Ain't no bloody northern hemispherean pointy-headed boffins gonna tell me how to use my English.
English 101
- Thread starter REDY
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Ain't no bloody northern hemispherean pointy-headed boffins gonna tell me how to use my English.
mangxema
I
Why not?
I suppose this is strictly true, but I'd like to point out that this isn't a particularly rare exception, as there are lots of, I guess, 'singular' compound words (e.g., bedroom, bathtub, notebook, grapefruit, applesauce, etc.)
Hello and sorry for bumping this thread.
I'm helping to translate a flyer from French to English. It's for a farmer who grows asparagus, has a farmshop and opens his terrace to customers and serves them dishes with asparagus and a local beer called "de Chokier".
Sentence in French is "Dégustation d'asperges et de la bière de Chokier"
which was first translated to "Tasting of asparagus and the "de Chokier" beer"
This doesn't sound very English to me. Wouldn't it be better to call it an asparagus and beer tasting? But wouldn't a beer tasting imply that people could taste different beers?
Can someone help me please?
I'm helping to translate a flyer from French to English. It's for a farmer who grows asparagus, has a farmshop and opens his terrace to customers and serves them dishes with asparagus and a local beer called "de Chokier".
Sentence in French is "Dégustation d'asperges et de la bière de Chokier"
which was first translated to "Tasting of asparagus and the "de Chokier" beer"
This doesn't sound very English to me. Wouldn't it be better to call it an asparagus and beer tasting? But wouldn't a beer tasting imply that people could taste different beers?
Can someone help me please?
Furiey
No Longer Just Lurking
It would depend how it is used in the flyer as I guess you are trying to intice people to visit/buy.
Something like "Come and try our asparagus and local de Chokier beer" may be move inviting than just Asparagus and beer tasting, and yes beer tasting would probably be taken as more than one beer.
Something like "Come and try our asparagus and local de Chokier beer" may be move inviting than just Asparagus and beer tasting, and yes beer tasting would probably be taken as more than one beer.
Furiey
No Longer Just Lurking
True, it all depends on how the flyer is pitched, it would not be appropriate if it was casual and friendly in tone.
mangxema
I
True, but you'd really have to know your audience. Regular dudes might think of something like 'disgustation' which would not be very enticing.
Cashie
King
It's REDY's thread
REDY AYM FYRE
It gets irritating quickly. If I see it more than once in a paragraph, I grit my teeth and look for a red pen. I'd suggest keeping it to an absolute minimum in any context. It can look (or sound) like you don't know what you're talking about.
Plenty of native speakers use phrases like "...and whatnot" (Kevin Smith, cough) or "and what-have-you" (my old housemate). It's OK talking with people who know you well, but they may still tease you (gently) about it.
As far as I'm concerned, they are of equal value, but are obviously different.
Linguistic diversity, even within the same language, is something to be celebrated.
Somebody please pass that on the Chinese Communist Party
*dig* *blowingAwayDustFromTheCorps*
Need a short advice in english. I'm currently writing an application letter, and i'm wondering if you normally write "you" with a capital letter in an application.
In the case this question seems very dumb: You're doing it in german, somehow out of order from the normal grammar, and i'm not sure if i payed attention if it's the same here.
Need a short advice in english. I'm currently writing an application letter, and i'm wondering if you normally write "you" with a capital letter in an application.
In the case this question seems very dumb: You're doing it in german, somehow out of order from the normal grammar, and i'm not sure if i payed attention if it's the same here.
If you're sending the application to God, yes. Otherwise, no. You don't have to capitalise for formal address.
Also, just to elaborate on something else, if you notice something (notice as a verb), you are aware of its existence. If you notify someone, you're making them aware of it too. To give notice (notice as a noun) is essentially the same as to notify.
Also, just to elaborate on something else, if you notice something (notice as a verb), you are aware of its existence. If you notify someone, you're making them aware of it too. To give notice (notice as a noun) is essentially the same as to notify.
Thanks
.And no, not god, somehow the wrong profession
.Also, just to elaborate on something else, if you notice something (notice as a verb), you are aware of its existence. If you notify someone, you're making them aware of it too. To give notice (notice as a noun) is essentially the same as to notify.
To nitpick for the sake of the thread:
A 'corps' (which is a homonym of 'core') is a body, but a body of soldiers, containing between 20 000 and 45 000 men (according to wikipedia). A necromancer would deal with a 'corpse'.
Also, 'blows' would seem preferable to 'blowing' in this context. When you're using *<insert description>*, you're writing in the third person, so the implied pronoun would be 'he', in this case. Though, maybe it's just me that does that in the third person.
For instance:
*attempts to correct The_J* (rather than *attempting to correct The_J*)
'Advice' needs to be quantified with 'some' or 'a lot' or something, rather than being measured with 'short'.
Grammatically, you shouldn't leave out the 'I' in this sentence, though in common usage it's kinda acceptable.
'A' is unnecessary, as 'advice' is not really a 'thing'. It's like 'help' (which could be used instead in this sentence). You wouldn't say 'I need a short help', you'd say 'I need some help'.
'English' should be capitalised.
So, the sentence could read, 'I need some advice in English'. However, that simply implies that you're wanting the advice to be given in English, not that you want advice on the subject of English speaking (though we can figure that out from the context). I would write, 'I need some help with my English', though I can't say for certain that's absolutely correct either.
'I' is always capitalised, so it would be '...and I'm wondering...'. However, restating the subject is a bit redundant, so it'd be preferable to just say, '...and am wondering...'.
Also, it'd be more efficient to write '...write "you" with a capital letter...' as '...capitalise "you"...'. 'Capitalise' is a quite commonly used verb.
Don't take my advice on this bit, but I also think it might be '...wondering if you'd normally...', which is like using würdest, because the phrase is reliant on the possibility that the subject is actually writing a letter.
'The' is unnecessary. It doesn't, BTW. 'Dumb' is perfectly acceptable, but informal and a slightly...delinquent...word choice. I'd say, 'In case that question seemed idiotic;', though I'm fairly sure both 'that...seemed' and 'this...seems' are acceptable.
If I understand you correctly, what you're trying to say is, 'Imagine you're doing it in German, not using what you'd consider 'normal' grammar. There are so many changes between the two languages to look out for that I can't remember if this rule [capitalised 'Sie'] is the same or not.'
Which is a bit of a mouthful. I'm finding it hard to render what you're trying to say into a sentence. The intent of what you've written is understandable, but maybe that's because I've been hanging around you for too long.
With 'You're doing it in german', you need to capitalise 'German', for starters. What am I doing though? What 'it' is isn't clear, though I assume you imploring me to imagine myself in your shoes.
The next clause looks like it needs to be reworked. 'Somehow' doesn't really work in that context. '...out of order of the normal grammar' has a misplaced 'the', for starts. It should go before 'order' rather than 'normal', I think, making, '...out of the order of normal grammar'. That still doesn't make much sense, but that's where you would put the 'the', at least. 'Normal' is probably the wrong word to use because it's unclear what you're referring to as 'normal'. Normal for us or normal for you? This might be cleared up with a change in the initial clause.
The final clause is confusing. You suddenly jumped to a different subject, and there is still the problem of not specifying what you're talking about. You're not sure you paid attention to what (note that it's 'paid' rather than 'payed')? If what is the same to where? See my suggested sentence above for what I think you're trying to write. Condensing it down to a short clause probably isn't advisable. Note that that's probably not a problem restricted to your use of English; not sufficiently specifying what you're talking about can probably happen whatever language you're speaking. It's just that when you combine that brevity with some grammatical errors (there are some in the last clause, but it's hard to correct them when the entire clause doesn't make sense independently), things suddenly start to fall apart.
Capitalise 'God' (I guess it's optional nowadays, but conventionally and grammatically it's meant to be capitalised).
'Somehow' doesn't work here, either. If I understand what you're saying correctly, then 'wrong' is probably not the best choice of word. It's not incorrect, but stylistically 'not quite right' is better in this context (and when you add 'profession' to that, the 'the' precedes 'right').
I'd probably go with , 'And no, not God. That's not quite the right profession'.
(Also note that starting a sentence with 'and' is a no-no according to some largely unobserved rule).
Disclaimer: as is probably the case for a lot of native speakers, I don't actually know many grammatical rules, but just go with what sounds right.
A 'corps' (which is a homonym of 'core') is a body, but a body of soldiers, containing between 20 000 and 45 000 men (according to wikipedia). A necromancer would deal with a 'corpse'.
Also, 'blows' would seem preferable to 'blowing' in this context. When you're using *<insert description>*, you're writing in the third person, so the implied pronoun would be 'he', in this case. Though, maybe it's just me that does that in the third person.
For instance:
*attempts to correct The_J* (rather than *attempting to correct The_J*)
'Advice' needs to be quantified with 'some' or 'a lot' or something, rather than being measured with 'short'.
Grammatically, you shouldn't leave out the 'I' in this sentence, though in common usage it's kinda acceptable.
'A' is unnecessary, as 'advice' is not really a 'thing'. It's like 'help' (which could be used instead in this sentence). You wouldn't say 'I need a short help', you'd say 'I need some help'.
'English' should be capitalised.
So, the sentence could read, 'I need some advice in English'. However, that simply implies that you're wanting the advice to be given in English, not that you want advice on the subject of English speaking (though we can figure that out from the context). I would write, 'I need some help with my English', though I can't say for certain that's absolutely correct either.
'I' is always capitalised, so it would be '...and I'm wondering...'. However, restating the subject is a bit redundant, so it'd be preferable to just say, '...and am wondering...'.
Also, it'd be more efficient to write '...write "you" with a capital letter...' as '...capitalise "you"...'. 'Capitalise' is a quite commonly used verb.
Don't take my advice on this bit, but I also think it might be '...wondering if you'd normally...', which is like using würdest, because the phrase is reliant on the possibility that the subject is actually writing a letter.
'The' is unnecessary. It doesn't, BTW. 'Dumb' is perfectly acceptable, but informal and a slightly...delinquent...word choice. I'd say, 'In case that question seemed idiotic;', though I'm fairly sure both 'that...seemed' and 'this...seems' are acceptable.
If I understand you correctly, what you're trying to say is, 'Imagine you're doing it in German, not using what you'd consider 'normal' grammar. There are so many changes between the two languages to look out for that I can't remember if this rule [capitalised 'Sie'] is the same or not.'
Which is a bit of a mouthful. I'm finding it hard to render what you're trying to say into a sentence. The intent of what you've written is understandable, but maybe that's because I've been hanging around you for too long.
With 'You're doing it in german', you need to capitalise 'German', for starters. What am I doing though? What 'it' is isn't clear, though I assume you imploring me to imagine myself in your shoes.
The next clause looks like it needs to be reworked. 'Somehow' doesn't really work in that context. '...out of order of the normal grammar' has a misplaced 'the', for starts. It should go before 'order' rather than 'normal', I think, making, '...out of the order of normal grammar'. That still doesn't make much sense, but that's where you would put the 'the', at least. 'Normal' is probably the wrong word to use because it's unclear what you're referring to as 'normal'. Normal for us or normal for you? This might be cleared up with a change in the initial clause.
The final clause is confusing. You suddenly jumped to a different subject, and there is still the problem of not specifying what you're talking about. You're not sure you paid attention to what (note that it's 'paid' rather than 'payed')? If what is the same to where? See my suggested sentence above for what I think you're trying to write. Condensing it down to a short clause probably isn't advisable. Note that that's probably not a problem restricted to your use of English; not sufficiently specifying what you're talking about can probably happen whatever language you're speaking. It's just that when you combine that brevity with some grammatical errors (there are some in the last clause, but it's hard to correct them when the entire clause doesn't make sense independently), things suddenly start to fall apart.
And no, not god, somehow the wrong profession
Capitalise 'God' (I guess it's optional nowadays, but conventionally and grammatically it's meant to be capitalised).
'Somehow' doesn't work here, either. If I understand what you're saying correctly, then 'wrong' is probably not the best choice of word. It's not incorrect, but stylistically 'not quite right' is better in this context (and when you add 'profession' to that, the 'the' precedes 'right').
I'd probably go with , 'And no, not God. That's not quite the right profession'.
(Also note that starting a sentence with 'and' is a no-no according to some largely unobserved rule).
Disclaimer: as is probably the case for a lot of native speakers, I don't actually know many grammatical rules, but just go with what sounds right.
Winner
Diverse in Unity
I am looking forward to the day when English finally drops definite and indefinite articles, the bane of my existence 
mayor
Heart & Mind
never mind 
To my defense: Many (but not all) of the errors were caused by not paying enough attention to what i write
.But the advice about advice was needed
, as well as some others.Similar threads
