A little piece of trivia today, because I don’t have much time for writing this weekend. Do you know the answer? (By the way, by football I of course mean soccer). I’ll put the answer after this picture of kittens:
This post is inspired by two common and related questions I often see posed online:
Before answering (and mercifully, the answer to both questions is the same, and quite simple), let’s have a look at what word stress actually is. Continue reading
Une bière, s’il vous plait.
Una birra, per favore.
It’s something we might think about before going on holiday: oh, I should learn a few phrases of the local language before I go! And sometimes we do just that: maybe get a phrasebook, or peruse the little section on useful phrases in the Lonely Planet guide a few times. Or we do a quick Google the night before or at the airport because we’d completely forgotten about it until then.
And then we arrive and there a few variations on what happens: either we forget about what we’ve learned, and rely on English and hand gestures; we think about using a few phrases but are terrified and rely on English and hand gestures; or, we use a few phrases here and there. And that can go a couple of different ways. Sometimes ending in English and hand gestures. Continue reading
If you have a spare four hours or so, have a look at all parts of this ITV documentary The Adventure of English. Or the first part of it anyway: Continue reading
Pronouncing names correctly, whether they be first names or surnames, is something most of us are understandably concerned about. This is especially the case if you’re in a situation in which you’re with people with surnames which aren’t familiar to you, like being in front of a class of people learning English. It can be tricky, because other languages often have different pronunciations of letters. And, from experience, our knowledge of those differences can vary.
A common example is Spanish names with J, such as José. The classic mistake is to pronounce the J exactly as it’s normally pronounced in English, as in juice or jam. But you might know that in Spanish, it’s usually more like the letter h in English. So, being very culturally sensitive, you pronounce the J like an H, but then, it’s not exactly as simple as that, is it? It’s a little more strongly pronounced, a little throatier than in English, and the o is more emphasised. But then if we try to pronounce it exactly as a Spanish speaker would, it’s embarrassing. Why is that? Continue reading
What’s your name?
Not a particularly difficult question, generally speaking. In English, when we say name, we usually mean a person’s given, or first, name. Things can be a little more confusing when you have to switch to dealing with French though. I’m currently living in Belgium, and routinely get momentarily confused by forms which ask first for nom, and then prénom. My instinct is to write my first name in the space for nom, until I remember that in French, nom means surname, and prénom means first name. Continue reading
This is the beginning of one of the most common questions English teachers get asked. And the answer is usually, Well, it’s technically correct, but we never actually say that in English. Which in turn is usually met by frustrated sighs. For all the language’s flexibility, we often fix on only one of the many possible ways to express an idea. This is often a tremendous source of frustration for learners, especially if they’re feeling pleased about using a certain grammar form, only for their teacher to tell them what they’re saying doesn’t really sound natural.
Often, this stems from direct translation from one’s mother tongue. In French for example, it’s standard to use nouns to refer to feelings. For example: Continue reading
English-Language Thoughts 