These two sentences are trying to express the same thought:
Now we examine the trunk, which is also called the boot, especially outside North America.
Now we examine the trunk, also called the boot, especially outside North America.
First, are they grammatically correct? If so, why is it ok to drop the "which is" from the first sentence?
Similarly with "who", we can say "This is Robert, who is also called Bob." or "This is Robert, also called Bob."
Is there a term for use of a combined singular / plural like parent(s)?
For example:
Do not assume there are two parents when you pen the letter regarding baby Bob;
use _____ instead.
or
use the _____ approach instead?
I am not asking if parent(s) is good style - that is separate issue.
I have seen a question asking how to add a possessive 's to it but that is separate problem.
I googled for this but am not sure what to even search for.
Answer
Many sites refer to this convention as the parenthetical plural.
For example, at the Grammarphobia Blog, the American Medical Association, and the Chicago Manual of Style.
This site discusses the merit of "parenthetical plural," and points out that
The Gregg Reference Manual calls them "plural endings in parentheses."
You might also find them called optional plurals.
In the case of the proper noun Ross, which of the following would be correct?
The question:
Suppose John is my friend, and I am introducing myself to his brother, should I say
"I am a friend of John's"
or
"I am John's friend"
??
I would use the former, but some think the latter is also correct. If both are acceptable, what are the differences? If we can already say John's friend, why do we need constructions like a friend of John's in English?
Note:
There are lots of question on this site asking about a friend of John versus *a friend of John's
* and so forth. This however, is not one of those questions!
Frequently when reading tech articles, I see sentences like "Microsoft have released ..." or "Apple have announced ...".
This seems wrong to me because the nouns are singular; Microsoft and Apple are individual companies, even though they refer to groups of people. I have not seen this usage outside of tech journalism, but it's pervasive enough that it makes me wonder: is this actually the correct usage?
As a follow-up question, is it correct to use a plural pronoun for a singular antecedent like this? For example, "Apple has announced they are changing their name to Orange" or "Apple has announced it is changing its name to Orange". The second form seems technically correct but sounds awkward.
Answer
This is a classic case of collective nouns. They can be treated as both singular and plural, depending on whether you refer to the entity as a unified whole or the members that make up the entity.
It is more common in British English to lean towards the plural form, while American English favors singular for collective nouns.
“There’s some men wouldn’t look at a girl with a baby.” (Ken
Follett, Fall of Giants)
There is a young student comes here some evenings. (James Joyce,
Dubliners)
“That’s a smell could raise me out of a concrete grave.” (East of
Eden)
“I guess it was Cal asked Lee.” (East of Eden)
I have a friend called me yesterday. (The Syntactic Phenomena of
English)
There are sayings that subject relative pronouns can’t be omitted. But from the examples above on novels and a syntactic book, the construction seems not a rare case or wrong. What allows them the omission?
Answer
All but one of these sentences starts with a phrase saying something exists:
There's …
There is …
That's …
I have a …
I could easily be wrong about this, but my gut feeling is that this is what allows the informal deletion of the subject relative pronoun, although the constructions with it deleted definitely feel informal to me. Taking examples from grammar websites and deleting the subject relative pronoun,
in general I find that the only ones I feel work well are those starting with such an existential construction.
I told you about the woman lives next door.
This is the house had a great Christmas decoration.
The following sentences don't work for me when you drop the "who", although maybe it's just because they're more complicated.
*It took me a while to get used to people (who) eat popcorn during the movie.
*The world is a much sunnier place for people (who) have a positive attitude.
From the official Autodesk page:
Create or open a document with the styles you want to copy to the style library.
From the official For Dummies page:
Create a new document or open a document with styles that you can recycle. (Without the in front of styles.)
It seems Dummies version is an error, isn't it?
Another option is that both versions are correct, with a subtle difference in the assumed meaning. But I really don't see any difference in the context of these examples, and therefore one of them should be wrong (to my opinion).
Answer
In the first case the styles are known to the reader, in the second one they're not.
Create or open a document with the styles you want to copy to the style library.
"Styles you want to copy" are predetermined in this context (since these are the ones you want to copy to the style library), and thus this sentence uses the definite article 'the'.
Create a new document or open a document with styles that you can recycle.
Here, the dependent clause is "styles that you can recycle". Adding the definite 'the' would suggest that these styles are known in advance, or that they are limited, and different from styles that you cannot recycle. Using no article implies generality.
There is often talk about when to use a comma before conjunctions, but what about when to use them before and after? I would typically write the below sentence as follows:
There is a weight of expectation on her, but, judging by her recent performance in
class, she has a great shot at getting into Harvard.
I have seen many things online that say you really should not be using commas after "but" and only before when it starts an independent clause. However, there are those times when you need to use them both before and after.
It does make the sentence look choppy when you use a comma before and afterwards, but it is technically correct comma usage from what I can see? Would it be perfectly correct to just omit the second comma in order to create a smoother sentence:
There is a weight of expectation on her, but judging by her recent performance in
class, she has a great shot at getting into Harvard.
Which is correct?
I was recently reading this very interesting post here:
When is a gerund supposed to be preceded by a possessive adjective/determiner?
In this thread, it is argued persuasively that we could use either his or him interchangeably in front of a gerund. However, this does not seem to me to be true. For instance, consider the following example:
It appears that only a possessive will do here and an accusative is completely ungrammatical (in the true meaning of the word):
An accusative also seems to give rather dubious results in the following examples too. Compare:
... with the completely ungrammatical:
So, it seems that we cannot just freely exchange the accusative and possessive pronouns that occur before gerunds.
My questions therefore are:
When must a gerund be preceded by a possessive pronoun as opposed to an accusative one?
Are these gerunds, and if not why not?
Recently, I've been helping a friend with some essays. I'm not a teacher in any way, but I've done a lot of english reading in my life, and because of that I can (somewhat) spot wrong/misused expressions and grammar errors by experience alone. As I was revising her text, I came across the following sentence:
If abortion has not been legalized until now, this is not due to the absence of debates on the subject, but because of the fact that after years of discussion, abortion continues to be rejected by the population.
I suggested the following correction:
If abortion has not been legalized until now, it is not due to the absence of debates on the subject, but because of the fact that after years of discussion, abortion continues to be rejected by the population.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I assume that this doesn't properly identify or correlates with the previous condition -- at least if compared with the use of it instead. But again, that suggestion was given based on my own experience; I couldn't give her a grammatical background and/or reason why it's better to use it. Hence the question: which one is wrong (if any)?
Also, what exactly are the types/roles of this/it on each of the samples in this specific case (e.g. noun, pronoun...)?
Feel free to suggest any further corrections to the sentence's structure, it'd help us a lot! :)
Answer
I've never come across a "rule" about the differential usage of "it" and "this," and either word is okay in this context. If anything, I think "this" better captures the fact that the writer is referring to the entire dependent clause rather than simply abortion, though I don't think there's a practical risk of confusion. "It" is considered a personal pronoun (third-person singular) even though it's not used to refer to people, while "this" is a demonstrative pronoun, but these classifications won't help answer your question. Both words are used to refer to something mentioned earlier, and in both cases this something can be a specific noun, a phrase, a clause, or something even more general.
Other aspects of the sentence are significantly more problematic. Could you explain the context or why the writer used a hypothetical introductory clause? The rest of the sentence suggests the writer is referring to an actual case rather than something hypothetical or general. I'd suggest something like "The fact that abortion has not been legalized until now [recently?] is not due to an absence of debate [singular unless writer is referring to specific events] on the subject. Rather, despite years of discussion [ditto], it continues [continued?] to be rejected by [the majority of] the population [until recently]." I suggested "continued" under the assumption that the change of law reflected a change of heart in the population. More to the point, if that's not true, the sentence does not make sense. [Edit: I just read S Conroy's comment. Because of the "until now," I didn't even consider the possibility that abortion might still be illegal. If it is, then "until now" definitely needs to go. Perhaps she meant "still," which could be added before "has." (I can see how a non-native English speaker might think that "until now" and "still" are equivalent, but they're not even close in this context.)] Accepting my edits would mean you don't have to choose between "this" and "it," but that's not why I suggested them. If you want to use one sentence instead of two, I would cut the "because of the fact that," which is unnecessarily wordy after "due to." Instead, try "...is not due to an absence of debates on the subject[,] but rather to the fact that the population..."
I'm still trying to figure out why she started with with a hypothetical. Perhaps she is referring to many countries, including some that still haven't legalized abortion and/or others that legalized it long ago? This seems unlikely, but if true, you could try something like "To the extent that abortion has been legalized recently..." or "To the extent that a country has legalized abortion recently..." (Btw, I don't think the passive voice is necessarily bad, but you could also avoid it at the end of the sentence: "...the fact that the population continued to reject abortion.") If the writer is referring to the laws and attitudes of a specific country or region, as I suspect, I can't see any justification for the hypothetical dependent clause.
Is the correct to say
A pack of wolves run through the woods
or is the correct English
A pack of wolves runs through the woods
The former sounds right. However, I think the subject is a pack and of wolves adds a description to the subject. In this case the subject is singular, so therefore the verb must be singular.
Am I correct? It just doesn't feel right.
the verb must be in a non-finite form (such as an infinitive,
participle, gerund or gerundive), and it is consequently much more
likely that there will be no subject expressed, i.e. that the clause
will consist of a (non-finite) verb phrase on its own.
What rules govern the omission of the subject?
What about in the following, can the phrase ever be a clause?
I think so because "be" is the bare infinitive, so the verb is non-finite.
Is there a term for use of a combined singular / plural like parent(s)?
For example:
Do not assume there are two parents when you pen the letter regarding baby Bob;
use _____ instead.
or
use the _____ approach instead?
I am not asking if parent(s) is good style - that is separate issue.
I have seen a question asking how to add a possessive 's to it but that is separate problem.
I googled for this but am not sure what to even search for.
Answer
Many sites refer to this convention as the parenthetical plural.
For example, at the Grammarphobia Blog, the American Medical Association, and the Chicago Manual of Style.
This site discusses the merit of "parenthetical plural," and points out that
The Gregg Reference Manual calls them "plural endings in parentheses."
You might also find them called optional plurals.
I found this explanation: http://www.english-test.net/forum/ftopic38633.html
but what about present?
I continue to work or I continue working? Are they the same?
We were shocked when we found/find out the toilet had/has no flush.
My natural intuition would lead me to write this way:
We were shocked when we found out the toilet had no flush.
Then I thought that I was really trying to say that it's the kind of traditional toilet where there is no such thing as a flush — they cover them with banana leaves (seriously).
So, I am stating a fact that still holds true. Hence I revised as below.
We were shocked when we find out the toilet has no flush.
Can someone please explain and/or correct the sentence above?
I am writing a small essay and I am confused about how to how to properly express this particular sentence below:
Chapter 11 begins with the saint chastising the king who was thinking himself to be very intelligent.
My Microsoft Word 2010 said 'himself' should be 'he' like below:
Chapter 11 begins with the saint chastising the king who was thinking he to be very intelligent.
Once I changed it as above, the word then said it should be 'him' and not 'he':
Chapter 11 begins with the saint chastising the king who was thinking him to be very intelligent.
At this point it doesn't complain any more. Is this the right way to use? I want to express that the king was thinking himself to be intelligent but I am not sure if that meaning comes out with him. I would appreciate some explanation on the correct usage and if possible may be some general rules around this.
Answer
Posting an answer using the comment by JohnLawler so I can close this. There is nothing wrong with using 'himself' in the sentence but adding a comma after the king would make it better.
Chapter 11 begins with the saint chastising the king, who was thinking himself to be very intelligent
Would you mind me opening the window?
Would you mind my opening the window?
Who uses which form, and why? Is this a difference in dialect? A difference between formal and informal grammar?
Is it correct to use "softwares"?
For example:
There are various video conversion
softwares in the market.
Answer
For all I know, software is uncountable, so it's perfectly fine to say "there is various software". If you don't like how that sounds (I know many people who don't), you can always go with "there are various software packages", "there are various pieces of software" or something like that. An even simpler alternative would be "programs". Depending on the context of your sample sentence, even "video converters" might work, if it's already clear that you are talking about software.
Edit: I have checked Merriam-Webster, Wiktionary and The Free Dictionary, none of them mention softwares at all.
I heard this lyric in a song the other day and it just sounded so wrong that I assumed it must be incorrect grammar, but I can't find any specific prohibition that applies.
That's what it's.
That rolls off your tongue with the grace of a moose in a tutu, but I can't figure out why.
There is clearly no problem with ending other sentences with a contraction. These sound fine.
I thought I could, but I can't.
Stop touching that, it will fall off if you don't.
You say that the sky is green, but it isn't.
Also, it sounds just fine if you remove the contraction:
That's what it is.
So what's up with this construction? Should it be avoided?
Answer
This is covered in the Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (CGEL), as it turns out, in Chapter 18, “Inflection Morphology and Related Matters”, section 6, “Phonological reduction and liaison”.
The form ’s, representing either has or is, along with ’m (am), ’re (are), ’ve (have), ’ll (will), and ’d (had or would) are called clitics, and they are a variant of what are known as weak forms of words, which are pronunciations of words like a, have, from, you, etc. (about fifty in total) with a reduced vowel, such as schwa.
In the discussion of weak and strong forms, CGEL points out that there are certain grammatical contexts that require strong forms, and one of those contexts is something called stranding, where the object of a phrase is preposed (moved before the phrase). These are examples they give of stranding requiring strong forms:
a. Who did you give it [to __ ]?
b. We’ll help you if we [can __].
c. They want me to resign, but I don’t intend [to __].
In each of these cases, the word in the brackets has a weak form, but it cannot be used in this context because its object has been stranded. Of course, in written English, there is no difference between weak and strong forms—it’s only a spoken difference—but clitics are distinguished in written English, and the restriction on weak forms also extends to clitics. (There are additional restrictions on clitics, but they are not relevant to this discussion).
So, thus we can say that the second is in the sentence It is what it [is __] cannot be reduced to either a weak form or to a clitic because of the restriction to strong forms in cases of syntactic stranding.
What is correct?
The jury was divided or The jury were divided?
I am told that the latter is accurate because all of the jury do not have the same opinion in the particular case.
Then, how does the subject verb agreement fit in 'The jury is still out' ? I mean, 'The jury is out' would allude to a situation were the opinion on a matter is (are?) still divided.
From some comments in the answers for common English usage mistakes (now deleted, 10k only), there's confusion around the usage of I vs. me:
While the sentence, "the other attendees are myself and Steve," is agreed to be incorrect, there's confusion about whether the correct form is "the other attendees are me and Steve" or "the other attendees are Steve and I."
(I've always used the heuristic of removing the other people from the sentence, so I always thought "the other attendee is me" would be correct, instead of "the other attendee is I." Is this true, or am I using a flawed heuristic?)
Answer
Your method of removing the others is indeed correct. At least, that is what I used to do when I was in high school.
Always try using "I" or "me" in the singular, for the same sentence. For instance, people might say:
"Robert and me are going to town." Which is wrong, because one does not say "Me am going to town." Therefore the correct way to say it is "Robert and I are going to town."
However, this sentence is also wrong: "The police arrested Robert and I", because if it were in the singular, one would not say "the police arrested I", it is, "the police arrested me." Therefore one should say, "The police arrested Robert and me."
Should we always worry about what precedes a preposition?
Many times we come across people concerned with what preposition comes after a certain word.
A preposition's raison d'être is qualifying what typically follows it, not add to what precedes it.
a word governing, and usually preceding, a noun or pronoun and expressing a relation to another word or element in the clause, as in ‘the man on the platform’, ‘she arrived after dinner’, ‘what did you do it for?’
a function word that typically combines with a noun phrase to form a phrase which usually expresses a modification or predication
used before nouns, pronouns, or other substantives to form phrases functioning as modifiers of verbs, nouns, or adjectives, and that typically express a spatial, temporal, or other relationship, as in, on, by, to, since.
[emphasis added]
Does the selection of the right preposition depend also upon what is said before it?
Right here on englishSE,
what preposition should one use with redundant
which one is more appropriate to use send you or send to you
proficient in at with what is the correct usage
what preposition should I use here written of me or written about me
which preposition should I use here thinking of or thinking about
I am studying present perfect, and I found the following phrase:
Susan hasn't mastered Japanese, but she can communicate.
What's the difference between this phrase and the next:
Susan don't master Japanese, but she can communicate.
If Susan can communicate right now, and present perfect gives us a sense that something happened in the past and still happening in the present, so why not Susan don't master Japanese….
I'm very confused about these things. I appreciate any help..
Answer
Master is a telic verb: it signifies the change of state from non-mastery (or incomplete mastery) to mastery, in the same way that learn signifies the change of state from ignorance to knowledge.
The simple present form with telic verbs ordinarily signifies habitual, repeated action. If we say of someone that He builds houses, we mean that he is a builder by profession: he spends every day working at building one house or another.
But ordinarily, master doesn't work like this: when you master a skill you enter into a more or less permanent state of being able to perform that skill. You don't master a skill over and over again. So Susan masters (or doesn't master) Japanese doesn't fit very well with the meaning of the verb.
And the present perfect doesn't signify that "something happened in the past and [is] still happening in the present"; it signifies that the past event establishes a present state. With master, specifically, if you say of someone that they have mastered a skill, that means that at sometime in the past she passed from a state of non-mastery to a state of mastery which continues into the present. Another way of expressing that state of mastery is to say that she is a master of (the skill).
By the same token, if you say that someone has not mastered a skill, that means that she is still in a state of non-mastery, or incomplete mastery. That is the case with Susan:
She is not yet a master of Japanese, but she can communicate.
MS Word likes to correct "subpoint" to "sub point"
Is there anything grammatically wrong with "subpoint"?
Possible Duplicates:
“A user” or “an user”?
Use of “a” versus “an”
If I remember correctly back to my school days, the rule is to use "a" if the next word starts with a consonant, or "an" if the next word is a vowel.
For example:
If the above is correct, then why does this sentence sound wrong...?
Answer
When a word begins with a u, sometimes it a acquires what linguists call a "y-glide": a pronunciation that makes it sound like it begins with a "y":
And so on.
Now think of words you pronounce that begin with "y": a youth, a yew — you wouldn't say "an youth" or "an yew".
So we say "a user" but "an understanding" — just that simple.
Are both valid? I think the first is the only option, but I have been challenged on this and I can't explain exactly why the second is wrong. It does make sense, I suppose.
Is the Oxford comma restricted to the use of "and"? Or can/should it be also applied in sentences with "or"?
- I would choose physics, mathematics or biology.
- I would choose physics, mathematics, or biology.
Answer
The comments so far haven't answered your question. There's quite an extensive explanation of the ins and outs of the Oxford or serial comma here.
You'll notice that the writer of the article says that "a serial comma or series comma (also called Oxford comma and Harvard comma) is a comma placed immediately before the coordinating conjunction (usually and, or, or nor) in a series of three or more terms."
So in answer to your question, the Oxford comma is not restricted to and.
When I was at school I was told that a quote should end with a comma. For example:
"The car is on the road," said Tom.
"No it isn't," replied Dick.
"He's right — it's over there!" said Harry.
However, I've recently been advised that this is not correct, and that the preceding text should read:
"The car is on the road." said Tom.
"No it isn't." replied Dick.
"He's right — it's over there!" said Harry.
I'm specifically interested in British English — can anyone tell me if either/both of these are correct?
EDIT
From the answers below, it seems like this depends on what follows. For example:
"The car is on the road," said Tom
But
Tom said, "The car is on the road."
Is this correct?
Answer
I learned the same way you did, and have not seen anything recently to the contrary, in any reputable source. The second way you showed looks wrong. I would ask the person who advised you for a reference ("citation needed").
This page says,
A direct quotation is set off from the
rest of the sentence by commas. Do not
use a period to end a sentence quoted
within another sentence.
This page does not address the question directly, but does show by example that it endorses the style you learned in school, not the one you heard about recently.
Update in response to edited question:
Yes, it's correct that it depends on what follows: the period at the end of the quoted sentence is changed to a comma only if the containing sentence continues after the end of the quote (e.g. with a dialogue tag like "said Tom"). If the containing sentence ends with the quote, both are terminated by the same period, which is inside the quotation marks.
Btw, your example
"The car is on the road," said Tom
is missing a final period (after Tom). I think this was just a typo, but I thought it worth mentioning in case that was actually part of your "Is this correct?" question.
There is a quiz section on my blog, and a list of quiz result. I need a title for the list of quiz results. I prefer not to use "Replies" because I've already used it up in forum discussions. "Submission" sounds not good enough because it feels like "surrender". "Answer" is close but it's been used up in other part of the blog, too. Is there a single word for this?
Answer
"I need a title for the list of quiz results."
Can you just use this?
Quiz Results
Seems to be the most straightforward, and have the clearest meaning.
"Never play the podcast from anywhere but the start"
What does this sentence mean to you? By podcast I mean a house music episode that is one hour long.
I'm trying to find information about the grammatical correctness of interchanging lighter and brighter in the sense of:
- I turned on the lamp and the room became lighter.
- I turned on the lamp and the room became brighter.
I think that 1 is wrong, but I can't find information backing that up. Could anyone explain why, especially as some dictionaries may list light and bright as synonyms (ex: Dictionary.com (def 24), citing Random House)?
[edit]
I think I can narrow my question sufficiently, especially per my comments below. I believe using the term lighter to refer to levels of light, such as in the first phrase, is incorrect as as lighter appears to mean paler, while brighter means more vivid, intense, or luminous; however the two meanings while similar, do not appear to overlap. I am try to get confirmation/refutation of this.
For example, brightness and lightness appear to refer to two separate, but somewhat related, properties of perception: brightness to radiance or luminosity, and lightness to value of tone. (Compare: bright red to light red)
Finally, and the primary basis of this question, is a reference from the OED:
a. Bright, shining, luminous. Of a fire: Burning brightly. Phrase, on (of, in) a light fire : in a blaze (very common in 16–18th c.). Obs.
["light, adj.2." OED Online. Oxford University Press, September 2014. Web. 30 October 2014.]
The key here being the "obsolete." The other two variants pertaining to the same topic - one an adjective and the other an adverb - are likewise obsolete.
For illustration, consider the two additional example sentences:
- The lamp is too light.
- The lamp is too bright.
Thus, I suppose, the question worded distinctly would be:
Is the first sentence incorrect? If not[/so], is it colloquially and/or grammatically [in]correct?
Let's say John and I agreed that at April 6h he and I would have a work done. Thus, I would like to send him an e-mail saying something like this:
Hi John,
the agreed date is approaching. Do you have any news for me?
the agreed date is coming. Do you have any news for me?
we are quickly reaching the agreed date. Do you have any news for me?
How could I express this and sound like an American native speaker?
Answer
I'd rewrite it as the following. I partly agree with @Josh, except I would change his version to "As the deadline is drawing near, I was wondering if you have any news for me" (as opposed to "deadline date", which in my opinion is a bit redundant).
As the agreed-upon date/deadline is quickly/rapidly approaching, I was wondering if you have any news/updates for me.
Note that in the above sentence, it's your choice whether you use "quickly" or "rapidly", "date" or "deadline", or "news" or "updates". I just thought I'd give you some more options to work with.
I just stumbled upon a Reddit post titled:
My wife and I's seafood collaboration dinner. How does it look?
Sure enough, the top comment immediately points out that it should be "my wife's and my". However, a cross-post to the Grammar subreddit produced the following comment:
It's fine as it is written. "my wife and I" is a noun phrase, functioning as a subjective pronoun in the singular and made possessive with the apostrophe. It is exactly the same as "our".
It seems weird because you would never use "I's" on its own but it is not on its own here - it is part of a noun phrase.
That's a rather intriguing argument. Does it hold any water?
Answer
Yes, this argument does have a basis in linguistic fact, which is why some people do it in the first place, but that doesn't mean it must be correct in Standard English (and it isn't).
This argument does hold water in the linguistic sense. "My wife and I" is, in fact, a phrase — a syntactic constituent. The fact that this phrase happens to end with the word I does not preclude it from taking the Saxon genitive as a whole unit. There are many cases where people apply the Saxon genitive ('s) to entire phrases in everyday speech:
In the case of (1), if we follow the logic of "my wife's and my", we should have to say "John's and Marsha's house" — the genitive should have been distributed among the nouns in the conjoined phrase. Same for (2) and (3). And in (3) the 's is directly next to an adjectival phrase "next door", not even a noun phrase.
Now, people may have different opinions about which of these types of constructions they would allow and in what context; the fact is that people say these sorts of things all the time, and for most people they don't even register as anything out of the ordinary when they happen.
In Standard English, when a pronoun is involved in a conjoined phrase like "my wife and I", the genitive marker is distributed to all the noun phrases in the conjoined phrase. This would yield the construction "my wife's and my".
However, in the case of "my wife and I's", what we are seeing is one or more dialects extending this phrasal Saxon genitive to include some conjoined phrases that include pronouns. So the phrase is getting the genitive marker, rather than each of the units within the phrase.
Both approaches are linguistically sound, but only one is accepted as a standard; namely, "my wife's and my". Standard forms are chosen somewhat arbitrarily. This means that they don't have some sort of objective "correctness"; it also means that you can't argue for the correctness of a non-standard form based on logic. There are many logical ways to convey ideas, and one was chosen to be the standard. If you wish to communicate in a context where adherence to formal/standard rules is beneficial, then you should choose the standard form.
May I ask if the following sentence sounds right or if I would be better off rewriting it?
Stockpiles of weapons were found in the building of the staff members who worked there - one of whom was later caught attempting to smuggle some of the guns out in the boot of his car.
The part I'm particularly concerned about is the 'one of whom was later caught'. It doesn't seem to sit right with me for some reason; is there a better way to word it? I'm basically just trying to say that one member of a group got busted. Thank you.
So I've looked up the word "software" around, and I've learned that -ware words are uncountable, and there's even a claim at the Wiktionary entry for this word that "a software" or "softwares" are a non-native thing. Which makes sense, other languages have countable words that would translate better to "program" or "app," but also to "software" as a broader concept, so when translating back into English, errors are bound to arise. But today I found that this dude named Grant who lives in Chicago and who sounds very, very much like native North American speaker of English (I haven't found anything more about him), and he keeps saying "a software" and "softwares." Are those a thing among native speakers of major English varieties (AmE, BrE, AuE)? I'm disregarding other varieties because they're not commonly taught or featured and a lot of them have quirks, probably including these ones.
Edit: It's not a duplicate, period. At least read the intent of the question, folks. Don't just knee-jerk.
Answer
'Software' is non-countable (like 'milk'). As a native American English-speaker who grew up with software (and a vested interest in it) and is nearing age 40, it seems like people who are quite computer literate and have been since before the age of smartphones will never say 'a software' or 'softwares' unless they're joking, or mis-educated, but native speakers (including business managers/owners who aren't personally into computers) do say this sometimes (much to the dismay or amusement of those who know better, such as the programmers who work for them). People who aren't into software much or who don't really know what it is have been known to erroneously say 'a software'. The younger generation, and those who started using computers at the same time, are probably more prone to misusing the terminology if they use it, since it's less common these days (they usually say 'app' instead).
'Softwares' seems to be less common than 'a software' by far, for native speakers. But, regardless of who says them, 'a software' and 'softwares' are incorrect usage—kind of like how 'a women' is incorrect and 'women' or 'a woman' are correct (I have no idea why people keep writing that, unless it's autocorrect doing it).
Instead of saying 'a software' you should say 'some software', 'a program', 'a computer program', 'an application', 'a software application', or more modernly, 'an app' (although if you're talking to an old-time computer techie, you should probably only use 'app' if you're talking about mobile apps, since they didn't grow up with that and the term became popular in the smartphone community, which wasn't always everyone).
Instead of 'softwares' you should say 'software', 'programs', 'computer programs', 'applications', 'software applications', 'apps' or such.
It should be noted that software is a much more general term than 'program' and all those other words I listed. Software can refer to programming libraries/modules, media files, and other stuff (not just runnable programs—although as you'll note in the comments, not all definitions of software are so broad as to encompass things besides programs). Anything you program as a computer programmer is software. The same is not true of the other terms. Even a chunk of code that does nothing by itself is software. Documentation for programs is considered software. Even files are software (for instance, images, text files, documents). Images and word processor documents may be software, but they're not apps, programs, etc. Everything that is stored on a hard drive is, in my opinion, software (although some, if not many, people might contend that point, and think that software has to give more direct instructions, or be part of something that does in order to be considered software). Even websites are software (but please don't call them that; just call them websites). Computer programs are things you can run and use directly (like OpenOffice, Firefox, Audacity, SynthFont, VanBasco's Karaoke Player, etc.) Computer programs are also used to open files (if they support them; like, VanBasco's Karaoke Player can open and play .midi files—but both the midis and the player are software, while the midis are not programs).
I've been taught that when one mentions an object for the first time and it's countable, one should use a/an before it.
I know that there are exceptions, when you speak of a renoun object which everybody knows, like the moon.
But I cannot see why the author uses definite articles in some places in this piece:
"It had better use THE advertisement with THE shirtless guy rather than THE shirtless girl."
That ad/guy/girl were mentioned in the text for the first time. Why does the author uses the definite article before them? And could you please provide some rule which would clarify the usage of articles for me?
Answer
You were taught wrong. (Or at least you were taught a rule that works much of the time, but doesn't always).
You use the definite article when you are referring to one specific item. Obviously "the moon" is a good example, but in your case there is (presumably) only one advert with the shirtless guy. Therefore you use the definite article. It doesn't matter if you are referring to it for the first time. It also doesn't matter that there may be many advertisements - there is only one with the shirtless guy, so that is the one we mean. The second part of the sentence qualifies the first.
Similarly there is only one shirtless guy and only one shirtless girl in the advertisements we are considering, so they also get the definite article.
If there were several advertisements with the shirtless guy the first article would become indefinite. If there were several shirtless guys the second article would become indefinite. If there were several shirtless girls the third article would become indefinite.
Just me, a schizophrenic and a petty arsonist.
How many people are there in the above sentence? Is it ambiguous?
Answer
I could imagine anywhere from 1 to 3 people:
One:
Just me (further describing myself as a schizophrenic and arsonist)
Two:
Just me (describing myself as a schizophrenic), and another person who is an arsonist
Just me, and another person who is both a schizophrenic and arsonist
Three:
Me, a schizophrenic, and an arsonist
One begins with a vowel and should therefore have an and not a in front of it. Why is it, then, that ‘such a one’ is what is actually said?
It appears to have been the case when the King James Bible was translated in 1611:
1 Corinthians 5:5
To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.
Moreover, the google yield of "such an one" loeb has several instances from the 20th c.
Other questions like this one or this one do not explain why an is obsolete. Was the pronunciation different before? What changed?
One hypothesis would be that earlier orthography was considered to stand above phonology. Is that the case?
- The bread and butter was tasty
- Bread and butter are sold in this shop.
I have been taught when things are considered separately, we should use 'are' but when they are used collectively, we should use 'is'.
But in the following example, which one is correct?
A. There is tea and juice
B. There are tea and juice
From what I understand the second sentence is correct, and the first is not. What are the rules on using which versus using that?
- Instead it produces the above, which simply is a silent error.
- Instead it produces the above, that is simply a silent error.
Answer
The notes about when to use which and that reported from the NOAD are the following:
In U.S. English, it is usually recommended that which be employed only for nonrestrictive (or nonessential) clauses: the horse, which is in the paddock, is six years old. (The which clause contains a nonessential fact, noted in passing; the horse would be six years old wherever it was.) A that clause is restrictive (or essential), as it identifies a particular thing: the horse that is in the paddock is six years old (not any horse, but the one in the paddock).
To notice that (in sentences similar to the ones you used as example) which is generally preceded by a comma, and that is generally not preceded by a comma.
When adding possessive-S/apostrophe to a list, the rule is only the last person has the apostrophe if the item is shared, or everyone has one if they have the items each, e.g.
John and Mary's houses = the houses that belong jointly to John and Mary.
John's and Mary's houses = the houses that belong to John and Mary as individuals, at least one each.
However, I am curious if the rules are slightly different when possessive pronouns are used for a single item.
You and Mary's house OR your and Mary's house?
I'm even more unclear when the first person is involved.
Mary and my house OR Mary's and my house?
Finally, when there are at least three people, including the first person, does the last named person have the possessive-S/apostrophe, or all/none of them?
I'd be very grateful to anyone able to clarify this, ideally with a some form of reference, as I can't find it anywhere.
There have been several suggestions to use "our", yet if the text refers to a group of people, all of whom own co-own houses with some others within the group*, then the above style wording would be necessary, so my question stands.
* eg I own a house with John and Mary, I co-own another with Peter and yet another with Philip and Sarah.
Which of these is correct? This is in the context of buying a surprise gift for someone and you think your gift is hilarious.
I bought myself a hilarious one!
or
I bought myself an hilarious one!
I’ve been saying both so many times that neither makes sense to me anymore.
Answer
Based on LDOCE, the pronunciation of the word is: /hı'leəriəs -'ler-/ and that /h/ is actually pronounced, and is NOT silent like the h in the word "hour". So you must use the indefinite article a, rather than an, because what you hear at the beginning of the word, is a consonant sound, rather than a vowel one.
a hilarious story
Note: This is unrelated to your example, but it's worth mentioning: I've seen "a HTC phone" on Irish/British newspapers several times, and the first time, I just blamed the editors for not being careful with proofreading things before publishing, and it took me a bit of time to recognize that the way they'd say that letter in British English is /heıtʃ/, that actually contains that /h/ in the beginning, where in American English that would be "an HTC phone"!
For our linguistics course we are supposed to analyse the following sentence by breaking it down into its constituent parts. We need to analyse it in terms of Function (FU) and Form (Fo), that is, clause constituents, phrase constituents and word classes.
So how would you analyse the follwing sentence?
His attitude made him very unpopular with colleagues.
This is what I've got so far but not too sure about this.
FU: His attitude = S, made = V, him = Object direct, very
unpopular... = A
Fo: S = Noun phrase, V = Verb Phrase, ObjD = Noun Phrase, A = Adjectival
Phrase
FU: dtm head, mv, head, premodifier head postmodifier
Fo: det noun, full verb, pronoun, Adjectival Phrase = very unpopular
with, Noun phrase = colleagues
FU: premodifier head postmodifier, head
Fo: adj conjunction, noun
If you can't follow my analytics just tell me how you would analyse it when going by the following pattern:
Function: Clause constituents (S, V, Od, Oi, Cs, Co, A)
Form: On the level of "phrase": Noun phrase, Verb phrase...
Function: Phrase constituents: determiner, premodifier, postmod., head, mV..
Form: Word classes: noun, determiner, adjective, adverb...
Function: again, phrase constituents
Form: again, Word classes.
Answer
Here is a slightly simplified tree diagram of your sentence:
(Note: comp=complement; NP=noun phrase; Det=determiner; D-determinative, ObjectD=direct object)
I don't like the options that are usually given in the "gender-neutral pronoun" debate. The singular they offends my prescriptivist sensibilities. His/her constructions are clunky and look terrible. The generic he is simple and I find Strunk and White's (3rd edition, 1979) defense of it persuasive, but many these days consider it unacceptable. The generic she is still better to me than the singular they, but it seems retaliatory and besides has problems similar to those of the generic he.
I recently noticed a fourth option: use he and she as generic pronouns on an alternating basis. For example, if referring to a student, use she the first time. After completing the section of the discussion, referring to this imaginary student exclusively as she, the next paragraph or page introduces a second example student, and for this example the pronoun used is he.
The author intends that both examples be understood to refer to students of any gender, and carefully avoids gender stereotyping, such as regularly using "she" when referring to an art student and "he" when referring to a science student. The author also never switches the pronoun in the middle of an example.
This method has its drawbacks, of course, but I'd like to know if it has been recommended by any published style guides. If not recommended, has it been considered a viable option?
This question is different from the many others on this subject because a) I am asking about a gender-neutral option I have not seen discussed on ELU, and b) I am asking for style guides, not merely "is this acceptable?"
Answer
I've worked as a copy editor with numerous in-house style guides at different publishing houses, as well as with various style guides intended for a wider audience (Chicago, AP, MLA, Oxford, Words Into Type, Harvard Blue Book), and I can't recall ever having seen one that imposed an alternating-gender-pronoun approach. I have occasionally encountered this approach in books and periodicals, and have supposed that the author or publisher adopted it to emphasize the randomness of assigning gender to a person in a particular occupation or to a generalized human being, but I've never seen it required as a matter of house style.
The reason that it hasn't caught on as an approach to gender neutrality, I suspect, is that it has the effect of making gender more prominent in the course of a book or article. Whereas "he or she" or "she or he" or "(s)he" or "they" declines to assign a single gender to the hypothetical or representative person in a narrative, and indeed disposes of the issue of gender specificity by assigning both genders or neither gender to the working pronoun, the alternating-gender approach insists that each such pronoun—and the person it points to—is either male or female.
Rather than emphasizing (as I imagine it intends to) the interchangeability of male and female pronouns in generalized or hypothetical settings, it emphasizes that this first person is female, this second person is male, this third person is female, and so on. The reader is presented with an endless series of pronouns with alternating assigned genders instead of dealing with a text where gender assignment is avoided because it is unnecessary and irrelevant.
Undoubtedly, the distracting aspect of systematically alternating the gender of pronouns applied to generic individual people would diminish if the practice became the de facto standard in speech and writing, but even then I don't see how it would offer any meaningful advantage over the gender-neutral alternatives that are currently more common.
I have this statement that I do not want to end at 'for' (I read somewhere that it is improper to end at 'for').
The problem is hard as there are many sources of failures, and all
would have to be accounted for.
Please suggest alternative.
Answer
You do not want to end your sentence with for because you read "somewhere" that is improper.
I will give you a place to read the opposite:
There is nothing wrong with ending a sentence with for.
This should solve your problem.
On a general note: beware of any and all (restrictive) grammar and style advises that have accumulated over the years and that tend to be:
Most generalized "rules" tend to fall into one or more of these categories.
Famous examples include don't use the passive (given by someone who showed no understanding of passive constructions to start with) and don't split infinitives (unless they mean that you should not write wo [something else] rk).
- Which is your most favourite subject in school ?
- What is your most favourite subject in school ?
Which one is acceptable? If both are acceptable, do they have any difference in meaning?
Answer
In short, when the interrogative pronoun which is used, it is asking about something among a group of things.
Note: which can also be used as a determiner.
One of the classic battles prescriptive grammarians fight is that "You did good." is grammatically wrong, while "You did well." is correct. The justification for this is that "well" is a legitimate adverb but "good" is not. But as a native English speaker I cannot think of a single other case where "You did [adverb]." does not sound very obviously wrong in a similar environment, apart from synonyms and antonyms of "well".
From a grammatical standpoint "do" is either a transitive verb or an auxiliary verb. In "You did good.", "good" is the direct object (a noun), while "well" can only be an adverb. The only times when "do" is ever used without a main verb or direct object is in cases of deletion of a predicate that was stated immediately prior, e.g. "I didn't do it, but he did" or "I didn't go, but he did". I cannot think of any other cases where it is grammatically correct to use "do" without a main verb or direct object, and in such environments adverbs are never used because these are cases of deletion of the predicate. Yet if you were to say "You did good/well." it would almost invariably be in an environment where the predicate was not stated immediately prior.
Is it possible that prescriptive grammarians are simply wrong, and that ages of this prescription has made this particular case sound acceptable despite being a grammatical structure that is otherwise obviously wrong?
EDIT: Since this is a topic that is coming up in comments in multiple places, I'll put it here. http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/do meaning 2 describes "do well" under the heading "Act or behave in a specified way". We might then suppose that the rule is not that "do" requires a main verb or direct object as I state above, but rather requires a complement which specifies what is done or how (which could be an adverb or adverbial phrase). This implies that any adverb describing manner should work in the phrase "You did [adverb]". How then do we account for the fact that most adverbs that are not a synonym or antonym of "well" (e.g. quickly, solemnly, angrily, etc.) do not sound grammatical in such a context?
If I were to say that I was a former student of a particular person (for this purpose let's pretend his/her name is Eve), would I add an apostrophe s to the name because I would be referring to them as being one of their students? In other words, would I say:
- "I'm a former student of Eve."
- "I'm a former student of Eve's."
Is there a linguistic or academical name for those verbs which express a general action compared to those which express a specific action?
Examples:
I found this, but boring verbs vs. specifical verbs does not sound very academical to me...
For example, I want to refer to someone on the internet, but I don't know this person's gender. Which personal-pronoun do I use? (as article I mean he, she, it, etc)
Answer
It's perfectly fine to use they in the singular sense. (Verbs are conjugated the same as they would be in the plural sense: "are they joking?", "did they break anything?".)
All the same, when the gender is not known, some authors prefer constructions like (s)he, he/she, he or she, she or he, etc., some prefer to stick with the masculine pronoun as default (he), others prefer to stick with the feminine pronoun for balance (she), some will alternate using he and she in their writing.
I have been working through a grammar book, and I have learned a lot. However, I have trouble when it comes to question type sentences.
My best guess is that
"What is it about cheetahs" is a noun phrase?
"that makes them so fast" is another phrase?
I feel like the main verb is "makes", but I'm not sure about "is"
Also I'm not sure about the role of "that" does it just join the two phrases? It almost seems that there are 2 dependent phrases but that doesn't sound like it would make sense.
I'm just looking for help breaking this sentence down into its parts.
What is more accurate to say when writing a noun before a list?
"student list" or "students list"
(also "student group" vs "students group")
Examples taken from OMG Ubuntu:
Apple are expected to finally give a release date for OS X Mavericks,
the latest update to their desktop operating system at an event
today.
For Mavericks Apple are adding even more functionality.
Why do they use are instead of is?
I've seen the verb "help" be used transitively and intransitively - in the latter case, followed by the preposition "to" - in various sentences. For example, these should have identical meaning:
I'll help you do it. / I'll help you to do it.
Jim helps run the shop. / Jim helps to run the shop.
Should it be used intransitively in this way, though? If we have a transitive version, doesn't it make sense to use that instead if we're using this verb with an infinitive? It also seems to me that using "help" intransitively in this way can lead to ambiguity; for example:
It helps to buy holidays.
... could mean that some previously stated thing helps with the process of buying holidays, or that buying holidays - in general - helps something. What would be the more likely meaning of the above sentence?
Answer
The to in all of the sentences above is not a preposition.
It's an infinitive complementizer, i.e, a meaningless word that introduces the verb in an infinitive clause complement, the same way the complementizer that introduces a tensed clause complement in
Such complementizers are often deleted, though this depends on the matrix verb.
In the case of help, the to complementizer is optional for Object complements
but required for Subject complements
even when they're Extraposed and leave a Dummy it in subject position
However, if the it is not a dummy, and actually refers to some real thing, then the complement is an object complement, not a subject complement, and the to is optional.
To avoid confusion, avoid ambiguous pronouns, and distinguish dummy it from referential it.
In the following sentence, how do you understand the en dash?
Our findings are very interesting from an international viewpoint – business tourism.
Is the use of the en dash appropriate here?
Spoiler
By using an en dash, the author of this sentence said he wanted to give just a hint or a summary of what the findings were without having to write too much.
In response to the long-term measures recommended by the School Board,
the then Principal initiated the Pledge Day on “Clean LA", to encourage
all schools to make the “Clean LA” commitment on that day.
I wonder if it sounds better to replace the to-infinitive clause with a participle clause:
In response to the long-term measures recommended by the School Board,
the then Principal initiated the Pledge Day on “Clean LA", encouraging
all schools to make the “Clean LA” commitment on that day.
because I think it is seldom to use to-infinitive clauses after a comma.
Answer
"To encourage" and "encouraging" both sound fine to me. There's a subtle difference:
the Principal initiated the Pledge Day, to encourage ....
This answers the question, Why did the principal initiate the Pledge Day?
the Principal initiated the Pledge Day, encouraging ....
This means that through initiating the Pledge Day, the principal was, in this way, encouraging....
(Note, the comma is fine.)
There's a third option:
the Principal initiated the Pledge Day, and encouraged ....
This one suggests that perhaps the principal held an all-school assembly, where he explained the concepts and provided encouragement.
At first glance, sentence 1 below seems more correct because there are two subjects. However, something seems more natural about sentence 2. Maybe there is something abbreviated, elliptical, or adverbial in sentence 2.
In sentences of this structure, should the verb be singular or plural?
Not only a book, but also a pencil are on the table
Not only a book, but also a pencil is on the table.
Answer
The correct word should be is.
You wouldn't normally say "a book are on the table" or "a pencil are on the table". Since you did not make a list of nouns or use any plural nouns, the verb should remain singular.
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 all of these examples that do not break any grammatical rules.
"Kris left their umbrella at our house" : Kris left an umbrella at our house (yes, it could technically then be somebody else's umbrella that was left behind, but would you really know?)
"They [Kris] would like more cake." : Kris would like some more cake.
"Kris would like some more cake, can you please pass it to they?" : Could you please pass the cake? Kris would like some more.
While my dictionary (Chambers 1990) does have a secondary definition of "they" as "he or she", it also says that this usage is "with pl. verb", as in "there are lots of people; they are happy". "They is" would not be correct.
I'm trying to write this sentence, but something doesn't seem right:
Walloopp.com is the place to discover, collaborate, and create what's next.
The first two are just options for actions on the website (you can discover, and you can collaborate,) and the third is the option to create what's next.
However, it seems like creating what's next is the object here, and collaborate would thus require "on" for it to make sense since you can't "collaborate what's next".
The question is (I think) can you have an intransitive verb, set off by another infinitive, followed by a transitive verb with an object without the previous verbs also having to modify it?
_
p.s. this could be fixed with recasting it e.g., "The place to discover and create what's next—together." but in this particular case (my job) that would require a lot of time (coding).
Merci d'Avance!
I was speaking to an English learner and said, “All you have to do is read a lot.” And they thought that sentence wasn’t grammatically correct because I dropped the word to between is and read.
They thought it should be “All you have to do is to read a lot.” That sounds weird to me.
How do I explain to them the reason you drop the to? Or am I incorrect and it really should have a to?
As non native speaker of English , I'm having trouble making sense of a structure pertaining to object pronouns.
Likelihood of me doing this....
Your plan involves me attempting to prepare plans necessary for you.
Chances of me getting into that school is high.
What is it that establishes the connection between object pronouns and verbs in gerund form in terms of both grammar and meaning? In my language , expressions corresponding to the expressions in bold above are constituted with "my" instead of "me". That is the reason why I'm having trouble making sense of it.
I've been told that it is okay to say "What can I do you for?" instead of "What can I do for you?" and in fact I myself have heard people say that many times.
So, if it's correct, would "you" be a direct object in that case or still indirect like in "What can I do for you?"
By the way, if it's not a big trouble for you, please, tell me if my punctuation in the end of the title is correct.
Answer
In my experience "What can I do you for" is a joke that became a catch-phrase and entered some people's everyday vocabulary. It stands for "what can I do for you".
The literal meaning is about "doing (someone) for (something)", which in British usage means prosecuting them at law. "He got done for dangerous driving". In this literal phrase, yes "you" would be the direct object.
"What can I do for you" is of course a common phrase offering a service, and "you" is at best an indirect object, probably only an adjunct.
Note: the previous discussion, that Peter of the Corn linked to, refers to a number of different colloquial meanings of "do someone"; but it seems to me that most of them are not relevant, because they are "do someone", not "do someone for something".
OK, I was recently asked a question by a foreign friend on an English sentence that they created.
Mixing and matching all kinds of vegetables, seafood, and meat, some of my newly added dishes are this and that.
To me, this sounded awkward.
With a parallel list structure, I should be able to do the following with the above...
So, this part seems wrong; therefore, I concluded that, while seafood and meat don't technically have plural forms, this case requires that seafood and meat be seafoods and meats. That is because of the preceding words, all kinds of. This means that you have more than one kind of meat (ie. pork, beef, chicken, etc...).
Other than that, it feels like the flow isn't correct.
Answer
Your sentence is correct as originally stated. You can also use "seafoods" and "meats," which are acceptable plurals of seafood and meat -- although less common. Some might argue that this produces a slight change in nuance, such that "meats" implies "types of meat" and "seafoods" implies "types of seafood." However, even if the case, this distinction doesn't seem substantive in your particular context. I would use what you think sounds better.
The "while" is not necessary and tends to imply you'll say something contradictory in the latter part of your sentence.
In terms of challenges to the sentence, most of it I think has to do with word choice.
"Mixing and matching" isn't something that we often apply to ingredients. It's a bit odd to think about what matching different meats means. In culinary writing, there's often a statement about "pairing" food items, e.g., pairing a steak with a cabernet sauvignon. However, this is usually reserved for pairing completed dishes and not ingredients. A simpler phrase, such as "Mixing different kinds of vegetables, ..." or perhaps, better for a cooking context "Combining different kinds..." Since mixing has a particular meaning when we're talking about recipes and we'd actually prefer a more general meaning.
"Newly added dishes" is a bit odd sounding, but it may depend upon the context. By itself, I ask the question "added to what?" But if this is part of a discussion on, say, creating a recipe book, this might be understood.
"This and that" is also unclear. This and that is often used to describe a collection of unrelated items and while certainly there are vegetables, meats, and seafoods -- they still seem pretty coherent as a set of items. I recognize that this and that refers to dishes, but, once again, it's not apparent to me that they're that dissimilar. I'm not exactly sure what the original author was trying to convey. However, if you can make it more precise, that would be greatly beneficial (e.g., "... are very distinct.").
Is the sentence
One only has to look at the size of Claire’s house to know that you can make a lot of money as a doctor.
correct?
I'm not sure whether mixing the words "one" and "you" in the same sentence is grammatically correct.
I wonder what gentlebeing means and how it is used, especially when compared to similar phrases like Ladies and gentlemen!
I saw Gentlebeings! being used at the beginning of an email. Is it a formal or informal word, and does it have any sarcastic or humorous connotation to it?
Answer
It's not an accepted word (at least not yet), but an attempt (semi-humorous, at a guess), to find an appropriate salutation for a group of people, some of whom may object to "Ladies and Gentlemen". People have been attempting this for years, without noticeable success: "Gentlebeings", though harmless, has too much of a science-fiction flavour to catch on generally, I would say.
I am writing about Random Variables, which I am abbreviating to RV. Should I write 'an RV' (an Arr-Vee) or 'a RV' (a Random Variable)?
Answer
This depends entirely on how you expect people to read the letters RV. If you expect them to say "random variable" every time, then use a RV. If you expect that they'll pronounce the letter names, use an RV. Personally, I would lean towards the latter.
That's because the choice of a or an is determined entirely by pronunciation.
Neither of the following sounds quite "right" to me:
In my native language (Indonesian) we have a phrase or a way of saying this without sounding weird or overly formal. Do you use any of the above at all, or is there any different sentence pattern for describing this kind of situation?
When we use causative verbs as in "I asked you to do something", we say "to use".
However, we don't say "I made you to do something" but just "do something".
Is there any particular reason that we use zero infinitives after make, have, let?
For example:
Since it's raining, wouldn't it be a
good idea to bring an umbrella?
That sounds OK, but I'm not sure if it is.
What about these alternatives?
Since it's raining, isn't it a good
idea to bring an umbrella?
I thought that this might be grammatically correct because "is" is on both sides of the sentence. It doesn't sound right though. Why?
Since it's raining, won't it be a good
idea to bring an umbrella?
For some reason this doesn't sound right either, but I don't know why. It sounds better than the second example, but not as good as the first example.
Answer
There is absolutely nothing wrong with
Since it's raining, wouldn't it be a good idea to bring an umbrella?
Look at a few other constructions to see how natural it is:
Since you're going to the store anyway, wouldn't you like to pick us up some ice cream?
Since our success is uncertain, wouldn't we be well advised to consider how to minimize our risks in case of a downturn?
The first clause assumes a fact, and the second balances it with a speculative counterpoint. That is grammatical, unexceptionable and, incidentally, one way to make a sentence interesting.