Discussion Forum
This is a forum to discuss the gray areas of the English language for which you would not find answers easily in dictionaries or other reference books.
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Latest Posts : Grammar
So I frequently write headlines such as “Manchester United are in the quarter-finals” but I always wonder if it should actually be “Manchester United is in the quarter-finals”. I think I actually use them interchangeably depending on what mood I’m in. I guess the question is whether a soccer team is a group of players (”are”) or if it’s an entity (”is”). Which is it?
I cannot stand when people say “sleep” instead of “asleep”. For example I’ve heard, “When I got home, he was sleep on the couch”. What is this laziness of not saying ASLEEP?? I have lived in the North all of my life, and most recently moved to the south. This must be some sort of “southern dialect”, annoying to say the least....Has anyone else encountered this?
Which would be correct? There ARE progress and improvements. There IS progress and improvements.
This is what I’d like to have engraved on a memorial brick, but the last line doesn’t look correct with the word “it” after “known”.
I’m glad most
folks let me know
they’re religious.
By their actions,
I wouldn’t have
ever known it.
My wife is a non-native speaker and came up with the phrase above. Rightly or wrongly - I gently suggested that I’d use OR instead of AND ie
“I didn’t sleep last night AND the night before”. --> “I didn’t sleep last night OR the night before”.
That’s based on the sound of it (I’m no expert). The second sentence sounds better to me, but makes no sense really. Why is it “OR”.
In fact I’d probably use a slightly difference sentence in written English (after multiple hacks), and don’t really care re verbal use.
But that’s not my my question. I’ve been wondering about the use of ‘AND’ and ‘OR’ in similar contexts. For example:
“I don’t like chocolate OR ice-cream” “I don’t like chocolate AND ice-cream”
“I don’t like chocolate OR vanilla ice-cream” “I don’t like chocolate AND vanilla ice-cream”.
I think there’s two issues here... the grouping of words, and the way in which OR somehow acts like AND.
The AND vs. OR bit particularly bothers me... Can somebody explain this? In math/logic they are opposite terms.
I was wondering if Curriculum Vita is indeed the usage for a single CV. Is Curriculum Vitae not used in both the plural and singular formats?
How do you refer to two people with the last name Valdez. Is it “the Valdezes” or “Valdez’s” are coming for dinner?
How do pronouns function with a collective noun? Today I was in my College Prep class and we read a sentence that used the pronoun “they” after the word class. The sentence was “The teacher, who was angry, told the class to do whatever they wanted to.”
Would ‘it’ be a better pronoun than that and if not, why?
1. which one is correct? “i am glad to be of some help or i am glad to be of any help?”
2. what`s different between them?
Ok I am always coming up against the following with non-native speakers: disinterest vs uninterested dissatisfied vs unsatisfied disorganised vs unorganised
Any simple rule of thumb or guideline?
