English Language Learners - 2014-07-28 (page 1 of 2)

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Anonymous

12:00 AM

Wikipedia says it's very old

Anonymous

A frame story (also frame tale, frame narrative, etc.) is a literary technique that sometimes serves as a companion piece to a story within a story, whereby an introductory or main narrative is presented, at least in part, for the purpose of setting the stage either for a more emphasized second narrative or for a set of shorter stories. The frame story leads readers from a first story into another, smaller one (or several ones) within it. == Origins == Among earliest known frame stories are those preserved on the ancient Egyptian Papyrus Westcar. Other early examples are from first millennium BCE...

Anonymous

Please use specific titles. — snailplane 4 mins ago

12:59 AM

I have experienced a momentous event: I've got CGEL!! ... I had to come here to announce this, because nobody else I know would get how exciting this is. (Except my wife, and she's in the middle of moving to Tennessee for four or five years to get her doctorate, so she's got other things on her mind.)

@snailboat This is not the first un-web-documented work this quaerent has cited (see this question, for instance). And some of the works cited are quite flummoxingly obscure ... [this one]((encrypted.google.com/…), ...

(oh BOTHER!) ... this one,for instance, is from an advertisement in vol.1,no.1 of The Literary Northwest, published in St. Paul in 1892!

On the other hand, 'a also asks about pretty standard stuff: Shakespeare, Bacon, Milton, Keats, and a whole bunch of questions about Samuel Butler's translation of the Odyssey. So if 'a's a troll, a's such an eccentric one that 'as trolleries are themselves entertaining. And the questions are not stupid ones.

Perhaps username901345 is a whimsical literary creation.

1:25 AM

@StoneyB I've never seen those as stupid ones. What I really think is... Are they fair ones (for our answerers)? And are they useful ones (for most of our users, which are supposed to be average learners in one way or another)?

1:49 AM

@DamkerngT. a) Fair or unfair, they're interesting, to me at least. b) I don't believe in 'average' learners. Are you an 'average' learner? -you put several weeks into typing out a novel that's almost a hundred years old now. Is Listenever, our leading questioner, an 'average' learner? - When she started here she was simultaneously working her way through Harry Potter and Jane Eyre.

... I take the questioner's bona fides for granted, and answer what I can: I'm not a schoolmarm censor saying "This is suitable to read, but this isn't". For heaven's sake, they're grownups!

And I try to make all my answers relevant to learning English: not "this is what this means" but "this principle is operating here, which you may generalize in these contexts - and should be careful not to generalize in these".

I might make a wrong impression. I don't object to the questions and don't try to forbid anyone to ask anything. I just had a similar discussion related to this issue a few hours ago. I hadn't changed my opinion when I mentioned fairness and usefulness a few while ago. My point was, and still is, that the OP should've shown more efforts than they did.

4 hours ago, by snailboat

I do think discussing Early Modern English should be on-topic

4 hours ago, by Damkerng T.

I think it's fine, as long as we make it clear that it is not what we use today.

user116848

Good morning!

Good morning!

Good evening!

GOOD MORNING

user116848

2:02 AM

:)

I feel chronically marginalized.

user116848

:)

user116848

Different time zones. haha

Or possibly postcolonial anxiety.

user116848

yeah

2:08 AM

As for voting to close on that question, here is what I said:

24 hours ago, by Damkerng T.

I agree to put it on-hold. My reason is more like ESN's than jimsug's, but I was too lazy to write a new reason when I voted.

Here is what ESN (Esoteric Screen Name) wrote:

This question appears to be off-topic because it does not identify any particular issues or concerns regarding the text. — Esoteric Screen Name yesterday

In short, I didn't vote to close because the question is about Shakespeare. (I wish I could read a lot more of his work!) But I think just pasting a random sentence and ask "What does this mean?" is unfair. When other learners pasted a homework question and asked "What is the correct answer?", I remember that almost always, we voted to close on such a question.

@DamkerngT. Yes, I handled that conversation very badly. But we have many, many learners whose command of English is so slight that they (a) often cannot identify a 'particular issue' and (b) even if they can, cannot express it clearly. So I've gotten used to trying to put myself in the questioner's shoes and asking What could confuse somebody about this? I think you do the same thing very often!

And you get to know questioners, too, so you know Hey, if this guy has a problem it's not this sort of problem but that sort of problem.

I tried to, though I don't always succeed. Putting yourself in learner's shoes is much more admirable, considering that you're a native speaker. It's much more difficult, I suppose.

I planned this a while back...

7 hours ago, by Damkerng T.

I think I will create these three tags: formality, outdated, and literary

I'm thinking about tagging those questions of user8153, user4550, and username901345 that are related to classic works with a new literature tag. (I think using the same set ELU uses is better.) I'd like to know your idea about such tagging. Do you think it's appropriate?

2:25 AM

No question, having NNSs like you and Maulik and oerkelens come on board as answerers has raised the bar around here. You've lived through learning English, and spot difficulties much more readily than the Old Guard here. Me, I have to extrapolate from learning German and French.

(I've just created a new tag outdated some hours ago.)

I'm the wrong guy to ask about tags - I've never found them useful, except to grey out the single-word-requests!

LOL

Maybe I will just go ahead as planned.

I hope the tags can help our learners to be aware of uncommon phrases and usages they might find in some questions on our site.

Anonymous

A literature tag could be nice, I suppose, but I'm afraid it would be inconsistently applied

Anonymous

(Who decides what is Literature?)

2:31 AM

One thing I have noted in my own language learning is that 'old' language is not significantly harder than contemporary language. I think learners find them equally baffling, because they don't have the expectations that a NS brings to a text. I know that when I read German, 20th century writers like Brecht and Mann are just as hard as 18th century Goethe and 16th century Luther.

@snailboat I do, and I've got the union card to prove it :)

Anonymous

Oh, well then :-)

Hehe!

i do not know exactly what you are concerning about

I guess you mean my concern? or it's snailboat's concern (about who decides what is Literature?)

But Postmodernist LitCrit rejects the concept of Literature. It's all Texts: Shakespeare, Milton, broadside ballads, and publisher's ads in The Literary Northwest.

Anonymous

2:34 AM

Say, do you think it would be reasonable to reopen this question?

Anonymous

0

Q: Arranged In The Colors Of

On the web, I found some phrase: SENTENCE 1. [A] arranged in the colors of [B] Here's an example from Yahoo Photos for the day (24th image) Mathias Danze arranges fruits and vegetables in the colours of the German national flag (TOP) and Argentinian flag (BOTTOM) in a supermarket in S...

grammar meaning usage

I forgot how I voted, but I'm afraid that reopen it or not wouldn't help the OP much.

Anonymous

They still care about it enough that they just edited it

Anonymous

I put through another edit

Anonymous

Oh, I can't vote to reopen

Anonymous

2:38 AM

Apparently I've already voted to reopen, and my vote expired

Wait, I think that question has already been reopened, hasn't it?

Anonymous

It appears to be closed

Anonymous

No, it doesn't appear to have been reopened

Oh! Was it voted to close again?!

Anonymous

It was never reopened

2:40 AM

Okay, I voted to reopen.

> According to the venerable *Cambridge Grammar Of The English Language*, the as-clause as a dependent of a nominal could be interpreted as follows:
http://ell.stackexchange.com/q/30104/3281

Wow, CGEL is quite popular among our users!

Anonymous

I'm sorry, my brain glazed over when I read that question

@DamkerngT. your concern

Anonymous

Apparently we have a that tag. I've just added to it :-)

Anonymous

I may be the least consistent tagger we've got

@happenask Hmm... I have several concerns. Which one do you refer to?

2:49 AM

i am wondering what you try to reopen

I voted to reopen on the question snailboat mentioned a while back.

It's a perfectly reasonable question, and a perfectly bewildering reason for closing it. Seems to me to boil down to "Does arrange mean what the dictionary says it means?" DT, your comment nailed it: meatie is a very literal-minded learner. I've voted to reopen.

That's what I worry about meatie. I think being too literal is not very productive in learning a second language. (Before I found meatie's questions, I thought that I read most stuff very literally. Meatie blew me away!)

Anonymous

Some people are very literal-minded. You know, in general.

And this one's more of the same!

Anonymous

3:02 AM

Was there ever any sort of meta consensus that "historical English" is off-topic, by the way?

You know what we need? Three Canonical Posts: One on How to Use the Dictionary. One on How to Use English Textbooks. And one on How to Use Real Grammars.

@snailboat Has there ever been any sort of meta consensus on anything?

Anonymous

Point!

Anonymous

@StoneyB Possibly Dictionaries, plural. Part of using a dictionary is probably using another one, often enough :-)

The 'historical English' thing was a raging argument (mostly over Listenever's questions) between me and Matt for weeks back in the spring of '13, with FumbleFingers and J.R. playing, respectively, cheerleader and peacemaker.

I remember seeing FumbleFingers' comments about the 16th or 18th century English (that it should be off-topic on ELL).

3:06 AM

@snailboat Yes. That's Point One. Point Two is definitions do not pin words to a point on the wall: they draw big fuzzy circles around words.

(Actually, I think 16th or 18th century English can help increase flexibility for learners to understand English, given that they know that it's a different kind of English.)

FumbleFingers I think wanted to draw a hard line somewhere around 1750, and look very suspiciously at anything before about 1950. Matt wanted to draw a hard line at about day before yesterday, and look suspiciously at any writer who aimed at a more complex English than that found in a marketing brochure.

I found it! I finally found it!

I found the original text in Zwingli : Or, The Rise of the Reformation in Switzerland. A life of the reformer, with some notices of his time and contemporaries (1858), p.198, line 8 from the top of the page. — Damkerng T. 2 mins ago

I just recall that some marketing brochure might be more perplexing than classic novels. :)

I usually know what was going on in the story in the novels I read, but sometimes I had no clues about what brochure I was reading was trying to say.

3:40 AM

Holy Cow, DT! Bravo! The passage comes from a 1523 letter by Zwingli, probably in Schwyzerdeutsch, translated into Neuhochdeutsch by a 19th century Swiss clergyman, translated into English by a 19th century Scotsman. Where does he come up with these things?

@DamkerngT. Ha ha! Too true! That's because most of the real effort goes into sounding like you're saying something while not actually saying anything you can be held accountable for.

Anonymous

user image

Anonymous

This is another picture of my new snail :-)

Is this guy the same one I saw a few days ago?

Anonymous

This is the only snail I've taken pictures of this week.

3:55 AM

A photo of a pet eating something is always cute. :D

Gorgeous colors ... complementary, too! (not to mention complimentary).

Argh - it's 11:00 here - I have to go to bed. And dream of purple snails on green wet lettuce.

Have a good sleep!

Ah, I found this detexify.kirelabs.org/classify.html while reading about MathJax.

user116848

@snailboat Have you got another pet?

user116848

@snailboat So if I always say going to instead of gonna will I be sounding unnatural?

user116848

4:11 AM

Because sometimes I don't feel like using gonna .

user116848

While speaking that is.

user116848

4:52 AM

@snailboat What's this? Ms Boat do you have a problem with me?

user116848

Fair enough.

user116848

5:05 AM

@DamkerngT. Damks why I am getting the silent treatment by snailboat all of a sudden?

user116848

I didn't say anything wrong. Did I?

user116848

I am gonna go do my study and work. Can't a person make a conversation here?

user116848

Bye!

user116848

8:13 AM

I don't know why I love this saying: "Everybody loves you when you're six foot in the ground" (John Lennon)

8:55 AM

Is anyone else suprised by this results? six foot in the ground vs six feet in the ground

books.google.com/ngrams/…

six foot vs six feet

books.google.com/ngrams/…

3 hours later…

12:09 PM

The only time the word "incorrectly" isn't spelled incorrectly is when it is spelled i-n-c-o-r-r-e-c-t-l-y.

12:42 PM

0

Q: What is this difference between with about and with at?

I am good about getting things done. My grammar book says "I am good at getting things done." But why "about"? Is it the same?

^The question reminds me of what StoneyB said earlier.

10 hours ago, by StoneyB

You know what we need? Three Canonical Posts: One on How to Use the Dictionary. One on How to Use English Textbooks. And one on How to Use Real Grammars.

Where are those three canon posts when we need them? :)

The first one is the most important imo

^So true!

how did you like my attempted clarification?

@Arrowfar I can't really be sure. As for "I didn't say anything wrong", you could try asking her nicely.

@skullpatrol Ah, I like it!

thanks :-)

12:46 PM

Welcome!

The quote reminds me of what Audrey Hepburn said. "Impossible is possible. The word itself says I'm possible." -- This might not be the exact words, but it's what I can remember. :-)

It might be "Nothing is impossible" instead, or such, not absolutely sure.

yep

I'm possible

Yeah! Yay!

@DamkerngT. did you ask about why snailboat removed me?

I didn't. I remember that you appeared to be reinstated before I was gonna ask her.

@DamkerngT. never mind, it's not that important :-)

12:54 PM

I also remember that medica was here during the World Cup! :-)

@DamkerngT. I'm not reinstated either.

Ahh... I might remember it incorrectly! :(

but that's ok

I'm glad that you don't mind my forgetting. I'm sorry.

she instated me without asking anyway...

np

12:58 PM

I thought both of you had discussed it over already. Would you still want me to ask her about that?

nope

Okay.

in English Language & Usage, 2 hours ago, by Johan Larsson

in Lounge<C++> on Stack Overflow Chat, 2 hours ago, by Mark Garcia

Yet another productivity killer: http://gameaboutsquares.com/

@DamkerngT. the latest game

Umm... Thanks!

> Luckily, it's not exactly an AAA type of game, so I don't have to feed you empty promises.

Now I wonder what an AAA type of game is. :D

1:14 PM

Here's a real example of use: "Edwards published an account of the legal status of women in Canada in 1908 and a review of Alberta law as it affected women and children in 1917". Is this example representative of the usage you're interested in? — Nico 5 mins ago

Context really helps!

1:32 PM

+1!

user116848

2:08 PM

@DamkerngT. Ok Thanks. I will :)

2:18 PM

Having been exposed to only a diminutive amount of works of giants of English literature, and with ignorable apprehension of English, in the manner of speaking, my simplistic mind understands this "no material injury accrue either to body or mind" as English subjunctive. — Damkerng T. 1 min ago

:D

Anonymous

2:35 PM

@DamkerngT. AAA games are games from large companies that spend a lot of money on them

Anonymous

It's not well defined

Anonymous

It's basically the opposite of "indie", which is likewise not well defined

@snailboat Ah, thanks for the two not well defined terms! :-)

Anonymous

@Nico It looks pretty much like what I expect

Where did you find the sentence I am good about getting things done.? Is there any reason why you would think that sentence is correct when it contradicts your book? — oerkelens 7 mins ago

^for my collection of nice reply phrases

Anonymous

2:38 PM

Is there something wrong with that sentence?

Nothing wrong, definitely. I spotted a nice phrase (and good advice).

Anonymous

Oh. oerkelens seems to be implying that the sentence is bad

He might, but it's not absolute. I think it's a fair query.

Anonymous

Hmm. Now I'm confused about what the question is asking :-)

good about vs. good at :-)

> Does the sentence "I need to change eight pieces of clothing in one day" sound natural to you?
http://ell.stackexchange.com/questions/30118/differences-between-in-one-day-one-day

Anonymous

2:45 PM

Uh. :-)

Anonymous

Nope!

Hmm... I can't imagine when someone would say that!

lol

Anonymous

You can say "I need to change clothes eight times in one day", but it's pretty weird saying how many pieces of clothing

That's one of the two things I wonder about the sentence.

(Though the OP didn't ask about either of them. They asked about in one day. :-)

What if the speaker is a fashion model?

Anonymous

I don't know. Does that change something?

2:50 PM

@snailboat I bought some food, wherewith being enlivened, I trekked out into the field.

Is this grammatical?

Anonymous

I don't know how to use wherewith off the top of my head

Anonymous

It doesn't exist in Modern English

but in victorian english?

Like Dickens.

@StoneyB what do you think?

Anonymous

Oh, I would've thought it was older than that

like who?

Chauncer?

Anonymous

2:55 PM

That is, I would've thought it'd be old-fashioned in Victorian English, too

Anonymous

I'm sure Shakespeare used it

Anonymous

The wh-word plus preposition compounds were productive in EME, IIRC

Anonymous

Today most of them are marginal

Anonymous

We basically have a fixed set we can use in that class, like therefore but not wherefore, etc.

Anonymous

Henceforth but not thenceforth

Anonymous

2:59 PM

You can still get away with using a number that I would say are marginal, but some others will confuse listeners

Anonymous

So when Modern English speakers read Shakespeare and they see the famous line "Wherefore art thou Romeo", someone has to teach them what it actually means

Anonymous

They can't understand it natively

Anonymous

(It sounds like it might mean "Where are you, Romeo?")

oh!!!

I didn't know that

Native speakers can be dumb like that

Anonymous

Haha.

Anonymous

3:05 PM

People who are very intelligent can nonetheless fail to understand something when they don't have the information they need to do so

@snailboat Ah, yes. Like, "What do I have in my pocket?"

Anonymous

@DamkerngT. Hee!

:D

Anonymous

The Hobbit was my favorite book when I was little.

3:21 PM

@DamkerngT. I am afraid that your false modesty has falsified your intent. "in A manner of speaking" is correct; not "THE." — username901345 28 secs ago

See, I can learn a lot from our users. :D

user116848

@DamkerngT. Hi! again Damks. Did you take a look at my "gonna" question above?

@DamkerngT. Too bad that they accused me several points.

@Arrowfar I remember I've seen you mentioned it, but I think you didn't ask me.

@user4550 That's a very odd sentence. Wherewith being enlivened llooks early 18th century to me--think Crusoe. But trek doesn't enter English at all until the middle of the 19th. And it's apparently (mis)used here in a distinctly PDE sense = "hike"; in the 19th century it always retained its original meaning of travel by (ox-drawn) wagon; trek is a Dutch/Afrikaans cognate of E draw, drag, draft.

so grammatically OK?

@user4550 Why did you accuse me so? (I am afraid that your false modesty has falsified your intent.)

3:24 PM

because its a fact

@user4550 Oh sure.

your english was so grand there like Dickens'

but you were saying "limited English"

about your skills

so thats why

user116848

So if I always say *going to* instead of *gonna* will I be sounding unnatural?
Because sometimes I don't feel like using *gonna* .
While speaking that is.

@StoneyB I see. Can I also say, "food, wherewith I being enlivened, my god pestered me for its food."

?

@user4550 Ahh... I thought you talked to StoneyB... until the last line.

Anonymous

3:26 PM

@DamkerngT. Have I missed part of the conversation?

So, i was helpful there?

It was in the comments of ell.stackexchange.com/q/30131/3281.

I spotted your mistake and improved it

to help yoiu

Anonymous

You can say "going to" if you like

I'm still thinking... (Do I really need to change it to a?)

3:28 PM

yeah

it is an idiom

the doesn't make any sense there in that context

Anonymous

Besides, there are times when gonna isn't a valid contraction of going to (at least for most speakers)

in the manner of Dickens I used convoluted sentences

This is OK

Anonymous

Are you being paid by the word, then? :-)

Are you saying you are a genius? In a matter of speaking yes.

ok__

Snailboat what do ya thnk

Anonymous

About what, exatly?　←　Hold on, my keyboard isn't behaving

Anonymous

3:30 PM

exactly

Anonymous

Phew! I was afraid my C key had bailed on me

Having been exposed to only a diminutive amount of works of giants of English literature, and with ignorable apprehension of English, in the manner of speaking, my simplistic mind understands this "no material injury accrue either to body or mind" as English subjunctive.

This "the before manner is wrong,

it should be a

user116848

@snailboat Thanks I guess.....So did you get my pings earlier?

What if I say that I used that the manner of purposefully? :-)

Did I just make a stupid mistake?

Anonymous

@Arrowfar I see them

user116848

3:33 PM

@snailboat But?

But thats not good

mistakes are not good.

Anonymous

@user4550 Mistakes are okay.

Anonymous

Repeating mistakes is bad.

coz your englihs is grand

user116848

@snailboat Whose mistakes?

3:35 PM

Mine? No, I think my English is just passable. :)

Anonymous

But it's more or less a given that you won't learn without making some mistakes

user116848

I see

his english is grand.

user116848

Without pinging the correct person it sometimes gets very difficult to follow the conversation!

so his mistakes will be considered bad.

if Obama made a mistake, the media would go into the frenzy feeding

Anonymous

3:38 PM

@user4550 Which is nonetheless ridiculous

man, wait, are you female?

Anonymous

You can use man as an informal interjection when speaking to women

oh yeah,

i see

then ok?

I am not sexist.

Anonymous

Dude, too, if you're the type to use either of these interjections

i d use Sirrah

Anonymous

3:40 PM

Young women say dude to each other

it sounds Indian

Anonymous

That, I would not suggest.

user116848

Sirrah is offensive

or Oh Mule!

or

Anonymous

I usually speak Modern English.

3:40 PM

Critter

scamp

Anonymous

"Oh Mule" and "Critter" are more or less meaningless to me as interjections

user116848

Yeah! meaningless

user116848

And old fashioned

user116848

And very offensive like----->scamp

user116848

phew

3:45 PM

oh sorry, arrow

forgive me

moose

jk

Arrow are you from India?

mideast?

...

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