ...

I know that to mark possession of an item you can use 's like in the following example: The user's password shall not be blank. However, is it correct to use the following: The car's antenna is embedded in the windshield. I seem to remember that possession must only be used for people but I'm not certain really. Answer There is a bias against the genitive case with inanimate things, that is sometimes found in advice to avoid it in some cases. In some cases that advice is indeed, that one should only use it with people and sometimes that one should only use it with living things. (So "the dog's" is allowed, but "the car's" is not). Fowler raged against it, and blamed headlines' need for brevity (or as he would rather say, the need for brevity of headlines). The rule was never consistent, for some inanimate words of one syllable would generally be accepted as being allowed with such a construct, but there really wasn't a clear rule exp...

With seemingly increasing frequency I come across a phrase using 'learn' when I think it should be 'teach'. The classic example is 'that will learn them!', as in "Shoot all criminals - that will learn them!". I thought this was being deliberately wrong for comedic effect, in keeping with the general sentiment of the sentence. Another example from a Stack Exchange site (http://programmers.stackexchange.com/questions/53880/stuff-you-should-have-learned-in-school-but-didnt-pay-attention-to-at-the-time) I don't know if you can learn someone to write at this age Am I being overly fussy/old fashioned or is this just wrong? Answer In standard English, using learn to mean teach is incorrect. It is, however, a feature of some non-standard dialects. The examples you give all seem to be to be using learn for comedic effect, mimicking the non-standard dialects where this sort of thing is common.

Homophones are two words with the same sound, but different meaning, like red and read (the past tense of to read  ). Is there a linguistic term which refers to two or more words which have almost the same, but not quite the same sound? I am particularly referring to the situation which happens in Chinese, in which two words have a similar sound, and would even have the same spelling in IPA, but different tone, for example 到 (dao) which has a falling tone and 岛 (dao) which falls, then rises, so they are nearly alike in pronunciation, not not identical. Is there a broader linguistic term which both includes homophones and these “almost-homophones”? Answer There is a linguistic term which refers to two or more words which have almost the same, but not quite the same sound. It has nothing to do with the spelling, however. It's a term for the two words, as a pair. Beat [bit] and bit [bɪt] , for example, which differ only in their vowels - tense high front [i] and lax high front...

I'm having trouble coming up with a word/two-word phrase describing unwillingness to share advice (such as strategy on how to improve in a sports match)? May someone help? I'm hoping that this would either be one word or two words.

What is the correct way to say: "All items over 5 lbs. are excluded." I'm specifically asking about "lbs." or is it "lb."? American English if it matters. Also is "5lbs." ever correct? Or is it "5 lbs."? Answer In scientific publications, units of measurement are almost never pluralized when abbreviated. This should remain true for general use, as well. You should therefore never write "lbs." You should technically not need a period after "lb" either, unless it's at the end of a sentence. The abbreviation "lb" comes from the Latin libra , which is itself short for libra pondo , or "pound weight." And in any case, the plural of libra would be librae , not libras . And, again in scientific papers, there is always a space between the quantity and the unit.

What exactly is the meaning of the phrase “The morning constitutional”? Is it an early morning walk or the first visit to the bathroom during the day? What is the origin of this phrase? What is the word “constitutional” doing here? Answer It literally means "something that is good for your constitution", usually a walk, but it's also a common euphemism for the first visit to the washroom, particularly in areas where heading out to use the facilities is not a very distant memory. It was much more common in my youth (and it's been a while since I was a youth) among older people, and it seemed to carry a bit of feigned poshness among the working class (who didn't need to go for a purposeless walk to get their exercise).

In electronics, we can solve a problem digitally or analoguely ? That doesn't sound right, but surely there must be a word I can use? Update : some definitions: digitally: Relating to or being a service that provides information expressed in discrete numerical form. analoguely: Relating to or being a service that provides information expressed in continuous, non-discrete form. (This is my made up definition of a word I made up) . analogously: Similar or alike in such a way as to permit the drawing of an analogy. As you can see, the word analogously doesn't mean the opposite of digitally , it means something else.

I recently saw someone refer to Michele Bachmann as Michele Botch man [emphasis added] and was wondering what the term for such a parody name would be? Obviously it was intended as pejorative, so I'm not sure if "parody name" is specific enough.

I have generally (I would say always, but I'm not sure I always thought this) supposed that in English, uses of the subjunctive are quite limited. They include desires, judgments, etc. ("I desire that she go"), general propositions ("the very idea that he marry her"), assorted hypotheticals involving to be ("If I were mad"), and some archaic expressions that you can find in Shakespeare. Now, in pursuing a question for someone, I find myself confronted with the possibility that many ordinary conditionals in English are in fact subjunctive-carriers. Some sources omit mention of the subjunctive; some state that it's only the "type two" conditional that takes the subjunctive ("If I got up early every morning..."); and some seem to imply that just about every conditional statement is really a subjunctive one. My first point of concession is that, on some inspection, this so called second type might really be a subjunctive after all; ...

I was wondering when should I use point instead of dot and vice-versa. Could anyone help me with that? In the sentence I had to write that made me think about this, I was going to say that the user entered a value with dots (i.e. a monetary value). Answer Point seems to be more British. Dot seems to be more American. I think for number though we would probably just say decimal or decimal point.

In this related question ( Definite article with proper nouns, titles followed by a common noun ), the OP asks if it is grammatical to use the definite article before phrases like Advanced programming in Java whitepaper and Microsoft Office 2010 product . The accepted answer by @Kosmonaut was: Yes, it is. This is because the "Advanced programming in Java" whitepaper phrase forms a syntactic unit, with whitepaper as the head of the unit. The definite article for a phrase always corresponds to the head of the phrase, so using the definite (or indefinite) article for these phrases makes perfect sense and is correct English. My question is whether the same answer applies to phrases like Heathrow Airport, Hyde Park, Waterloo Station, Edgware Road and Parliament Square. I ask becase it seems to me that airport, park and station, etc. sound like they are part of the proper noun itself, and not simply a common noun. Moreover, I think the head of the unit in these cases would be th...

What is the name for the pricing strategy where the item price is just below a psychologically significant amount? For example $199 instead of $200, $2.95 instead of $3, $49,990 instead of $50,000. Answer The Pricing Strategy article (from the NetMBA Business Knowledge Center ) mentions those kinds of price in the section: Psychological pricing - base the price on factors such as signals of product quality, popular price points , and what the consumer perceives to be fair. So I would argue for: "price points" or "popular price points" if you want to be specific about those "popular" ".99" cents.

I've suspected before that "Cheers" as an email sign-off is a bit of an English (or possibly Commonwealth) thing, but being English it's natural to me and I use it as the mood takes me to end an email. When I email an American, what sort of impression does it give? Are there any other English speaking cultures out there where it's a bit unfamiliar? Answer To me, as an American, it doesn't really get interpreted other than to flag to me that the writer is speaking British English. I have no idea when it is or is not proper to use "cheers" in British English, so it sort of gets ignored as to whether this is a formal or informal way of signing off. Internationally, it's probably best to stick to a more formal "Thank you" or "I look forward to your reply" if the communication is with someone with whom you do not have a pre-established relationship. This is more important when the recipient is not a native speaker of English and m...

So, I'm creating a complex task manager. I have a list of tasks, but certain tasks cannot be started until others have finished. However, the position of a task on the list does not necessarily specify the order in which it has to be completed; some tasks can be done in tandem by different people, while some rely on another person(s) to complete other task(s) first. I would like to list the tasks an item is waiting on next to it, with a single word to describe what that list represents like this: Wash walls Paint walls Hang artwork (this task cannot be done until task 1 and task 2 are done) Some shorter versions I've thought of are "pending: task 1 and task 2", "dependent: task 1 and task 2", "awaiting: task 1 and task 2", and "yielding: task 1 and task 2" I don't think any of these words quite represent the situation properly, though I could be wrong. Would you please suggest the correct single word to use in this situation?

I was wondering if there's an idiom or expression for a person who knows everything there is to know about his field of interest or expertise, practically no detail is unknown to them. I thought of the expression: knowing like the back of hand , but I guess that has a geographical sense to it and is used for cities, streets and neighbourhoods. (Please correct me if I'm mistaken.) I hope I was clear. Thanks in advance.

BACKGROUND There are grammar terms such as 'present perfect' and 'past perfect' as in: She has learned English for 10 years. [present perfect] She had learned English when she was little. [past perfect] I believe that these terms are fairly well established in more recent grammars as well as in the traditional grammar. The way these terms are made is such that the first word 'present/past' represents the tense of the auxiliary 'have', and that the second word 'perfect' the structure of 'have + past participle'. Now, I notice that the term 'perfect infinitive' is used in the traditional grammar to refer to the form 'have + past participle' where 'have' is in the form of infinitive. For example: She seems to have learned English when she was little. [perfect infinitive] Similarly, the terms 'perfect participle' and 'perfect gerund' are used to refer to the form 'having + past participle'...

After I found this website, I have a chance to ask questions I used to hesitate to use in a sentence as I am not a native English speaker even though I am really interested in learning English. Anyways, Can these sentences be legit and give the same meaning? I feel something towards her. I feel something against her. Do they have same meaning and also where can we not use against and towards interchangeably if we can use them interchangeably sometimes. Edit: Okay, it seems while feelings are coming to play they cause different meaning but where can I not use them interchangeably when there is no feelings involved? Answer Against and towards can be used interchangeably in some circumstances, but I don't think this is one of them. In this case, towards would imply affection and against would imply distate or dislike. An example of a situation where they could be used interchangeably would be "Please apply the overpayment against/towards my existing credit card balance." ...

Sadly, I don’t have much to add from the title to this question: does œ exist in English, such as in the word manœuvre ? The same question may also apply to what the French call the “e dans l’a” (e in the a), the æ , in addition to what they call the “e dans l’o” (e in the o), the œ — at least as far as the French part is concerned. Answer First, be aware that manoeuvre is now normally spelled maneuver in America, and indeed, has fallen behind maneuvre in England. Even the Economist (but not the Œconomist :) uses maneuvre now. Rendering Typographic Ligatures Correctly The general answer is that œ is considered a mere typographic ligature in written English, not a lexical ligature as it is in French. See this answer for more about all that. It is the modern custom to print all instances of œ as oe in English. Indeed, the OED switched its custom from the ligated digraph to the separated form when it went from its 2 nd to its 3 rd edition. Therefore, for example, these wo...

The words infimum and supremum are technical terms in mathematics. Should their plurals be infima and suprema or infimums and supremums ? Answer For mathematicians, the plurals of infimum and supremum are infima and suprema, respectively. Google Ngrams shows that the incorrect plurals infimums and supremums are used roughly equally often (and much less often than the correct plurals), so I don't believe there is actually any asymmetry. Here is the Google Ngram with the incorrect plurals: They are used so infrequently that they barely show up on an Ngram if you try to compare the usage of the correct and incorrect plurals.

The accepted (and highly upvoted) answer to the question in the question What’s the rule for using “who” and “whom” correctly? states that the easiest way to find out whether to use who or whom is to try with he/him and see which fits. But that doesn’t seem to fit very well in this case: Who will it be? Whom will it be? If I replace with he/him there, it becomes: Will it be he ? Will it be him ? – and I don’t know which of these is right, either. Is it really true that you can always associate who with he and whom with him ? Or does that not always work? And which out of 3 and 4 is correct? Answer Check these out: 'Who' vs 'whom': 1 , 'Who' vs 'whom': 2 It is usually "Who will it be?" for the reasons given in the second article. For your second question, I think "Will it be him?" is better. These definitions may be helpful: he pronoun used to refer to a man, boy, or male animal previously mentioned or easily identified. ...

I'm reading a novel based in ye olde pirate-times, and I have come across the author's usage of "cannon" (without the "s") to refer to multiple cannons. The ship boasted 32 cannon onboard. Is this just an archaic usage that the author is employing for purposes of story-telling? Also, how/why did this evolve to "cannons" in modern usage? Answer Strange as it seems, cannon does appear to have once been a mass noun, like rain or infantry. Instead of saying rains, one says drops of rain. Similarly, instead of saying cannons , it appears that one either said cannon or pieces of cannon. Consider the google Ngram below: Here, the curve for two cannon is higher than it should be, because of constructions like two cannon balls. Tsuyoshi is right about cannons being the plural in the 1500's; Google Ngrams doesn't have adequate data before early the 1700's, but we can check Shakespeare, who uses cannon as a regular count noun. So the plu...

What is the origin of the expression hashing out plans ? I can't find a definition when googling for: definition "to hash out plans" definition "hash out plans" definition "hashing out plans"

In a recent blog entry, Jeff Atwood quotes his sysadmin Kyle: "Should the developers have access to the production environment, and if they do, to what extent?" My understanding is that this sentence is only perfectly grammatical if it's parsed as: "Should the developers have access to the production environment, and if they do [already have access to the production environment], to what extent [is it okay for them to have it]?" However, that is not what Kyle is actually asking. It's fairly obvious that he expects the question to be parsed as: "Should the developers have access to the production environment, and if they do [should], to what extent?" And sure enough, that's exactly how I parsed it when I first read it. As in, I didn't even blink at the "do" kicking out a modal verb. It was only upon reading the sentence for a third or fourth time that it struck me as odd. It should also be noted that Kyle is a native speaker. So ...

In English, to express strong obligation we can use either must or have (got) to . Grammars remind us that must is often used to express internal (personal) obligation, deduction (likelihood), and exhortation. The insulin shots for your pet must be given at twelve-hour intervals . (deontic) We must be late, there's no one in the foyer . ( epistemic ) If he wants to be healthier he must exercise . (deontic) However, they tell us that have to tends to convey the rules and laws of an external authority which we have no choice but to follow and/or obey. The longer construction have got to is normally classified as being informal, and idiomatic in speech. I'm sorry but we have to leave early. ( deontic ) (a) You've got to believe me . (informal) (b) You gotta believe me . (very informal) In my experience, this distinction between internal and external authority is very hazy and subjective, with the exception of sentence 2 where no obligation is expressed, native speakers us...

According to H. Stephens, "There is a great difference between worry and concern. A worried person sees a problem, and a concerned person solves a problem". But ODE seems to be disagreeing with him: WORRIED: Anxious or troubled about actual or potential problems CONCERNED: Worried, troubled, or anxious So, do native speakers recognize the difference between worried and concerned Stephens talks about?

There are many examples of this, and I'd like to give a few: A person who puts a lot of effort to help the community and earns reputation points. But that reputation is the motivation behind helping the community, not because they really want to. A student approaches a professor, and helps them in their teaching and doing research in order to have a good LOR (letter of recommendation). To a SEO, the content of the website must be good (well, this one is a little tricky, but you get the spirit.) I'm not saying that the reputation/LOR/high-ranked is not deserved. It is. I just want to focus more on the selfish reason(s) behind that. Any kind of answer can be accepted: single word, phrase, proverb or idiom. Answer Ulterior , as in, an ulterior motive . From the Collins dictionary: if you say that someone has an ulterior motive for doing something, you believe that they have a hidden reason for doing it While this doesn't necessarily define the action, it describes the reasoni...

I'm not a native English speaker. If at all possible I try to use spell checkers while writing anything on the web hence using one in Firefox as well. Whenever I try to write "seldomly" it highlights it as incorrect. Is it really? Example: This particular word is seldomly used. Answer Contrary to your (very reasonable) gut feeling, seldom is an adverb , even though it doesn't end in -ly .

Which tense should I use in the following example? Is it OK to use the Past Perfect Continuous if I want to explain to someone that I had been working in some company for 10 years , without mentioning - before I finally quit , or maybe I should use the Past Perfect - I had worked in that company for 10 years … but also without mentioning - before I moved to … ??? Thanks!

I am writing an ad and would like to write: "Our team of economists are at your service and available by phone or email. They will be happy to respond...". I know that grammatically speaking, 'team' is the subject of the sentence and, being singular, would dictate that 'it' is "at your service". BUT, it just feels better reading this and it evokes a picture of a bunch of economists doing what they do rather than a single unit". Is what I'm doing OK? Should I be arrested by the grammar police?

I am not familiar with the idea that an adverb can function as a conjunction at the same time. Here are a couple of sentences that are confusing me. This is the reason why she left him. ...and He was transferred to New York, where he was promoted to a higher level. The relative adverbs why, where, when, and how seem to introduce a clause. Therefore, can they also be called conjunctions? If yes, would I be right in assuming that relative adverbs can function as conjunctions at the same time ? Answer श्री गणेशाय नमः The problem here is that parts of speech (adverb, conjunction, pronoun, etc.) are being used as labels to classify words as "being" one and only one part of speech, and that this categorization seems to be directed by faulty definitions. Parts of speech are uses of words, and in English almost any word can be used in a number of such ways. Definitions of such use categories are just summaries, and not directions to be followed. So, first of all, it is entire...

I’m confused to find opposite definitions in the same word, ‘peruse’ in Readers English Japanese Dictionary published by a leading foreign language dictionary publisher in Japan. It defines ‘peruse’ as: vt. Read carefully and attentively. Examine carefully. Read cursorily, quickly. As I thought ‘read carefully’ and ‘read cursorily’ are contradicting definition, I checked OALED. It defines ‘peruse’ singly as: vt. to read sth. especially in a careful way. Oxford Online English Dictionary single-mindedly defines ‘peruse’ as: read (something), typically in a thorough or careful way: examine carefully or at length: with a specific note: Note that peruse means ‘read’, typically with an implication of thoroughness and care. It does not mean ‘read through quickly; glance over’, as in documents will be perused rather than analyzed thoroughly. Cambridge Online English Dictionary similarly define ‘peruse’ as: to read through something, especially in order to find the part you are interested in: H...

The "oa" in the word "broad" is pronounced like the words "or" or "awe". In phonetic symbols that is ɔː . However in all other examples I can think of it is pronounced like the "oe" in "toe". Or in phonetic symbols, əʊ . For example, in goat, toast, oat and so on. Etymology: Common Germanic: Old English brád , identical with Old Frisian brêd , Old Saxon brêd (Middle Dutch breet -d- , Dutch breed ), Old High German (Middle High German and modern German) breit , Old Norse breið-r , (Swedish, Danish bred ), Gothic braiþ-s Although perhaps not directly relevant to the question, where it makes a difference I am talking about British English pronunciation. So broad is pronounced /brɔːd/ , both or and awe are pronounced /ɔː/, toe is pronounced /təʊ/, goat is pronounced /ɡəʊt/ and so on and so forth. Answer First we must set aside oar , board etc. (i.e. where the oa is followed by r ). Then there are no rhymes for broad in my Pengu...

How does one correctly use a semicolon? It is probably one of the more difficult punctuation marks to master in my opinion. Answer Yes, it is so complicated that you want a clear, concise, and humorous but useful explanation like this : When dinosaurs agree on something, they often high-five one another; dinosaurs are all about high-fives. If you'd used a comma in this sentence, it would have resulted in a comma splice. If you'd used a period, you'd lose the connection between the two clauses.

What is the difference between metonymy and synecdoche? Answer In practice, there isn't much difference: you could arguably pick just one of the terms and use it to describe both types of rhetorical substitution. (I like metonymy : it's easier to spell, more spelling checkers know it, and the meaning is more apparent to me: meta+name.) The difference, to the extent that it exists at all, is whether the attribute that is substituting for the whole is part of the whole ( synecdoche ), or merely associated with it ( metonymy ). So "suits" instead of "officials" is metonymy (officials wear suits, but last I checked, the clothing is not permanently attached to their skin), while "hands" for "workmen" is synecdoche. You could also make a case for using metonymy for any example where a smaller part or attribute substitutes for a larger part or attribute, and reserving synecdoche for examples where the larger stands for the smaller, or the ...

Sogou is a Chinese search engine, which can search text, images, music and maps. Is a comma required before "which" in the above sentence?

I am trying to understand the logic of grammar and semantics in this specific context, and to what extent to "push" the boundaries within language-common-sense (I have read the various threads here on the topic of "off"). Standard usage example "Pushing them off to..." (to the corner, to the side, etc.) If the adverb off amplifies the value/significance of the verb push , clarifying that the thrust is away from certain limits, why it could not do the same with the verb persuading? Example question: "Persuading them off to.." (another physical location or a mental position) There is some overlapping in meaning: Push Cajole Persuade Any thoughts? Answer "Pushing" may be used in a physical sense: "The panicked crowd pushed over anything and anyone in its way." It may also be used figuratively: "His father pushed him to study harder." The verb "persuade", however, may only properly be used to mean to change s...

What does a person mean when they ask this question: "Why would that be the case?" Answer "to be the case" is an idiom meaning "to be thus" or "to be true" "Why would that be the case?" --> "Why would that be true?" --> "What leads you to believe that that is true?"

English sometimes has several different ways of expressing the same thing. For example, it can form a possessive either by using an old case inflection: The dog’s tail was always wagging. Or it can do so periphrastically: The tail of the dog was always wagging. Those are both possessives, the one an inflectional possessive and the other a periphrastic possessive. The same appears to be possible with tenses, too, not just with possessives. In Jeremy Butterfield’s The Arguments of Time (OUP 2006), he writes: A tense is inflectional if it is realized as an affix on a head (in English, a verb), periphrastic if it is realized as an independent word. Thus the English past is inflectional, but the future is periphrastic, co-opting the modal will . This accords with the OED’s definition of tense : Gram. Any one of the different forms or modifications (or word-groups) in the conjugation of a verb which indicate the different times (past, present, or future) at which the action or state d...