Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Proofreading Service - Pain in the English
Proofreading Service - Pain in the English

Your Pain Is Our Pleasure

24-Hour Proofreading Service—We proofread your Google Docs or Microsoft Word files. We hate grammatical errors with a passion. Learn More

Username

Brus

Member Since

September 4, 2011

Total number of comments

316

Total number of votes received

612

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Latest Comments

Computer mouses or computer mice?

  • December 17, 2016, 7:59am

The computer 'mouse' resembles the rodent, so plural 'mice' does nicely. 'Mouses' is silly, as is being 'geesed' many times, just 'goosed' many times. What is plain wrong but we hear it increasingly is 'behaviours' meaning 'forms of behaviour', and similar inventions of neologisms by forming plurals from collective nouns which don't bear pluralising. Try 'thinkings' for 'thoughts' as in 'the thinking is, the thinkings are ...' - clearly pretentious silliness meant to sound clever but having the opposite effect on the listener, this one anyway. 'Behaviours' - no! no!

Resume, resumé, or résumé?

  • December 5, 2016, 2:16pm

My English dictionary, which has the word with both accents as in French, nevertheless gives the pronunciation as res- as in bet, and the emphasis on the first syllable, which is more natural. Someone suggested emphasising the final syllable, which would be like doing so to the English resumED which would be hard to do, indeed, and frankly quite daft.
I say that if you choose to use a French word as in this case, then pronounce it as in French, or why use it at all? Or use curriculum vitae, much better.

Resume, resumé, or résumé?

  • December 5, 2016, 12:25pm

Pronouncing this word as otherwise than Ray-zoom-ay is just plain wrong. Sandymc44 tells us that he or she was taught at college to pronounce the first syllable as long "a" (so RAH!! Rah-zoom-ay, then? Oh dear!). If long "a" means as in English then Ay, then Ray-zoom-ay, as we are insisting, which is indeed correct. You tell us you were taught it at college, but that it is wrong. Well it isn't: it is correct!

Resume, resumé, or résumé?

  • December 4, 2016, 5:13am

If we think it is pronounced 'resume-ay' we must think it means 'picked up where we left off' rather than 'summary' or 'summarised', and we are wrong then, no? That is why we need two accents, one on the first, another on the final syllable.

Resume, resumé, or résumé?

  • December 4, 2016, 5:09am

A glance in your French dictionary makes it clear that the first and last syllables have acute accents, so the word means 'summary' or more exactly 'summarised'. It is pronounced Ray-zoom-ay, after all.

I have discovered an American comedy show on British television called 'Everyone loves Raymond', in which all members of a family whose ancestors come from Italy but who now live on Long Island greet one another on each entrance on set by saying 'hey' in a listless manner. In Britain it would suggest you are about to rebuke or criticise the addressee, and is no good as a greeting for this reason. On the other hand the British really don't know what to say instead of 'hey'. Here in Dorset people enquire, seemingly anxiously, "You all right then?" on a rising note which can end in a shriek. I would prefer 'hey', but settle for 'good evening/morning/afternoon'.

Computer mouses or computer mice?

  • October 1, 2016, 9:51am

First it was called a mouse because it looked like a mouse, then 'they' thought up a suitable acronym. Of course the plural, should it ever be needed, is "mice", for 'mouses' sounds plain silly. The same applies to goose-geese, and your man who says it is "not acceptable" seems, as it were, to be shooting from the hip: being authoritarian but quoting no authority and using terminology which has a whiff of political correctness about it in its dogmatism. Humourless, too. 'Gooses' is a verb, and renders uncomfortable its use in the context suggested. So I say the plural form of the noun is 'geese' as always.

He was sat

  • June 8, 2016, 10:57am

I agree wholeheartedly. When books which win prizes include passages in dialect I am not persuaded that therefore dialect is proved to be Standard English, as Tom Welch seemed to be arguing there. I am not sure that I go along with "there is no oral English tests", however, simply on the grounds of sing./plur. number. The tests are neglected because the teachers are lefties and think it would be seen as class discrimination. Bring back Latin, I insist.

“Between you and I...”

  • June 2, 2014, 4:47am

When I wrote "German or Russian without it," I meant without reference to grammar, not Latin. Of course you don't need Latin to learn German, but you certainly need grammar.

“Between you and I...”

  • June 2, 2014, 4:45am

Agree with everything you say about using another language as, in part, a device with which to understand your own, and grammar is, surely, the tool to use. I think that Latin is the one to teach for this purpose, and its rigours are surely leavened if Roman culture and history are part of the course. I recommend the Oxford Latin Course by Balme and Norwood for this purpose; the first edition is much more thorough and enjoyable, the second being shortened to accommodate the need for it all to be stuffed into the fewer hours allowed these days. I do not know, nor begin to imagine, how you can learn German or Russian without it, but I have seen for myself how they try now to teach French without reference to your first language, leaving out the grammar too. Enough said about that.