In Idioms^x, Prepositions^x

. CJ

Well, maybe I'll say, where and with things I have difficulties.Firstly and it's the most important: tenses. In my mother tongue, we don't have so many freaking tenses Secondly, this problem is with every new language. The way you think and make sentence. Sometimes I translate from my language to...

thank you for your effort ...Well, to say the truth, I am kind of confused as well... The fact about "the intensifier" (sorry about that, the proper word is probably "intensifier" rather than "intensificator")is what makes me feel uncomfortable about the sentence.Actually it comes from my school...

A lot of English idioms use prepositions to give the word a new meaning: shut down, shut up, work out, work up, break down, break up, etc. Sometimes the dictionary will tell you where the words came from, or you can look at an etymology website. My guess is that doing hard work like...

I thank both Clive and CalifJim for the excellent replies.It seems even if you are a native English speaker and an expert in English, you can't judge a given verb's transitive/intransitive nature.You should refer to a dictionary to make sure whether it is transitive or intransitive.This is my...

Hi, When I first learned English, hear and listen were clear to me. The later requires the attentiveness of a listener. However, talk and speak ran my teacher in circle. He took an English-Vietnamese dictionary and told us to stick with the translation and then he failed to reason why some...

They talked for a while.(they were in conversation)They speaked for a while.(they made sound)He is talking about the issue.He is speaking of the issue.(both are the same but the prepositions are different)They talk business.(they discuss business)They speak business(wrong)Money talks.(idiom)Money...

Sorry; I misspoke in my earlier post. Take care of is not a phrasal verb, it is just a verb phrase, a verbal idiom.Phrasal verbs consist of a verb + particle (adverb, preposition) which behave as a syntactic unitMake up (= invent) is a phrasal verb, and cannot take an internal adverb: Make up...

They are a preposition and a noun, as you say, and not considered an idiom. You are right. CJ

What are the functions of "by" and "bus" in the sentence "I came here by bus."? I think their functions are literal, preposition and noun, but one of my colleagues is claiming that "by bus" is to be taken as one, like an diom or something to mean "riding". Who is right, me or my colleague?