texts:
I have a friend who believes that I can't say I stopped smoking as I have taken it up again (I have given it up and taken it up again a few times before).
I believe that I can say, "I gave up smoking", and that "I stopped smoking", even if I had/have taken up/begun this foul addiction again.
Examples:

I stopped smoking 30 years ago, but I have taken it up again a few times since then.
I gave up smoking 30 years ago, but I took it up again.

Just because I have taken up smoking again, does it mean that I can't say I stopped smoking at a particular time in the past?
That is, is stopping permanent, or can it be temporary?


texts: 'Starting' in March [participle or preposition]

texts:
Starting in March, people will also finally be able to buy the Exodus phone with cash and not just cryptocurrency.

Is 'starting' here a participle form of a verb or a preposition?

If it's a participle, how come it's not a dangling participle?

EDIT

By 'dangling participle' I mean:
The test is whether the omitted subject of the participle is the same as the subject of the matrix clause. If it is not, it's a dangling participle. There are some exceptions, but you get the picture.

In the above example, if the omitted subject of Starting is the same as people, it's not a dangling participle.

I think the omitted subject of Starting is not people, so theoretically this is a dangling participle. But it is a well-formed construction. Hence the question.

I think there are two ways to resolve this dilemma:
(1) to show that Starting in March is a prepositional phrase; or
(2) to show that an exception applies so 'dangling' doesn't matter.


texts: Why is Ukraine often called "the Ukraine"?

texts:
Possible Duplicate:
  Using the definite article before a country/state name

Hearing the Ukraine used to make me unsure whether Ukraine was really a country.  Now though I have realized Ukraine to be a country on the same level as Austria, for instance, I still don't understand why it is often the Ukraine in English, but never the Austria or the Poland. Where did that odd phrase come from, and why is it in use?


texts: Difference between "mind" and "heart" in Gunslinger's Creed in Dark Tower

texts:
In the 2017 moive "Dark Tower" (based on Steven King's Dark Tower), the main character recites the Gunslinger's Creed which is as follows:

"I do not aim with my hand; he who aims with his hand has forgotten the face of his father. I aim with my eye.
I do not shoot with my hand; he who shoots with his hand has forgotten the face of his father. I shoot with my mind.
I do not kill with my gun; he who kills with his gun has forgotten the face of his father. I kill with my heart."

I understand the difference between mind and heart is usually interpreted as the former being more rational and the latter being more sentimental. Do you think I can apply the same interpretation to this creed? That is, can I understand that "I shoot with my mind" suggests that you must shoot while being calm and having clear mind (not being absent-minded)? On the other hand, I interpreted "I kill with my heart" as not forgetting the purpose for fighting as a gunslinger, the savior of the world. These phrases are a bit poetic, so there may not be any clear-cut answer, but it would be helpful if someone could suggests some ideas. Thank you.


texts: Even though mm is a shortened form of millimeter, would mm be written as 'an mm' or 'a mm', given that m starts with an 'e' sound.


texts: Is it correct to insert other words between modal verbs and the verbs that come after them?

texts:
Usually, Whenever I insert other words (for example, adverbs) between modal verbs and the verbs coming after them, Microsoft Word asks for revising in the order of words. Is that insertion incorrect grammatically or style-wise?

Example:

  It is not clear if that may, as an independent factor, affect the value.

I know that writers are advised to avoid split infinitive, but it is not grammatically incorrect and one may do it when there is no other way. Is is the same about insertion between modal verbs and the verbs after them?


texts: What do you call a question at the beginning of a questionnaire?

texts:
In a questionnaire for a housing survey, it starts with the following question:

Do you rent the house you are living in?
If the respondent answers "No", move on to the next question.
If the answer is "Yes", say "Thank you" and leave.

This question is like a probing question to know if the tenant is a real owner or a renter. So, what do you call this kind of question? Something like a "test question"?


texts: What does the phrase "Fee-fi-fo-fum" actually mean?

texts:
Fee-fi-fo-fum;
I smell the blood of an Englishman.
Be he alive or be he dead,
I'll grind his bones to make my bread.

Joseph Jacobs, Jack and the Beanstalk (1890)
I've read about the origin of 'Fee-fi-fo-fum' but what does it actually mean?


texts: Is "reserved" an adjective or verb in this example?

texts:
I need an answer about this sentence please:

  We had a reserved seat.

Reserved in this sentence is a verb. I read that in a morphology book.
My question is: how does this become a verb?  I thought it was an adjective.


texts: What is the meaning of "some" in this sentence?

texts:
What does some mean in the following sentence? Does it has a meaning similar to hardly any?

Some consensus has been reached regarding the theoretical basis for
measuring the cost of travel time.


texts: Indefinite article in the "An [adjective] [number] [plural noun]" construction

texts:
I wasn't sure how best to phrase the title of this question.

I'm interested in constructions of the following form:

  An estimated 50 people died in the bombing.

'An estimated' could be substituted with adverbs like 'approximately' or 'about', so it seems that prepending the indefinite article to certain words produces an adverb.

My question is why the indefinite article should function in this way.

For one thing, the use of 'a[n]' when the following noun is generally plural seems odd.

There are quite a few words that fit this pattern:

An additional ...
An approximate ...
An estimated ...
An extra ...
A good ...
A huge ...
A mere ...
A possible ...
A record ...
A scant ...
A whopping ...


texts: What is "better than I could have ever created" in one or two words?

texts: It sounds pretty lengthy-- how can I trim it down?


texts: Why he didn't use "to do" in this question: "What exactly did your Uncle say I was going to be doing?"

texts: I'm confused about the grammar in this sentence.


texts: Is there an adjective for "something that tends to be forgotten easily"?

texts:
When a learner does not practice a language for a while the language tends to be forgotten.

What is the adjective to describe this characteristic of learning a language or any other subject?

"This subject is ..."
Or
"Language is ..."

Note - To me, when something is "forgettable", you kind of want to forget it because it is ,maybe, not worth it to be remembered, but in the case of language and other subjects of study, I though it might be something different.


texts: What’s the difference between “cite” and “cite to”?

texts:
From page 69 of Frederick Shauer’s Thinking Like a Lawyer:

  A New York state court may cite to a case decided in Vermont . . . The
  courts are not even required to cite to these “authorities,” let alone follow
  them.

Why does this use cite to?  Why isn’t it simply cite?

What are the similarites and differences?


texts: What do you call a person who always has what you need?

texts: For example I seem to always have what everybody needs/wants, from Advil to bobby pins to a deck of cards. What would you call me?


texts: Is there a term for being aware of new things, such as 'my ____(being aware of new) for music has increased since having used this new website'.


texts: Should objects be singular or plural in percentage statistics?

texts:
I work in marketing, so I often see stats that reference smartphone penetration/usage.
Which of the following is correct? I've seen both.

65% frequently check items on their phone while in-store
65% frequently check items on their phones while in-store

What about:

Their confidence, camaraderie and try-it-once attitudes define every aspect of their lifestyle.
Their confidence, camaraderie and try-it-once attitudes define all aspects of their lifestyles

And:

Chinese male millennials depend heavily on their phones when shopping in-store.
Chinese male millennials depend heavily on their phone when shopping in-store.

Or:

65% say their phone is the most valuable tool when they’re in-store
65% say their phones are the most valuable tools when they’re in-store

Please help, this is so confusing! I, for the most part, get collective subject and plural/singular verb usage, but am often confused about the plurality and singularity of the object nouns.
Thanks in advance!


texts: What is the social context of "pizzazz"?

texts: The word can also be written "pzaz" and "pizazz". I have found some definitions, but I want a synonym. As English is not my natural tongue, I also don't exactly know what it means socially. Is it the same as je ne sais quois?


texts: Is there a word for this geological formation?

texts:
Is there a word for a very tall, narrow rock formation whose base is on the sea floor and the tip is above sea level?

There is this similar formation above sea level.


texts: What is a compound adjective for "chemical + colloidal"?

texts:
I am trying to figure out what would be the correct compound adjective which I can use instead of "chemical and colloidal". I would expect it to be similar to "physicochemical". What are the rules of making such type of adjectives? I came across "chemocolloidal" and "chemicolloidal" but not sure which one is correct, if any. Also, do we need to use the -al suffix for "colloid"?
Will greatly appreciate your help and explanation.


texts:
I know the definite article is frequently used before word Internet in most of cases like

  Free use of the Internet.

However, I found when it is used with other nouns, lets just say Wifi, it will drop off the definite article.

  Free use of Internet and Wifi


texts:
In the book A Song of Ice and Fire I came across this sentence, the meaning of which isn't clear to me:

  "Have you drawn any watches this past week, Will? Yes,m'lord."

What does this sentence mean and what is a watch?


texts:
I would like to ask whether my usage here is right or wrong:

  Inman had started a long journey. He met persons who helped him, as
  well as persons who tried to turn him in to the Black Guard whose job
  was capturing and killing the deserters.

I want to say that somone met two types of people, and I thought about using as well as for that.


texts: What does it mean to "sabotage an agenda"?

texts:
There was the following passage in Time magazine’s article (Nov. 15, 2015) that came under the title, “Is Iran finally ready for change?”

  “The arrests of prominent Iranian Americans are widely interpreted
  inside Iran as hard-liner provocations, an attempt to sabotage an
  agenda that is about to slip from their grasp for good. The larger
  trends – including a youthful population eager to engage the outside
  world – favor the moderates. By agreeing to delink hijab from politics, Iran's rulers surrendered a central tenet of the ideology they claim to serve.

I’m not clear with the meaning of “sabotage an agenda". What does “agenda” mean here? What word can be replaced with “agenda”?

Oxford Dictionary defines the meaning of "agenda" as:

A list of items to be discussed at a formal meeting.
A plan of things to be done or problems to be addressed.
The underlying intentions or motives of a particular person or group:

If I apply either of 2. or 3. definition, whose agenda is it in the above quote, hard-liners or their opponents' agenda – plan or intention?


texts:
Dong as in ding-dong is clearly onomatopoetic as confirmed by etymonline.com:

  ding dong
      imitative of the sound of a bell, c.1560.

and similarly for ding:

  ding (v.)
      1819, "to sound as metal when struck," possibly abstracted from ding-dong, of imitative origin. The meaning "to deal heavy blows" is c.1300, probably from Old Norse dengja "to hammer," perhaps also imitative. Meaning "dent" is 1960s. Related: Dinged; dinging.

What, then, is the origin of dong to mean penis? Etymonline.com is no help here:

  dong (n.)
      "penis," 1891, of unknown origin.

We also have a much more recent word, dongle, which has no entry at etymonline.com but wiktionary claims it is:

  Apparently from dangle.

This leads me to the theory that the anatomical and onomatopoetic dongs
are not related and that the former usage, like dongle, derives from dangle. So, my questions are:

Is that so? Does dong (penis) derive from dangle? Sounds reasonable enough but I have found no definitive sources for it.
Does dongle derive from dangle? It makes perfect descriptive sense for dong but the USB devices called dongles do not dangle but instead protrude quite rigidly, so I feel that dongle being derived from the cruder meaning of dong makes more sense.


texts: Past participle of a verb created from an acronym

texts:
Standard GPL would require that those applications be GPL'd (or compatible licensing), whereas LGPL requires only the library's source to be made available.

Is the use of words like GPL'd common to other acronyms?
Is the meaning of such words understandable from common people?


texts: Is there any Idiom or provide verb that would imply " You cannot conceal such facts or issues"?

texts:
I'm looking for an idiom or expression that could be used for criticizing someone who tries to hide a big fact in their life/ an important issue while the nature of that fact/ issue is so that it will be disclosed inevitably.

For example:

1- A pregnant woman who tries to hide her pregnancy

2- A celebrity who has had a nose job or another cosmetic surgery but tries to keep it as a secret

3- A person who has fallen in love with somebody, engaged or married recently but tries to not disclose it

4- A country that sells military equipment and ammunition to another country secretly (but it is clear that after those equipment are applied or used, everybody would find out where they have been made in.)

We Iranians use this proverb:

  "You cannot ride a camel furtively."

Like in:

  "Why are you trying to hide you're pregnancy?! You'll eventually start showing and people will know. As the proverb says "You cannot ride a camel furtively".

Is there any idiom, expression, or proverb for criticizing behavior or implying " such facts or issues cannot be concealed"?

PS:

1- For a person who tries to conceal the fact he/ she is in love with somebody, I just found this proverb: "Love and cough cannot be hid", but I don't think it can be used for my other examples too.

2- In the bellow cartoon the former president of Yemen is shown while riding a camel furtively (I found it in a Persian website and it had no comment, so I just used it for showing that Persian proverb and translated the Persian texts into English).


texts: What are "up" and "down" in "up there" and "down there"?

texts: "Up there" and "down there" are two of the most frequent expressions that I, myself, use often.  I really don't know whether they are just expressions used to refer to a place to go ("I went down there and picked up the mail") or whether they have some significance attached to them. Like recently at the airport, somebody told me "to go down there for the International terminal" and I wondered whether they meant "down" literally, or was it just the expression?


texts: What is the definition of DRAIN used as follows “..and I've gone out to have a DRAIN with him.”

texts:
What is the definition for "drain" as a NOUN as used by W. Somerset Maugham in

the following: “..and I've gone out to have a DRAIN with him.”

(From the short story "The Fall of Edward Barnard").

I assume it means to have a drink (verb) from, for example, "drain a glass of beer". However, was it ever recognized as a noun or did Maugham throw in a piece of slang he'd heard. Sounds like it may be Irish.


texts:
Please, can you give me a cup of water?
Can you give me a cup of water, please?
Can you please give me a cup of water?

What's the difference in the above?  They seem similar to be, but subtle differences may be present?  Is any one of them more formal?


texts: What is the idiom or expression used to say that "what someone has done is nothing special"?

texts: Something like praising someone ironically when they have messed up or they don't derserve it.


texts: Preposition IN Vs Preposition ON when writing by an electronic device

texts: It is not clear to me, when to use IN and when to use ON in sentences such as: "Keep it organized on your computer or in a notebook." What about if the gadget selected to write were a Laptop/Palm/Cell-phone/Tablet? Bye.


texts:
(I am not a native speaker.)

I just got an email regarding a failed order that used the following sentence:

  I appreciate that this will not be what you wanted to hear and for that I apologize.

I understand what this sentence is trying to convey. But when you use I appreciate in that order, it sounds like he is appreciating that I am not satisfied.

I just wanted to know whether you can use appreciate like that, or whether whoever wrote that sentence made a small mistake.


texts: I am not a native English speaker. I was wondering how to express the situation in which one uses a tool for something other than what it was meant to be, and in a bad way so that you are not doing your best, or you are hurting yourself with your ignorance about the tool you use.


texts: Meaning of a waste of time in a specific sentence.

texts:
I'm reading this article, there is a sentence as follow:

  It would be foolish, not to mention a waste of time, to recount Wenger’s glories at Arsenal

I don't understand what does it mean by not to mention a waste of time here.

Does it mean it's a waste of time if not recount Wenger's glories at Arsenal?

Please explain for me,

Thanks.


texts: What adjective (other than "last") means "most-recent previous"?

texts:
If I were to say "the previous item" or "the prior item" or "the preceding item", I could be referring either to the most-recent previous item, or to any other item logically coming before the current one.

How can I refer to not just any prior item, but the last or most-recent item, without using the word "last"?

I'm especially interested in a word that would be a suitable replacement for the "most-recent previous" in technical writing.

By way of clarification...

I'm looking for alternative terminology that de-emphasizes the concept of time and emphasizes the concept of logical ordering.  The word "recent" seems too attached to the concept of time.  The phrase "most-recent previous" is, frankly, a mouthful --- especially if used repeatedly. The word "last" has the potential to be confused with the ultimate in an entire series, rather than merely the immediate predecessor of any specifically-referred to item the series.


texts: Can "learnings" always be replaced by "knowledge" or "lessons"?

texts:
I've come across the word "learnings" twice recently -

Stripe - "Running an online business is a difficult endeavor. Stripe Elements let you take advantage of Stripe’s collective learnings in security and building/optimizing checkout experiences so that you can focus on your product."
Microsoft - "In this post, I will cover: [..] * Key Learnings"

It seems to me that the word "learnings" can be replaced with "knowledge" (in the first case) or "lessons" (in the second case) with a clearer meaning. Is there some additional nuance conveyed by the word "learnings"? Is there a situation where the "learnings" conveys intent better than the alternatives?

For example, this answer says:

  My personal impression is that the modern use sounds like annoying business jargon or non-native speaker use, and I would not use it myself.


texts: Redundant command as an affirmation of authority?

texts:
I am fairly certain that there's an idiomatic phrase for this, referring to either the situation or the person. It's on the tip of my tongue.

Scenario: Alice tells Bob to stop making a such a noise with his power tools. Bob replies that he had already stopped an hour ago and was anyway done for the day.

How would you describe Alice, who instructed Bob to do something which he already did or was going to do? In other words, she gave him a redundant order that serves no purpose other than to reaffirm authority and stroke her own ego. Alternatively, she's making a show of strength by demanding that something that's already been done, be done.

It's similar in concept to the French phrase "faire la mouche du coche" but not quite. It's along the lines of gadfly, backseat driver, busybody, or tooting one's own horn.

EDIT: The closest matches so far are control freak and megalomaniac, but those still don't describe the post-facto aspect.


texts:
In Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, this phrase was used:

  "hold up on all those wonderful seven-dollar questions."

Does seven-dollar questions mean silly, useless questions?


texts:
We usually say that we 'write a column in newspaper' but if it's related to computer and all what do we use then? Do we say 'creating a column' instead?
For example if we have to fill in a blank like 'It takes time to _ a witty column' what should we fill in?


texts: Is there an adjective to express a quality of being risky and dangerous but highly rewarding?


texts:
Which one is correct?

Data gets backup to your computer.

Data gets backed up to your computer.


texts: "Sub optimally" vs "sub-optimally", which should be preferred?

texts: When writing "the part performs sub optimally", should that instead be "the part performs sub-optimally"?


texts: Maybe vs Probably? There is a lot of confusion

texts:
Maybe/Might = >0% something will occur
Probably = It is likely something will occur
Why does saying "probably" imply more confidence than "maybe/might" if both imply that something will possibly occur?
Context:
Person A is hosting a party, and invited Person B, but Person B has not replied. Person A sees Person B, and asks:
Person A: "Are you coming to my party?"

Person B: "Maybe." This introduces a possibility that the person will come. It does not say anything about the measure of the possibility, though.

Person B: "Probably." This introduces a high possibility that the person will come. "Probably" also implies "might".

Why is "Maybe" thought of "less probable" than "Probably" if the measure of possibility for "maybe" is unknown? It could be "high possibiligy" as well?


texts: Figuring out the meaning and syntax of the English translation of Charmides

texts:
I was reading The Dialogues of Socrates translated into English and one particular sentence in Charmides sprung out as odd. I can't tell what it is trying to say, but I also can't figure out if it is grammatically correct or not.

Very good, I said; and did you not admit, just now, that temperance is noble?
Yes, certainly, he said.
And the temperate are also good?
Yes.
And can that be good which does not make men good?
Certainly not.

I'm guessing that this is correct English but it simply fell out of usage in modern times (e.g. saying "[VERB] + not" instead of "Do + not + [VERB]" for negation). Having said all that, I'm not sure what it is.


texts: I am writing a user manual and am stuck upon these include and this includes. Do I use This includes when there is only one thing involved? For example, "This includes normal users" and "This includes the front door". And do I use These include when there are two or more things? For example: "These include the lights and doors", "These include administrators and normal users".


texts: Specifically, my students were asking why the terms "nonliving" and "undead" are the way they are. (And why "unliving" and "nondead" seem wrong.)


texts: "It is that ..." sentences in a non-linguistic context

texts:
I sometimes see or hear "It is that ..." sentences as the following:

  (1) "It's not that I don't want to support you. It's just that I don't know how."

I'd like to know if "It is that ..." sentences can give an explanation to a non-linguistic context.
For example, how about (2)?

  (2) [Context: The speaker coughs badly, and the hearer watches him/her with an anxious look.]
  "It's not that I'm sick. It's just that the water went down the wrong pipe."

I apologize if my English isn't very good.
Thank you.


texts:
What is the meaning of like growing up in the following sentence?

  Now, you grew up in Southern California. What was it like growing up
  on the beach in the summer?


texts:
To wash clothes is to launder. Then why is there no e in laundry?

Is the base word same in both?

Was e used in laundry earlier? When did it come to be dropped?


texts:
I saw a girl wearing a tshirt says Eat yourself smart.
When I search for eat oneself, the result brings up cannibalism or such. But there're books published as Eat youtself calm, young, beautiful.. What makes difference?  Why not say Eat smart?


texts: Can "that" as a pronoun be used without a leading noun?

texts:
An apple is on the table

edit: apparently these two didn't get separated when I typed it in. It's now separated

I looked at that

"That" is used as a pronoun
In this case, "apple" is the noun "that" is referring to.
But is something like this possible?(without a noun that is referring to of course)

that which he likes is good.

To prevent the X Y problem, I'll put the original sentence in question below

While some might think that all professors do is lecture a few times a week and assign some homework, that's not all Prof.

I think the original form is

...think that(clause leading "that") that(pronoun) that(relative pronoun) all professors do...

Would like a detailed response to this.
Thanks in advance


texts: the lives of children or the children's lives?

texts: Is the children's lives grammatically wrong? I am not a native English speaker. It just sounds more nature for me to say the lives of children instead of the children's lives.  Or these two are both correct? Thank you !


texts: "Read the sentence aloud" vs "Speak the sentence aloud"

texts:
A. Read the sentence aloud.

B. Speak the sentence aloud.

Which is more natural among native English speakers?

Is there any subtle difference between the two?

Thanks in advance.


texts: "The pair was ..." or "the pair were ..."

texts:
I've recently read a blurb from a local paper that included the following:

  The pair was drinking prior to the shooting.

To me, this appears wrong and I would say that the proper way to make the statement would be:

  The pair were drinking prior to the shooting.

Is the original article correct?


texts: Analogue of "orphan" for someone who's lost their siblings

texts:
As per title - is there such a word?

Either a noun:

  John is an ??????  (his only brother died when he was 3)

or verb (or past tense as an adjective):

  John  was ????ed today (his only sister died today)


texts:
From the movie "Atomic Blonde"

The main character, Lorraine, is briefed by her bosses about a secret document, the list, which can expand the Cold War for another 40 years, if Russians have it.

  If the Russians get that list, we're all buggered sideways.

I suppose it's some kind of British slang, but it doesn't make any sense to me. Especially the "sideways" part.


texts: Interesting: What's wrong with this sentence

texts:
Born of Ibuza parents in Nigeria, novelist Buchi Emeta moved to England in 1962, since which she has lived in North London.

The part in bold should be corrected/improved-accroding to the SAT mcq answer sheet-as "1962, and has lived in North London since then". But I don't know what's wrong with the original.


texts:
Can "would rather" be followed with a past perfect? Can it be used to express a regret, a wish the past had been different?

Example taken from First Certificate Language Practice by Michael Vince, page 43:

  I would rather you did not tell John about this.

Neither now, nor later, that is.

How about earlier? "I would rather you had not told John about this."?


texts: Is there any syntactic technicality preventing double contractions from ever becoming valid?

texts:
Possible Duplicates:
  Is “I'd've” proper use of the English Language?
  Can a word be contracted twice (e.g. “I'ven't”)?

I think the contraction "we'd've" for "we would have" is disallowed, but it doesn't seem technically incorrect. It seems to work well with common phrases like "we'd've gotten killed out there".

Of course, it's common in spoken English, but single contractions are quite common in written English, so I can't really see any reason that doubles shouldn't be allowed.

Is there a non-historical reason that it's invalid now, other than that it's not in any dictionary? Could it possibly become valid over the course of time?


texts: which is suitable for wine, "sourness" or "acidity"?

texts:
Which adjective is suitable for tastes of wine? And why?

I'd like to know which expression you usually use and if there is any difference.

More context: I had a chance to translate ”酸味”, which means both sour and acid, to English for a wine description. Then I wondered which word, sourness or acidity, sounds more natural for English speakers to explain the taste of wine.


texts: Should I capitalize "l" if I put log2 at beginning of a sentence?

texts:
For example, which of the following is correct?

A:

  log2 fold change of A is larger than that of B.

B:

  Log2 fold change of A is larger than that of B.

I was thinking "log2" is a function name and don't need to be capitalized.


texts: What does it mean by "made a national champion of"?

texts:
"Although the chip battle may have pre-dated Mr Trump, his presidency has intensified it. He has made a national champion of Qualcomm, blocking a bid for it from a Singaporean firm for fear of Chinese competition. "

What's the meaning of "He has made a national champion of Qualcomm, blocking a bid for it from a Singaporean firm for fear of Chinese competition?"
Thanks!


texts:
The novelist Kingsley Amis - Lucky Jim (1954) uses the word though he puts it in quotation marks. It appears three times in the novel.

First use:

  "Well, if you drink as much as that you must expect to feel a bit
  off-colour the next day, mustn't you?" She drew herself upright in her
  seat in a schoolmarm attitude.
        He remembered his father, who until the war had always worn stiff white collars, being reproved by the objurgatory jeweller as
  excessively "dignant" in demeanour. This etymological sport
  expressed for Dixon exactly what he objected to in Christine. He said
  rather coldly: "Yes, I must mustn't I?"

Second use:

  How well really the Callaghan girl had behaved, in spite of her
  stand-offishness at times, and how sound her suggestion had been.
  That, and her laughing fit, proved that she wasn't as "dignant" as
  she looked. He remembered uneasily the awful glow of her skin, the
  distressing clarity of her eyes, the immoderate whiteness of those
  slightly irregular teeth.

Third use:

  "Not that I think there's anything foolish in coming to see you. Oh, I
  just don't seem to be able to put it in any way that sounds at all
  sensible." Little by little and intermittently, she was adopting her
  "dignant" tone and physical attitude.

There is no OED entry for dignant


texts:
I'm trying to figure out whether it's appropriate to use "percussion" or "percussions" in the following sentences:

A break can be any musical segment (typically four measures or less), even if it doesn't contain percussions/percussion.
Drum breaks, breaks, or breakbeats are percussions-only/percussion-only passages typically found in funk, soul, and jazz recordings.

I'm leaning towards the plural because:

You would say "This is a members-only event".
As seen here (http://www.orsymphony.org/edu/instruments/woodwinds.aspx), you say "the woodwind family", but "the mouthpieces for some woodwinds".

I want to label certain objects as being either "percussion(s)-only" or "not only percussion(s)", and would therefore appreciate answers which adhere to this usage, rather than suggesting a more verbose alternative.


texts:
In the comments of an answer on English Language Learners, I explained to a non-native speaker the usage of "tonight" as being something like "the current or forthcoming night": during the nighttime, it refers to the current night; during the day it refers to the night that will start at the end of that day.

Another user disagrees, and says:

  Tonight is an ambiguous word. Generally, I have to clarify with those around me whether they're talking about "now" or the night period that just elapsed (if it's morning) or talking about the next night period that has not yet begun. Most people don't seem to realize there was a need to disambiguate their usage of the term.

The emphasis is mine, and highlights a usage of "tonight" which I don't believe I've ever encountered.

I'm a native (UK) English speaker and wrote my explanation primarily based on my own experience and intuition, but I did check several dictionaries (both UK and US) before posting it to make sure the advice wasn't misguided.

For example, Oxford Dictionaries provides the following definition:

  On the present or approaching evening or night.

Merriam-Webster:

  on this present night or the night following this present day

Cambridge:

  (during) the night of the present day:

American Heritage Dictionary:

  On or during the present or coming night.

All of the above definitions correspond to my understanding of the word, and seem to me to unambiguously exclude the interpretation as "the night period that just elapsed". I did find references to that interpretation on dictionary.com:

  Obsolete. during last night.

and at Collins:

  obsolete
  last night

but in both cases the definition is marked as obsolete, which I take to mean it is no longer in common usage (or if it is, the usage is confined to one or more relatively small areas).

I'd be very interested if anybody could provide evidence (preferably not just anecdotal) for or against this usage being widespread in English today (and any geographical trends relating to the usage). I asked the other user about their location and they said they

  live in the USA and have lived in various places throughout the country. In every single locale, I've dealt with ambiguous usage of "tonight"

so this wouldn't be explained by a usage local to some small area.


texts: 2 words that describes a keeping an argument on track

texts:
I have an interest in philosophy, argument, and reason. The problem I'm having is I take on all kinds of opponents and so sometimes when I'm reasoning with people that aren't accustomed to how frustrating and pointless it can be to not have a contextual and topical consensus for the scope of the conversation, I'm forced to make many elaborate diversions from the argument scolding my opponent on the importance of staying on topic - etc. Its soooo frustrating. I'm kind of happy with the phrase "diverging from the topical/contexual scope" to try to bring the argument on track as quick as possible, but I have another even more frustrating issue in need of that perfect word/phrase :).

I've been arguing with a psychologist lately and we have some interesting chats on the iPhone. I have trouble keeping her on topic so we can take something to it's logical conclusion, but I can sort of manage that. Its especially frustrating on the iPhone because you can only type so fast and so you must stay on topic and "play by the rules" as they say or its doubly frustrating.

Every now and again she will take my frustration on her going off topic constantly as a reflection of "my inner angst and hurt emanating from my childhood". The more my frustration builds at what the hell that had to do with our arguments on the nature of consciousness, the more she pushes the point; "why do you have so much hurt, we need to get to the bottom of this" in a more and more condescending way. She sets up for herself a tautology that creates a false cause for any increasing frustration. If I can get her off my inner hurt, she brings it up again when she disagrees with a conclusion - "you're saying something illogical as a reflection of your inner conflict from your hurt".  As you might be able to imagine it's an argument ending thing and I have to just say "look, I've got to go - talk later". I've even tried saying "yeah I'm hurt, but lets just finish this discussion first and talk about that next" simply to try to stop from talking about everything at once.

Whats the word for this ploy that is inherently tautological and slightly ad hominem in nature and makes further discussion useless. A blanket statement? Another one I just thought of would be an ignorant person dismissing any argument a woman comes up with that disagrees with his being as a result of her being "on the time of the month". The frustration the woman would feel from being so cruelly disarmed would feed into the accusation nicely (tautological), much like the "your angry cause your hurt" ploy used by my opponent.

Is there a tidy phrase or term for these tactics?


texts: Phrase to describe a potential positive future for a person?

texts:
I am describing a person whose recent performance has been excellent and whose future has potential.

What expression can be used other than "future looks potential" or "has a bright future"? It should be used to give an idea of an optimistic impression of the person's future.


texts:
I see these sentences in the dictionary,how do I distinguish when I use "rather than"?

  Why didn't you ask for help,rather than trying to do it on your own?(v. ing)

  Rather than go straight on to university why not get some work experience first? (v. )

  Bryson decided to quit rather than accept the new rules (v.)


texts:
Possible Duplicate:
  What exactly is an “adverb”?

Consider the following sentences:

  She went home.
  He swam yesterday.

Are the words "home" and "yesterday" adverbs or direct objects? Why? They both seem to modify the verb, but they are also both nouns.


texts: What would be a word that means pushing someone to their limit in a negative form

texts: I'm currently writing a story about a young man who was took everything from him and that died for the causes he fought for, I'm looking for a word that means taking everything from someone and more.


texts: "in sufficient numbers" OR "in/a sufficient number"?

texts:
The extract below is from an essay written by a private student of mine. The topic is about the measures a college could adopt to make it more environmentally friendly.

  Most of the colleges don't go further than the simple "paper" and "plastic" bins, which, in most of the cases, are not even in sufficient number to cover all the structures attended by students.

I am uncertain about the words in bold, should it be:

are ... in sufficient numbers
are... a sufficient number
None of the above. The original is acceptable
Most...are... in sufficient number

The term number is usually singular when it precedes a countable noun; e.g., a/the number of bins, a/the number of colleges, but what if it follows the subject? Should number become numbers?

I could rephrase that particular section:

  …the number of which, in most cases, is insufficient to cover…

But I would like to keep the word order and sentence structure as close as possible to the original.

Please help, I've been working quite a bit during the summer and my brain is totally fritto (fried), I just can't figure this one out.


texts:
If I want to dedicate my article to all the women in the world, should I write
"To women"
or
"To the women"?


texts: What does this sentence imply, as worded, in terms of the amount of Caucasians, e.g. some, all or another amount of Caucasians?

texts: "Next time Caucasians might think about voting with facts and common sense instead of with their white guilt."


texts:
Lionsgate just released a poster and a trailer for their upcoming western movie The Kid, with the tagline "It only matters the story they tell when you're gone".

As far as I can think of, the only occasions in which the verb matter takes an object are when it's an interrogative, as in "It doesn't matter what the intent is."

Is "It only matters the story they tell when you're gone" grammatical? If so, how is it parsed? And what does it mean? If not, what is the effect they are supposedly trying to achieve with the tagline?


texts:
How this sentence "The weather being very bad, we did not start the journey" is reduced?
I cannot understand what structure is applied for the clause "the weather being very bad".


texts:
[Candy] "That's the boss's son," he said quietly. "Curley's
  pretty handy. He done quite a bit in the ring. He's a lightweight, and he's handy."

  "Well, let him be handy," said George. "He don't have to take
  after Lennie. Lennie didn't do nothing to him. What's he got against Lennie?"

  Of Mice and Men (1937) by John Steinbeck

The adjective “handy" usually refers to something conveniently near, a useful object or someone skilful with their hands but in this instance it seems that handy refers to someone who is prone to using physical violence. We learn that Curley is a bit of  a boxer “He done quite a bit in the ring”, so he knows how to throw a punch and defend himself in a fight.

Online some sites suggest that handy denotes physical strength, and some suggest that Curley is skilful in picking fights.

However, none of the dictionaries I checked; The American Heritage Dictionary (AHD), Oxford Dictionaries (EOD), Collins (CED), and Cambridge Dictionary (CD) tell me that handy refers to a an aggressive person who uses their fists or hands.  In Italian the term manesco , which is derived from the noun mano (hand), refers to someone who is quick to use their hands in a violent manner. For example, a mother who slaps her children is una mamma manesca, and a husband who beats his wife is un marito manesco.

I'm  guessing this is an example of semantic shifting but I have never come across this secondary meaning before.

Am I mistaken? Do the three instances of  "handy" in the excerpt above refer to Curley as being skilled with his hands. Was it meant to be ironic?
Is it an example of American dialectal usage? Is it an example of Candy's idiolect?
What would have been the the standard American English equivalent of handy, meaning a person inclined to physical violence, in the 1930s?


texts: Antonym for 'serial', as in 'a serial publication'

texts:
I'm looking for a word that signifies the opposite of a serial publication, where a serial publication is described like:

  The first novella in a three-part series.

Or:

  A quarterly publication.

The British expression "one-off" accurately describes the concept, but it seems more colloquial and dismissive, i.e., something that is meant as a draft or a prototype, than what I'm looking for. Surely this word exists.

A use case would be publishing a short-form comic or zine. Some issues would be serial: it will take 3 or 6 (or at least more than one) issues to cover a storyline. Others will be "one-off": it will only take one issue or strip or panel to cover a storyline.


texts:
"Jennings is the founder of Mambo, the Australian surf-wear brand famous for its cheeky prints. It started as a backyard project in the 1980s and grew into a multi-million dollar company with 22 stores worldwide."

source:http://money.cnn.com/2016/03/10/smallbusiness/dare-jennings-australia-surfing/index.html?iid=INTL_SPC


texts:
It seems that two different structures are used to indicate that one event causes a reduction/increase in something else.

(1-a) This lifestyle might lead to a reduced blood pressure.
(1-b) This lifestyle might lead to a reduction in blood pressure.
(2-a) The changes in agricultural production are believed to be due to
reduced oil prices.
(2-b) The changes in agricultural production are believed to be due to a decrease in oil price.

I personally feel that(1-b) and (2-b) are more straightfoward than the other opition but (1-a) and (2-a) seem to be equally common.
Is there any difference between the two structures in terms of nuances and register?
Thank you.


texts: What is the correct use of present participle and "by" in a sequence of actions?

texts:
When writing a sequence of actions that happen after each other I get regularly confused about the correct use of the present participle. For example in:

A: I prefer learning by gaining an overview first and then deepen the understanding of the details.
B: I prefer learning by gaining an overview first and then deepening the understanding of the details.
C: I prefer learning by gaining an overview first and by then deepening the understanding of the details.

I’m not sure which grammatical rules should exactly be used here.


texts: I'm looking for an adjective which means "few people know", "only professionals know"

texts:
I'm looking for an adjective which means "few people know" or "only professionals know".

Especially, I want to describe settlement & clearing fields as "__________ fields".

Here is a full sample sentence. "I needed to learn the business model of XXXXX (the name of company which provides clearing services). However, because settlement & clearing is a very _____ field, it was very difficult to research by myself."

I came up with a word "esoteric" and found other posts discussing this word, but I'm not quite sure this word can be applied to context above for the following two reasons.
1. I thought "esoteric" means something like very eccentric hobbies, not formal things. Therefore, if I refer to settlement & clearing as "esoteric fields", it may sound humorous.
2. I'm not sure how frequently this word is used by native speakers.


texts:
Suppose Jason were at home and a mail carrier came to his front door with a letter addressed to Jason. Which of the following is correct?

It was a letter for Jason.
It was a letter to Jason.


texts:
I am an English teacher—a non-native, of course. During teaching my coursebook, I came across a structure that seems to be wrong:

  His was lost at the dry cleaners.

Is it correct grammatically to write/say "his was lost"?


texts: Word for: "dislike of people that has same gender as speaker"

texts:
Is there a word for "disliking people of same gender"? I.e. man that dislikes men in general (but not women), or woman that dislikes women in general (but not men)?

There's "misanthropy", but it means "dislike of humans in general", and "misogyny"/"misandry" do not satisfy "same gender" requirement. Is there a specific word for that?


texts: What does "can't get arrested in this town" mean?

texts:
A phrase I've heard on various comedy programs regarding famous people is "[he or she] can't get arrested in this town." It often seems to be in reference to the person no longer being famous, however I've asked native English speakers and they claim it's the opposite, that the person is so famous they cannot get arrested.

Further searching online I've found very few places which define it, Collins Dictionary defines it as:

  (informal) (of a performer) is unrecognized and unsuccessful   ⇒ he can't get arrested here but is a megastar in the States

This makes no sense, as why would it be difficult for a non-famous person to get arrested? Seemingly popular perception is celebrities are more likely to get away with crimes, rather than actually be arrested.

An example of usage I know if is in the television series 30 Rock, but I've heard it other places:

  Jenna: Thank you, but I am a selfless person who can't get arrested in this town!

So, what does it mean and why does it mean it? If it does mean they are no longer famous, what's the logic behind someone being so unfamous they cannot get arrested? If that's case it's rather strange that the phrase is so unclear that native English speakers don't seem even get the meaning.


texts: I've tried to find etymology of Linux command tee that splits standard output onto two another outputs. Have anyone reference on this history or word origin?


texts: Can "so on" and "vice versa" mean the same?

texts:
The example sentence from a Mathematics book:

  0 is predecessor of 1 and 1 is successor of 0. Similarly 1 predecessor of 2 and 2 is successor of 1 and so on.

I thought that we can use" vice versa" as well:

  0 is predecessor of 1 and 1 is successor of 0. Similarly 1 predecessor of 2 and 2 is successor of 1 and vice versa.

Can anyone please tell me whether their usage is different to each other, if not then which one is most formal than the other?


texts: At a/the __ level or At __level . Article or not? If yes which one (a or the)?

texts:
I would like some help with the following expressions, as I see them used in different ways:

Actions to reduce pollution at a/the municipal level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at municipal level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at a/the international level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at international level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at a/the local level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at local level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at a/the sector level play a crucial role.

Actions to reduce pollution at sector level play a crucial role.

My question is about using the article "a/the" or not when it comes to sentences of this kind, is there a rule or it depends on the word preceding "level"?

If yes which one (a or the)?

Thank you


texts:
I've noticed that people love to use the phrase rinse and repeat.

Where exactly did it come from?


texts: How to frame a polite sentence without using "please"? Is it even possible?

texts:
I am just wondering that, are there any alternatives to make a sentence look polite. Instead of using "please".

Kindly help me with examples.


texts:
What is the difference between liberation and free?
Are spiritual liberation and free will the same?


texts: Does the word "qualifications" when used in situations related to job application, refer only to educational qualifications?

texts:
I came across this mail(abridged version) on the Images section of Google search, which was sent by the management of an unnamed company in Bay Area to an individual who had submitted his/her Resume in response to a job advertisement:

  Your current qualifications do not match those needed for our
  current openings

Is the word qualifications in this context referring only to educational qualifications or does it include work experience as well?


texts:
I don't understand the meaning of "if not" and grammar of the sentence in bold:

As early as the 14th century, the organ supplied polyphony, in which
case the odd-numbered verses of text were omitted altogether. This
role for the organ grew steadily in importance in the late
Renaissance.
Until the middle of the 17th century, organ versets
were based on the chants they replaced, thus invoking if not
presenting the appropriate words. During the next hundred years this
large organ literature made little reference to a cantus firmus,
reaching its artistic zenith and liturgical nadir in France.

[Source: The Harvard Dictionary of Music' By Don Michael Randel]


texts: What does "giving your robes away humiliates your rivals" mean?

texts:
I saw this sentence in the essay "This is the life" by Annie Dillard:

  Everyone knows bees sting and ghosts haunt and giving your robes away humiliates your rivals.

I don't know what "giving your robes away humiliates your rivals" mean?


texts:
I have been told that rising and falling intonation can change the meaning of a sentence. For me as a non-native speaker of English this may sometimes cause misunderstanding. In the following construction, can be there any differences in meaning in terms of using rising or falling intonation?

  Do you want me to call Tim' or Jack?
  Do you want me to call Tim or Jack'?
  Do you want me to call Tim' or Jack'?


texts: One can’t test things which one doesn’t know (to) exist

texts:
I wrote a sentence:

  One can’t test things which one doesn’t know to exist.

My English teacher says that is should be without to: ...know exist.

I know this phrase is part of 'concise English' but I can't explain its grammar. Can you help me? Thanks.


texts: What do you call someone who is not materialistic?

texts:
By not materialistic I mean someone who just doesn't have interest in material things for the sake of the value it would give them from their possession, but rather acquires them for their functionality or simply because they like it for them. An example of getting something for for the type of materialistic reasons I'm talking about would be... A Fancy car not solely for the purpose as means to get from point A to B, or comfort or practicality, but rather to show off). Similar to getting a nice house or a phone or watch or anything material.
It's not "spiritual" because such person can NOT be spiritual. Nor is it "ascetic" because it's effortless and comes naturally. No desire of things beyond their practical usage.
There is no "discipline" involved. No if you let yourself go, and became lax, you'd fall back to materialism. The word I'm looking for would describe a person to be not materialistic by nature. Whether they let themselves go or not, it would be unnatural for them to be materialistic. No disciple required. Just no desire to attain material things as a tool to increase their self worth by way of using those goods to gain recognition.
As an anology, if they were offered a Rolls Royce or a 1989 Chevy Caprice (but they can't sell the car they choose or give it away), they'd choose the Chevy Caprice simply because they like it more.


texts: Single word request: "attempt to discover"

texts: What is the best single word to capture the phrase "attempt to discover", as in "attempting to discover the principles of infinite ethics"


texts: What does “I really get the juices flowing when I’m driving” mean?

texts:
The New York Times article “In golf, moments good and bad are well remembered” (June 14) ends up with the following episode:

  Jerry Kelly (PGA golfer) said that his steely memory of golf extended to his personal life, especially when driving.

    "I remember all those people who have cut me off," Kelly said. "I try to stay ahead of everybody so that I don’t let them cut me off again, especially when I come back to the Northeast. I really get the juices flowing when I’m driving here."

What does “get the juices flow” when driving mean? Does it mean to get the thrills and spills?

There’s no entry for “get the juices flow” in English dictionaries at hand, nor Google Ngram shows any incidence of the phrase.

Is this an idiom, or just a casual turn of phrase? If it’s a not-unusual phrase, in what else instances can I use “get the juices flow”?

PS.

Someone placed “This question may have an answer here -Where did the "juices" in "creative juices" come from? on top of my question. It doesn’t. I read through the said question, and find no connection / answer to mine. My question has evidently nothing to do with “creative juice" asked in that particular question.

My question is simply what Jerry Kelly meant in his remark, which now I wrapped my brain after posting this question, and getting a lot of inputs from you.


texts: When someone ruins all the good they have ever done!

texts:
Suppose you have a nice and kind friend who helps you whenever possible, but sometimes they say something to you so angrily and sarcastically that you forget about all their kindness and help, because you feel so annoyed and upset by this sudden change in their behavior or intonation!
(They are not two-faced at all, they just lose their temper badly, especially when you reject their requests or demand, and you feel so upset that decide never ask nor accept their help any more!, actually you feel this behavior neutralizes(?) their past kindness to you, in that moment. However, since this behavior is part of their nature, this doesn't necessarily result in your friendship coming to end, since they are basically kind, they might apologize you later and you forgive them, but this story will be repeated again and again!)
An American friend told me I can say:

Sometimes, my friend ruins all the good she has ever done by losing her temper or acting weird.

What is the most appropriate adjective, expression, idiom, or proverb for describing these people when they act like this? (something that means someone  neutralize/ undo(?)or ruin their good doing that easily )

PS:
In my country we use a proverb: someone acts like a dairy cow that once in a while kicks over the bucket of milk — just after her milking is finished — and causes all the milk be spilt and wasted.  (While the given cow produces the greatest amount of milk among the other cows in someone's farm!)


texts: In what region could one refer to honking a car's horn as "hooting"?

texts:
My family is South African, and I grew up hearing them saying "hooting", referring to cars honking their horns. Of course now that I'm an adult I'm aware that's common usage, as I learned this after moving abroad and being chuckled at a few times.  However, out of curiosity I recently had a look to see if I could see if this usage of "hooting" is peculiar to South African regional English, or whether it's just my family.

My question is, where (if anywhere) is it common to refer to cars honking their horns as "hooting"?  Is it British?  Is it particularly old-timey?

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to turn up any concrete answers, except for this forum thread where an English teacher of unknown provenance asks my exact question.  The responses aren't particularly enlightening, but a user from Leicester says it's valid, and this StackExchange comment also implies it's valid UK usage, so I thought I'd ask the wise users of StackExchange for their thoughts :).


texts:
Some online resources that have a meaning for this word

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/symmetricity

https://www.wordnik.com/words/symmetricity

But I am not sure whether they are correct. Can anyone clear my doubt on this?


texts: I often hear people saying phrases of the type "How are we doing over here?" by servers at  restaurants, for example.  Obviously they mean "How are you (plural) doing?"  Where does this type of usage of "we" come from?  Is this pronoun misuse a regional thing?  Has it entered mainstream American English?  Am I wrong in thinking that it is incorrect?


texts: Origin of the expression "and then I found five dollars"

texts:
My family often uses the expression "and then I found five dollars" to end a story that even the teller now realizes was rather pointless. The notion is to add a little (undeserved) punch.

A search on the internet shows that that usage is actually quite common, but I don't see any origin listed. Does anyone know where that usage originated and/or where it was popularized?

I tried looking via google ngram search
The earliest possible use I find is in a google books search, but I can't quite tell without more context. As a commenter points out this looks to be used in the actual sense but given that the questioner was frustrated I thought perhaps it could be an origin. Now that I see how hard it is to acquire that source, I rather doubt it had enough influence to start the expression anyway.


texts: "Get on": is it transitive, intransitive or both?

texts:
I'm new here (in the sense of asking a question, but I often use the site for reference.)

I have a question regarding the phrasal verb "get on", or more specifically when used with "with", eg. "get on with".

My confusion is partly regarding whether "get on" is transitive or intransitive. When I search the web I always find "get on" listed as intransitive, even when using an example like:

She gets on with her brother

The problem is I found another site that had a similar example that classed her brother as a direct object. But that would make it transitive, right? I think part of my problem is I'm not always sure what makes a verb transitive!

I thought about another verb, walk, that can be both transitive and intransitive and sentences like:

I walked a lot - *intransitive?*
I walked with her - *transitive?*
I walked many miles - *transitive?*
I walked the dog - *transitive?*

And then I thought back to get on with sentences like:

I get on with her - *transitive?*
I get on at school - *transitive?*
We get on - *intransitive?*
I'm getting on well - *intransitive?*

I'm not sure if "with her" and "at school" would be classed as direct objects. Any clarification would be much appreciated! I have to do a TEFL later this year and this is one area I want to understand better.

Alex


texts: This morning a coworker walked into our office kitchen and claimed that he smelled an omelette. He was correct. I wanted to say something like, "You have a refined palate," but "palate" is the wrong word. It refers to the sense of taste, not the sense of smell. What would have been a suitable word to indicate that his sense of smell correctly detected my omelette?


texts: What do you call the main telephone number?

texts:
I understand that someone's work phone might have an extension. What do you call the main number of that office, which would normally be answered by an operator or a computer voice system?

Would it be the "Main Line", the "Main Station", the "Root of Extension"? I would like to know the technical name as well as some more informal or slang terms, if there are any.


texts:
For example,
"We decide to engage a lawyer for the case."
"We decide to hire a lawyer for the case."

Is engage used particularly in British English?  Do speakers of American English use engage in such examples?


texts: What is a collective noun for "a set of policies"?

texts:
I'm having trouble find a collective noun (or similar word) that describes a "set or collection of [business] policies" for some documentation I'm writing for my domain of work (without going into specifics, I'm involved in reselling inventory for clients/suppliers).

My initial thought was "contract", but that already has an established meaning in our domain (a contract is an agreement with a supplier).  The word I'm looking for is to describe the set of specific policies tied to an individual piece of inventory (i.e. "return policy", "terms and conditions of use", "pick-up instructions", etc.).

Any other ideas?


texts: Expression for "protect against access by not qualified"

texts:
I've heard this expression (I think it was two words) long time ago. The expression meaning is that there is a protection/preventative measure against access/use by those who do not understand or know the subject. To me [as non-native speaker] the meaning was immediately clear when I've heard it, but now I cannot recall this expression.

I've heard it being used in software development industry, in casual speech only (would not be suitable for official communications). But I imagine it can be used in other situations where the same meaning applies.

It is similar to "fail-safe" but with the stress on the fact that "fail" would come from someone who does not know what they are doing. Which can be diminishing or even insulting towards end user (and so why not suitable for official communications).

As this is better suited for casual communication, the usage could appear as: "Let's put a _______________ there to make sure this does not happen" or "Let's make it _______ to avoid that in the future" (as that is how perhaps software developers would communicate such case to each other ;)


texts: What word can be used to describe an ideal situation based on finding companions?

texts:
I'm writing a paper analyzing Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse Five, and one of the pieces of evidence I am using in a section is the following quote:

  Weary's version of the true war story went like this. There was a big German attack, and Weary and his antitank buddies fought like hell until everybody was killed but Weary. So it goes. And then Weary tied in with two scouts, and they became close friends immediately, and they decided to fight their way back to their own lines. They were going to travel fast. They were damned if they'd surrender. They shook hands all around. They called themselves 'The Three Musketeers.'

Weary doesn't actually form close friendships with these men, but this is rather the situation he wants to happen in war.  The trauma caused by the fighting has actually cause Weary to believe this is the case.

What I'm asking is, is there a word to describe the situation that Weary wanted?  I don't want to call it a utopia, because that would most likely apply to  a situation without war involved, and I'm not entirely sure I can use Ideality in this situation.  Would fantasy work?

Thanks if you can help!


texts:
What is the connotation of "virility"?
Is virility usually used in a bad derogatory sense?

Thanks.
-K


texts: is it right to say ' provide huge job opportunities to society'

texts:
I'm writing an essay, when I meet the grammar issue.
the 'to society' is right? or should use 'to the society'?
thanks.


texts: Is it correct to say "proud of having met you", or should it be "proud to have met"?

texts:
Is it correct to say "I have proud of having  met both of you"

I am proud of having met both of you. (past present?)
I am proud to have met both of you. (present perfect?)

What does the first one say? The word "having" sounds like it is happening, but it was done already. Is it right?

The second one sounds like it happened in the past. Does it mean it is finished? Inconclusive?


texts: What is the meaning of 'latent potential'?

texts: I found a book saying This book is dedicated to Steve Jobs who challenged me to "think different"and helped me unlock my own latent potential. I thought latent and potential are synonyms so I don't get why two words are used in a row. Can you help me understand?


texts:
What does "surely not?" mean here?
Does "the Mind of God" mean:

a. our thought about god

or

b. God's intelligence (the intelligence that belongs to god, what is going on in god's mind)

Context:

some scientists think there’s a good chance they will be able to declare a Grand Unified Theory of Everything in the World, the Solar System, the Universe, and – surely not? – the Mind of God, or at least our construction of it, all the way from the evolution of the trilobite through to the death of stars in distant galaxies, from the rules governing the emergence of ‘human nature’ to the origins and purpose of art.

(Art and Science by Sian Ede)


texts: What is the exact meaning of the phrase "Cataract of rippling notes"?

texts:
I am reading the book "The story of my life" by Helen Keller. Many of the words, idioms and phrases are unfamiliar to me.

I have come across the phrase "Cataract of rippling notes". What does it mean? The meaning for each word is below

  Cataract = a large waterfall
  Rippling = a small wave or series of waves on the surface of water, esp. as caused by an object dropping into it or a slight breeze

I didn't found suitable meaning for note here. The most suitable for note here is below

  Note = a particular quality or tone that reflects or expresses a mood or attitude

But when combining all of them I am getting the exact meaning. Then sentence is

  What a joy it is to feel the soft, springy earth under my feet once more, to follow grassy roads that lead to ferny brooks where I can bathe my fingers in a cataract of rippling notes  or to clamber over a stone wall into green fields that tumble and roll and climb in riotous gladness

Does it mean "A waterfall which is producing a kind of waves" or some thing like that?


texts: What is the word for statements that aren't ironic but have an interesting juxtaposition?

texts:
For example: my grandmother went to university and learnt to speak RP; I went to university and picked up her cockney drawl.

Or: I was searching for a book on the internet and when I found it, it turned out that it  my next door neighbour was selling it.


texts: How many words/phrases were coined by Milton?

texts: In studying the works of John Milton in The Riverside Milton, I've noticed that the footnotes repeatedly point to the OED, which cites Milton as having coined a seemingly endless number of words and phrases that are still in use today. Knowing that he was fluent in Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Spanish, French and Italian, I've become extremely curious: Does anyone have a clue as to how many words/phrases Milton contributed to the English language?


texts: Does the sentence 'Boy, are my arms tired' mean 'Boy, my arms are tired.'?

texts: I found a meme that says 'I flew in from (wherever) and boy are my arms tired!'. I can understand what's funny about this meme but I can't understand why 'are my arms tired!' is used instead of 'my arms are tired!'. that's not an interrogative sentence, right? why does there have to be an inversion?


texts: Is there a name for a literary genre where the main character wanders around?

texts:
I remember reading about this genre on Wikipedia, but forgot what it was called. Books in this genre are wandering/doing things without purpose. There isn't really a plot, just connected small stories. It is close to Picaresque novels, but instead of poor main character it about is a rich, carefree main character. The stories are often humorous or satiric or both.

P.G Wodehouse's Psmith books and others are examples of this genre.

Another detail I seem to recall is that the words has the prefix "voy" or "voyage" or something along those lines. I could remember wrong, though.

Words that are close, but not it so far are:

Picaresque
Milesian tale
Travelogue
Absurdist fiction


texts:
I am interested in qualifiers for traffic ordered by fluidity. Here is what I would personally use:

Fluid Traffic
Heavy traffic
Congested

However, the last one would qualify the transportation layer rather than the traffic itself. Are there other qualifiers that can be used for the latter, respectively more qualifiers that simply escape the non-native speaker?


texts: Adjective for a "expected" or "aspirational" version of a document?

texts:
We're creating a user manual for a software application. Like the manual, the application itself is a work in progress.

We have a version of the manual that describes the application as we expect it to be when completed. It could change over time, as the application is modified, but it's mostly stable.

If "draft" (or "draft version") is the term for the current, pre-publication version of user manual, and "final version" is what you'd call what is ultimately published, what's the adjective for the initial version?

"Expected version" isn't quite right, and "Aspirational" sounds pompous. "Target" might work, except that our tools use that term for something else and I don't want the confusion.


texts: Is there a name for misspelling or mispronouncing a word by confusing it with a cognate?

texts: For example, tonight's news broadcast on Public Television identified a man selling fish and chips as a restauranteur.


texts: "the girls' nose" or "the girls' noses": which means the nose of many girls?

texts:
"the girls' nose" or "the girls' noses"?

We are talking about the nose of many girls.


texts: Gerund, to-infinitive or bare infinitive? The first thing I wanted to do was

texts:
Which of these sentences is correct:

The first thing I wanted to do was send you a text.
The first thing I wanted to do was to send you a text.
The first thing I wanted to do was sending you a text.

Thanks.


texts:
I'm looking for a word that has the same meaning of Sarcasm, however it describes the act of Sarcasm when the person involved actually means what they say (even though it might be a Lie).

e.g: I have this friend who makes this terrible Stew, and whenever she makes it, she tends to put on display, how great it's turned out, and really insists on me trying it and acknowledging how good it is, even though she knows it isn't, and she knows that everyone else knows [it isn't]. So I would tell her "you're behaving [fill_in_the_blank]ly again", or, "you're [fill_in_the_blank]ing again".


texts: What's a positive term to describe small eyes?

texts:
You never hear someone saying "beautiful small eyes", "nice beady eyes" or "cute squinty eyes" (except, you do hear, "beautiful large eyes").

As far as I know, all the synonyms for small-shaped eyes seem to have a negative connotation to them.

Now, is there a rather positive or optimistic word for small eyes or eyes that are small in shape?


texts:
Which one is correct:
'The first two quarters of current financial year' Or
'The first two quarters of the current financial year'


texts: What is the term for sentences like these?

texts: What are sentences like "men are to women as culture is to nature" called?


texts:
Is the lexical verb let or stay in this sentence?

  "Let us stay indoors while the weather cools"

I'm wondering whether let is an auxiliary (or even if let us is an auxiliary). Or is it a "lexical" verb or "main" verb?


texts: What does "lifted you sanction to your account" mean?

texts:
I got a message from a website:

  We already lifted you sanction to your account.

What does it mean?


texts: "Worse comes to worst" or "worst comes to worst"

texts: Which is correct: worse comes to worst or worst comes to worst? The former seems more logical but the latter is what appears in Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary.


texts: What are the differences of store(n.) and storage(n.)?

texts:
Store ex: The store's inventory has to be entered manually into the database.

Storage ex: Storage closet is where you will find all our office supplies.


texts: Why is "Prices to be set..." used in this sentence instead of "Prices will be set..."?

texts:
The whole sentence is "Prices to be set when the collection arrives". I guess it's a future tense but in a passive voice tense form, So it's not very clear for me why we didn't use "will be set" instead of "to be set" and when we use it?
Thanks in advance


texts: What's the difference between Anonymous and Pseudonymous?

texts:
Anonymous means someone who can't be identified by name. Pseudonymous means someone who uses false name.

It seems to me that Pseudonymous is a subset of Anonymous. Is it right? If not, what's the difference?


texts:
I'm looking for a word that means returning to the past or embracing old values, but words like "regression," "retrogression," and "atavism" all seem to have negative connotations attached to them.

Is there such a word that means "regression" in a positive sense?


texts:
Could someone please name the grammatical comma use in the sentence below? It looks like an interrupter (parenthetical), but I'm unsure if the usage is correct.

"The title of the song “This is America” stays true to what Gambino is trying to convey throughout the video about the culture who would record or share something rather than help, and how as a society, we are teaching the younger generations to accept this way of life too."


texts: Category of the First Term in the Partitive Construction

texts:
Are the words in bold type in the following sentences determiners?

One of the books was written by X
I want two of those
8 percent of the population has X
I ate some of that cake

In a treatise on partitives, the author identifies them as determiners. But I don't see a noun following these 'determiners'. Without a following noun, they more resemble a pronoun referring to that absent noun.

Online Oxford Dictionary defines partitive as:

  A partitive construction
  1.1. A noun or pronoun used as the first term in a partitive construction

From the definition it seems that the first term, which I think is the word or a group of words before of, is either a noun or a pronoun.


texts:
Is it acceptable to lowercase 'google' in all verb forms?

For example:

He googled the information.
He is googling the information.
He googles the information.
Please google the information.

Is it now acceptable to lowercase the word 'internet'?


texts: Can we use the present continuous with a gerund, other than the specific examples listed?

texts:
Can we use the present continuous with a gerund in instances other than have been + present participle + gerund , am considering + gerund, and "am going to + gerund" ?
I've taken the following examples from "Thinking About Using -ing Words?" at Learning English.

verb + gerund One common situation in which two -ing words can appear
next to each other is when the first -ing word is part of a continuous
verb tense and the second -ing word is a gerund, as in the first
example:
I’ve been avoiding going to the doctor.
Here, have been avoiding is the present perfect continuous form of to
avoid. Going is the gerund.
Here’s another example:
I’m considering buying a home in DC.
Here, am considering is the present continuous form of the verb to
consider. Buying is the gerund.
go + gerund Two -ing words can also appear together in what we call
“go + gerund.” Go + gerund is an example of the verb + gerund
construction.
In English, we add the verb to go to certain recreational activities.
These activities include fishing, swimming, shopping and skating, plus
more than a dozen more.
Because of this, when go is in the continuous verb tense, you will see
two -ing words together.
Listen:
I’m going shopping in Alexandria next weekend.
In this sentence, am going is the present continuous form of the verb
to go and the gerund is shopping.
Here’s another:
We’re going skating on Friday in the sculpture garden.
In this sentence, are going is the present continuous form of the verb
to go and skating is the gerund.
Note, however, that you will not see two -ing words together when go
is not in the continuous tense with these activities. For example: “We
went skating in the sculpture garden last Friday” is still part of the
go + gerund structure.

Are there any other grammar constructions than these with a verb-ing + gerund?
Thanks!


texts:
What noun can be used instead of the gerund  expecting? Users below have suggested  expectancy, but  neither its definition nor expectation's, mentions pregnancy.

I ask not about synonyms/alternatives (eg pregnant and pregnancy don't apply for both parents).

  Google offered this example: He was the first to break the news about your expecting a baby. There, you'll soon be a mother, and yet you keep on complaining that you can't get on with him


texts: Do they mean the same "a men-only party" or are there differences in their specific usage?


texts: Is the expression “Be flattered that” right? Couldn’t it be “Be flattered to do sth.”?

texts:
Michigan State Rep, Lisa Brown’s comment using the word, vagina in her address against banning abortions in Michigan state House caused a big dispute, and she was rejected to speak on the another bill by the House speaker.

According to NPR (June 18), she spoke on the floor:

"I have not asked you to adopt and adhere to my religious beliefs. Why are you asking me to adopt yours?" she said. But what came next is what got her in trouble: "And finally, Mr. Speaker, I'm flattered that you're all so interested in my vagina, but 'no' means 'no.'"

I’m interested in the use of the word ‘be flattered’ in the last line, “I'm flattered that you're all so interested in my vagina.”

Is “I’m flattered that” a right expression? To me, a non native English speaker, it appears to say “I’m flattered to do (say, speak, tell you that ....) is more natural, if not grammatical, than saying “I’m flattered that ...”

Is the meaning of “say” included in “be flattered,” not simply meaning “being urged “(to say a nice thing)?


texts: onomatopoeia for the sound of spoons hitting on the plate when eating?

texts:
Is there any word to describe this?
I have tried inging but not sure if that is the best word.


texts: Expression for advantages of solution being disadvantages of alternatives

texts: Is there some expression for situations where you can conclude that a solution's advantages are the same as the disadvantages of alternative solutions?


texts:
Is it correct to say (and write), "I feel/don't feel adjusted to a house/country"?

For example:

  I feel adjusted to Las Vegas because it's my hometown.

Can someone really be adjusted or feel adjusted to a certain place?

The sentence I wish to use in my essay is:

  I don't feel adjusted to any house or country.

The meaning I intend to bring out is that I don't belong to any country and have no place to call home.


texts:
Possible Duplicate:
  opposite of “retaliate”

What is antonym (?) for vengence/revenge?

The "?" after antonym is because the given antonyms : "forgiveness, pardon" are not what I am after, Something more along the lines of somebody does you favour and you try to get them back by doing something good.

In this context what is a better word than antonym? for example what would be antonyms for "War"? and by that I don't mean peace, it needs to be something stronger, something that poeple actively do, like getting together and building something for some other community, and in retaliation (?) another group builds/helps them in some way without being expected to do so.

Consider that in Paris there are anti-vandal(?)  groups where they break into ignored/decaying historical places and restor them illegally/without permission ( the show was on PBS ).

Every word prior to "(?)" requires a better word choice in it's place


texts: Is the phrasal verb “buck up” used only in British English, not in American English?

texts:
Is the phrasal verb buck up used only in British English?

I’ve never heard an American use the word buck up to mean cheer up; I suspect the phrasal verb is only used in British English.


texts: "In my younger years, early days, early years, and earlier years"?

texts:
I just wanted to express the period from when I was born to my recent days until I realized something.

I initially put "in my earlier years." Then I wasn't sure if the meaning of the phrase that I made communicate precisely as I intended.

So I looked up and got few more similar expressions such as, "my early years", "In my early life", "In my younger and vulnerable years", "in my younger age", etc.

Yet, I sensed all of them insinuate more like a childhood, not necessarily includes, for instance, my few weeks ago until I realized something.

Is there any proper expression or phrase for a such case?


texts: What is it called when poems rhyme the second-last word in two lines?

texts:
There's one thing I've seen occasionally in poetry (the only examples that currently spring to mind are from Edgar Allan Poe, but I know I've also seen it elsewhere) where instead of using two different words that rhyme with one another, the last word in two lines is the same and the second-last words in those lines rhyme:

  Thou was all that to me, love
  For which my soul did pine
  A green isle in the sea, love
  A fountain and a shrine...

or

  'Wretch!' I cried, 'thy God hath lent thee-
  By these angels he hath sent thee-
  Respite, respite and nepenthe
  From thy memories of Lenore...

Is there a word for this?  Or at least some way of describing it better than what I've done here?

(EDIT) Re Chappo's comment: I've tried a few Google queries along the lines of 'poem second-last word rhyme' and looked up a couple analyses of the poems linked above (which were sadly heavy on flowery descriptions of how moving the poems were and low on 'this rhyming device is called such-and-such').  I'm not sure what resources exist for answering questions like this, I'm afraid.


texts: "His life had been set on a different course" or "His life was set on a different course"?

texts:
I want to say
"His life has been set on a different course since then."
but push it into the past.

I can come up with two options:

His life had been set on a different course since then.
His life was set on a different course since then[ever since].

Between the two, I am thinking the simple past form is the (more) right one,
but do you see any issues with this (also, is this a common form of expression)? Normally, 'since' is used when there are two temporal points that mark a certain interval... but the latter temporal point is unknown, or it is more implicit than normal (also in relation, 'since' is normally used with the past/present perfect forms, so this is an aspect that causes me some confusion). The default assumption would be that he followed this different life course until his death, especially when 'ever since' is used. I would appreciate your input/thoughts on this.


texts: What is the proper term for global nicknames such as "Dude", "Slick", "Jack", etc?

texts:
Some people have the tendency to use words in a context similar to a pronoun, despite the word in question being an adjective, verb, whatever. Examples would be someone like Agent K in the film "Men in Black", who often referred to his junior agent "J" in such a way:

Whatever, slick, but let me tell you something.
It's your show, chief.

An historical example would be the hippy sub-culture of 1960's and 1970's America, which often used the expression "man" in this way.

It's looooove, man. Love sets you free.

Another example from that same time period would be the "Greaser" sub-culture, which used the proper name "Jack".

Don't be a square, Jack. Just ride.

In American English, what is the proper term for using words this way? I initially thought "nickname", but that's more of an individual thing. This use seems rather global and generalized.


texts: What does 'intimated' mean in the following sentence?

texts:
As we shall see, when satisfaction is invoked in Othello, and by
Othello himself, what is being sought is proof and revenge, knowledge
and retaliation, certainty and redress. And what is more than
intimated, as I want to show, is just how inextricable these things
can be.

This is a philosophic, psychoanalytic text. What does 'intimated' mean in the above passage?
Does it mean more than what has been said, more than just how inextricable can these things be? If "intimated" here means explained or shown, then what is that "more" doing in the sentence?


texts: Can a sentence have an indirect object without a direct object?

texts:
Everywhere I look online, people seem to say the same thing: "A sentence with an indirect object must have a direct object." Every case of confusion I've seen about this rule has only involved examples where direct objects are omitted but still implied.

However, consider the following sentence:

  Jim ran to the store.

As I understand it, here ran is intransitive and therefore has no direct object; and to the store is a prepositional phrase, making store the indirect object of ran. Therefore this sentence contains an indirect object and no direct object.

Is this observation correct? If so, why do so many people insist that sentences cannot have indirect objects without direct objects?


texts: Definite article before common nouns to denote type

texts:
Is it grammatically correct in the English language to use a definite article before a common noun to denote the type of noun?

For example - "The water is better than the wine" - as opposed to "water is better than wine"


texts:
Are my sentences correct?
Hi there!

1.Since I have had more time, I am happy (I still have more time)

2.Since I started having more time, I am happy

3.Since I have had believed in my father I am even more happy

Thanks in advance


texts: May / might usage based on the probability of the event happening

texts:
I just taught may / might and the book tells the students that, "you use 'may' with things that have around a 50% chance of happening and might with a 30% chance".

Is this true?

I, for one, use might much more than may, and I dare say it's the same for lots of others. I certainly don't go around thinking about what the percentage chance of me going to the cinema is.

I may have got this wrong, sorry, might have.


texts:
We can find sentences like the one below from the Merriam-Webster dictionary:

"Wet" is the opposite of "dry."

But I've heard others say "Wet is opposite of dry."

Is the latter correct? Why can't I find any dictionary that says the word opposite can be used as a noncount noun? Or if it is an adjective, why can't I still find this kind of phrase "be opposite of?"


texts: Past tense and future tense can be used together?

texts:
For example, They told me that they will support our next event.

Can these 2 tenses be together?


texts: What does “high-constitutional” mean? Mistyped here?

texts:
Below is a paragraph from the article from The Prospect Magazine: Revisiting John Rawls’s A Theory of Justice (URL: https://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/magazine/liberalism-john-rawls-jesse-norman-katrina-forrester-theory-of-justice-andrius-galisanka)

Better still, all could find points of disagreement. There were papers to be written, refutations to be published, careers to be made. The book was presented as an idealisation of human choice, purged of the contingent, the morally accidental and idiosyncratic. As such, it paid little apparent attention to the outside world—including the specific realities of being poor, and the particular experiences of women and people of colour, or of the infirm or other vulnerable groups whose status and wellbeing the difference principle was intended to protect. And it seemed to display a high-constitutional understanding of politics keyed to established political institutions, rather than to the informal, raucous and rapidly fragmenting reality of its time.

What does “a high-constitutional understanding” mean?
Is it a newly coined word? I looked up this word online but I couldn’t find any entry. Perhaps does that mean “highly constitutional?” But I don’t think that makes sense.


texts: An exact word for the opposite of academic progress?

texts:
I have been confronted with a word so many times for which I couldn't find any equivalent in English. What is an opposite term for academic progress? I mean specifically when one is no longer doing well at school or university, like one did before. What do we call this? I do not mean dropping out of school or academic failure.

edit

Imagine you're describing one's academic standing. So, can we say he has had "academic stagnation"? The results I found for stagnation showed it's not often used in this context.

I also searched for "academic probation", which seemed a good option. Is it a good option for the opposite of "academic progress"?

"Academic failure" does not suit my situation.

I want words that suit a formal situation.


texts: If I had a sentence I had my own room at my grandparents' place. I think I would place the apostrophe as shown because I'm talking about both grandmother and grandfather. However, let's say I shorten the sentence to I had my own room at my grandparents'. Am I correct in leaving the apostrophe as I have done?


texts:
There is a question in our grammar book that goes like this:

Her husband, a plumber's assistant, earns only 300 dollars a month, which makes it very difficult for her to feed and clothe her children properly, ______________ send them to school.
a. much more
b. still more
c. much less
d. even less

The book says that the answer is C. How do i explain it in the clearest way possible to my student? She is an intermediate level.


texts:
I'm looking for a word that would refer to TV-series which is plain voice. To be exact, there's someone reading you a book, no any kind of video even though it is broadcast through TV. Would "narrated TV-series" be wrong?

EDIT: asking this since in my first language we have a special word for this. A TV-series would be either "TV-ohjelma" or "TV-sarja", and a TV-series like I described "puheohjelma" (with or without the TV prefix).

EDIT2: If I use "radio", people will assume the wrong type of device used to transmit the speech.


texts:
What does "will not go unsold to" mean in the following sentence?

  The King of Portugal, Lord of Spices, has set... prices just as he pleases, for pepper, which, at any cost, no matter how dear, will not long go unsold to the Germans.

Source: Bound Together: How Traders, Preachers, Adventurers, and Warriors Shaped Globalization, by Nayan Chanda
Google book link--- http://goo.gl/YPngmK


texts: Can we use "Result" instead of "Conclusion" as a title in a paper/article?

texts: My paper is about computer science and I want to use one of these words as the title of a section. Which word should I use: result or conclusion?


texts: Ambiguous adjectives: fearful, suspicious, etc

texts:
Adjectives, for example...

  Suspicious, fearful, stressful, hopeful, etc...

These adjectives describe that the addressee causes the certain quality or has himself the quality. "A fearful man" may mean a man who's afraid or a man who causes fear. But "a fearful storm" obviously mean a storm causing fear, evidently for it can't possess itself the fear as feeling.

After that, I assumed that "a delightful/hopeful/woeful/stressful man" may mean both a man causing effect and a man having such feeling, depending on the context. How this happened and is there any term to categorize such adjectives?


texts: Why is it usually "friend of his", but no possessive apostrophe with "friend of Peter"?

texts:
As this NGram shows, we nearly always use the possessive form of personal pronouns for friend of mine/his/ours/etc.

But when it comes to actual names, we prefer friend of Peter without the possessive apostrophe. That preference is even more marked with, say, friend of America. Not that I think the usage itself is particularly American - it's much the same with Britain.

Personally, I find friend of him grates. In general I've no strong feelings either way as to whether it's friend of Peter or friend of Peter's (though I deplore the possessive in this example), but in line with many others, I really don't like the possessive in relation to things like countries.

Why is this?

Edit: Noting an apparent "progression" (pronoun -> person -> nation) marked by reduction in use of the possessive, I checked at a finer "granularity". NGram shows that although it does occur, friend of me virtually "flatlines" against friend of mine. But the bias reduces through of you, of us, and by the time I get to of them it's much less extreme. There seems to be something "egocentric" about the double possessive.

Presumably when babies learn to speak, they soon notice that possessive pronouns, possessive apostrophes, and the word "of", all do the same job. Parents would correct a child who says "of mine's", but probably wouldn't even notice the same "redundancy" in "of Peter's". Younger speakers are unlikely to even be talking about something "of America's". Perhaps as we mature we tend to discard the "double possessive" for the more "distant" things that only adults are likely talk about, but we keep it for "closer" people because that's how we spoke when we were younger.

EDIT2 I note that I'm a great fan of him is vanishingly rare compared to ...fan of his, but with ...fan (of John) the double possessive occurs far less often than ...friend (of John's). Usage seems to be affected by the noun before "of" as well as the one after it. This is getting complicated...


texts:
'Hands' of a clock,
'Arms' of a chair,
'Nose' of a plane,
'Mouth' of a river.
In these expressions human body parts are used.What are such expressions called?


texts: A question about one point of Donald Trump’s speech at Helsinki

texts:
At his recent Helsinki summit, while reading from a prepared, written speech, Donald Trump said during his opening remarks and then later tweeted, quoting himself:

  I would rather take a political risk in pursuit of peace, than to risk peace in pursuit of politics.

Here I got confused: since we cannot mix verb forms in the structure of would rather A than B, shouldn’t that only be a risk? Why was there a to?

I would rather
        take a political risk in pursuit of peace,
  than
      risk peace in pursuit of politics.


texts: Difference between "random want" and "whim"

texts:
What is the difference between the words random want and whim?

The definition of whim can be easily found in the dictionary:

  a sudden wish to do or have something, especially when it is something
  unusual or unnecessary

Random want is not on the dictionary. It turns out to be just two words combined together. But it seems to me to have nearly the same meaning as whim.

I came across this word chunk in the phrase made up by a native American:

  They thought the problem to be settled was how on earth to get posters
  to understand that CONTEXT is not just some random WANT on the part of
  those who would like to answer, but an ABSOLUTE REQUIREMENT.

But later in the discussion the native speaker writes:

  random want fits better than whim

, which suggest that there is some difference for him between the words whim and random want.

So, what is the difference?


texts: What’s the difference between “concerning” and “regarding”?

texts:
Is there a notable distinction between “concerning” and “regarding”, be it in tone alone?
I—a non-native—wondered about this when starting a sentence about the weather:

Regarding the weather, …
Concerning the weather, …

Four other random usage examples:

An Essay Concerning Regarding Human Understanding
Treaty Between France and Spain Regarding concerning Morocco
The Question Concerning Regarding Technology
Protests regarding concerning the Russo-Georgian War

Aren’t all those unconditionally interchangeable?
I imagined the difference might be in context, with regarding being used when refering to something voluntarily (regards), while concerning used when somebody needs to explain oneself (concern), but I dismissed that as a wild guess with lots of examples diluting this attempt to explain.