Search results for 'tag:Commas tag:Difference between' matching tags 'Commas' and 'Difference between'

Re: Combing 2 Sentences, which one is right?

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 09:51:16 GMT

Thank you CJ. You are very kind to tell me the correct answer. But would you mind also explaining the answer in a little more detailed so I can understand the difference between a cooma and no comma. This comma is driving me crazy as a ESL learner.

Thank you in advance.

With or Without comma and why?

Anonymous — Tue, 17 Jun 2008 05:16:52 GMT

I was asked to analyse and discuss the following 2 questions but I have little understanding about. Please help.

Questions # 1

1. Yesterday I saw a schoolboy.
2 He was knocked down by a sppeding car.

Combibe sentence 1 and sectence 2 to a single sentence and pick the correct answer or answers. Explain the difference between the one or ones you think is or are correct and the one or ones you think is or are wrong in terms of its or their meanings.

Choices:

a. Yesterday I saw a school boy who was knocked down by a speeding car.

b. Yesterday I saw a school boy, who was knocked down by a speeding car.

c. Yesterday I saw a school boy knocked down by a speeding ca.

d. Yesterday I saw a school boy, knocked down by a speeding car.

Questions # 2

3. Yesterday I saw the schoolboy.
4. He was knocked down by a sppeding car.

Combibe sentence 3 and sectence 4 to a single sentence and pick the correct answer or answers. Explain the difference between the one or ones you think is or are correct and the one or ones you think is or are wrong in terms of its or their meanings.

Choices:

e. Yesterday I saw the school boy who was knocked down by a speeding car.

f. Yesterday I saw the school boy, who was knocked down by a speeding car.

g. Yesterday I saw the school boy knocked down by a speeding ca.

f. Yesterday I saw the school boy, knocked down by a speeding car.

Re: What's the difference between these words?

Mr Wordy — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 22:17:33 GMT

"Maybe" is more conversational and less likely to be used in formal writing, but other than that the two words are very often interchangeable -- as they are in all your dictionary examples. There might be some expressions in which only one of "maybe" or "perhaps" is idiomatic, but none immediately come to mind.

John is not a engineer, maybe a technician.

This is not very good English. You could say John is not a engineer; maybe/perhaps he's a technician. or John is not a engineer; he may be a technician. In ordinary conversation John is not a engineer ... maybe a technician. is a kind of shorthand, but I wouldn't punctuate it with a comma.

Perhaps/maybe, but I'm not sure about that.

Fine.

Perhaps, I may have a car.

I'd punctuate this as Perhaps I may have a car (unless you actually mean Perhaps. I may have a car.). Strictly you don't need both "perhaps" and "may", but in ordinary conversation it's the kind of thing one would say. Actually, to answer my own question, when the sentence (redundantly) also includes the word "may", it would sound odd to use "maybe". For example, Maybe I may have a car is strange (while Maybe I'll have a car is fine).

Re: the middle voice option

MrPedantic — Sun, 25 May 2008 22:49:37 GMT

Hello Dawnstorm,

Dawnstorm

In most of these sentences you could make a case for elided objects, that are taken care off by context (rather than considered irrelevant, as in "I am eating."):

e.g. Yes, I saw X. X = anaphoric; referring to "Did you see X!" or "Omg, X!"

"You push X and I'll lift X." : X is exophoric; determined by a present or imagined contex (e.g. they're standing in front of X).

Yes, I agree; such cases could presumably be classified as "common ambitransitives" (see ex. 4a in my earlier post); or perhaps as "ambiguous ambitransitives" (see ex. 6); thus:

1. You push (it) and I'll lift (it)

But:

2. It lifted quite easily

Dawnstorm

"What should we do when we punish X?" This one's actually more like the "considering irrelevant" I mentioned above, the assumption being that there is one set of answers for all X, so that X doesn't have to be mentioned. (Similarly, "I am eating X," the point I'm making holds for all X.) Note that the listener might enquire, here, "punish who?" or "eat what?"

"Please give X generously.": Here, X usually means "money", but context probably takes care of this (it might mean used clothes, household appliances etc. for flood victims). Here X is not so much irrelevant as implied.

Again, agreed. Presumably therefore "common ambitransitives".

Dawnstorm

I've heard that cognitive linguists often work with an implied object for many "intranstives". So: "I am reading" and "I am eating" always have a hint of "I am reading X" and "I am eating X", which is not expressed. A lot of this has to do with "theta roles"; what parts the verb's arguments are playing.

I am eating (X): Subject = agent

I am dying: Subject = experiencer

***

Yes, agreed. "Eat" is presumably unergative (ex. 4); "die", unaccusative (ex. 2).

I also agree with your inverted commas ("intransitives"), for verbs such as "eat" and "read". In non-metaphorical usage, the objects of "eat" tend to belong to a particular class ("food"), and are therefore to some extent always cognate with "eat"; whereas the objects of e.g. "hit" are not.

Thus "He eats well" does not need a context, for us to understand what the implied object is; but "He hits well" does.

Dawnstorm

Notice, for example, the semantic equivalence, but syntactic difference between:

- The sign reads, "Beware of the dog!"

- The sign says, "Beware of the dog!"

I agree that there's a syntactic difference: the first can't be presented as indirect speech, for example. "Reads" has almost a copulative sense here.

But I find a semantic difference too: the first presents the sign from the point of view of the reader, and the second, from the point of view of the writer.

Dawnstorm

This is the gordian knot that tangles up syntax, semantics and pragmatics. There are a lot of problems:
- The mirror is breaking.
I am dying.

vs.

- Don't break the mirror!
- Don't kill me.

See the problem? It's not only a syntactic but also a lexical problem. Break (intr.):Die (intr.) = Break (tr.):Kill (tr.). Does it make sense to claim that "break" is ergative/unaccusative (I'm still confused by the difference) and "die" isn't, because "die" selects a different lexical item for the transitive?

No, it doesn't make sense; and precisely because of that distinction, I would call "break" here ergative (ex. 5) , and "die" unaccusative (ex. 2).

Dawnstorm

But, again, syntax is not the same as semantics. Take this construction, for example:

"He died a cruel death."

While this assigns subject and object along the formal transitive model, semantically the "agent/patient" distinction breaks down; or rather, the fact that dying is not an action that affects death posits a problem to the "agent/patient" distinction within "voice".

The object here is a cognate object (it is implied in the verb itself) and thus belongs to a slightly different model. (I would say that it only exists to provide an adverbial opportunity: "he died a cruel death" = "he died in a cruel way".)

Dawnstorm

I'm not surprised people run from "ergativity"/"accusativity"; it's a tangle. I don't think that conventional morphological/syntactic analysis can solve the tangle adequately. It's a gordian knot, and all the syntanctician has is Alexander's sword. I'd look for solution in cognitive linguistics, construction grammar, frame semantics etc. These approaches could then help patch holes in syntax.

The terminology is not happy, admittedly; "middle voice" and "ergative" belong to other linguistic contexts, as has been mentioned; but I think it can be disentangled.

It may be the case that "ergative" usage was once much more common in English. Before the rise of the passive present progressive, for instance, an active present progressive often expressed the same meaning. Thus:

3. The house is building (pre-19th century) =
4. The house is being built

Also, although the same few verbs tend to recur as examples in these discussions, actual usage is more imaginative. For instance, last week I heard a sports commentator say:

5. The pitch doesn't look very pretty; but as long as it plays well, that's all that matters.

Best wishes,

MrP

Re: Comma use

Akavall — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 19:42:10 GMT

Thanks, Clive

But there are some other issues that I am not sure about.

Is the original sentence a typical "independent clause + coordinating conjunction + independent clause"?

If so, is a comma always optional in the above structure?

Also, this sentence came from a British website. Is there any difference between AME and BRE is this type of situations?

Re: Optional commas.

Akavall — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 23:38:41 GMT

Yankee wrote:
Hi Akavall
To me, the only possible reason to use commas with 'however' (in your sentence) would be if someone else had just given an opinion different from mine, and I then wanted to stress the word 'I' -- i.e. to place extra emphasis on the fact that there is a difference between what I think and what they think.

So if I said:

Authors should not spend a lot of money on editing their books. I however think that using correct grammar is important.

I am not disagreeing with anybody; I am just changing the course of my initial idea. No commas?

I think I got the "therefore" part.

Thanks a lot for helping me with this .

Re: Optional commas.

Yankee — Mon, 28 Jan 2008 18:16:26 GMT

Hi Akavall

I would not use commas with consequently in that position. I doubt that I would insert the word 'thus' into the middle of "I think", but if I did, I would not use commas there either.

To me, the only possible reason to use commas with 'however' (in your sentence) would be if someone else had just given an opinion different from mine, and I then wanted to stress the word 'I' -- i.e. to place extra emphasis on the fact that there is a difference between what I think and what they think.

Re: Is it correct or not?

Philip — Fri, 11 Jan 2008 16:24:14 GMT

Darcy wrote:
5. Which is correct?Both are correct. (1) is more common.
(1) Today we're going to study 'relative pronouns'
(2) Today we'll study 'relative pronouns'.

6 Are they correct? (1) is awkward; both need a comma before 'and'.
(1) I'll make a list of relative pronouns and then we're looking at how to use them.
(2) I'll make a list of relative pronouns and then let's look at how to use them

7 What is the difference between them?
(1)I want you to write your introduction. (2)I want you to write out your introduction. Both are heard; the 'out' in (2) is not good.

8. Are they correct?
(1) Turn in your paper on Friday. (2) Present your paper on Friday.

Is "present" is used the same meaning as "turn in"? I turn in a paper to the teacher. I present a paper (read it) to the class.
If so, how can we know whether "present" means "turn in" or talking to students with his paper in class? Present also means talking to other students with his paper in class, doesn't it?

Thanks for reading long writing.

I hope this helps.

Welcome to EF!!

Re: Comma? Colon? Nothing?

Grammar Geek — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 15:16:02 GMT

I would certainly put the comma before a direct quote, so perhaps this is a difference between BrE and AmE. However, your sentence has too many parts. The "after 29 years at Indiana" just seems like it's stuck there.

After 29 years at Indiana, Knight--already on probation for prior incidents--was fired in 2000 for grabbing the arm of freshman Kent Harvey, who had said, "Hey, what's up Knight?" on campus.

(Unknown 22884)OHHH I FINALLY CAN POST!!!

Jen001 — Fri, 21 Dec 2007 01:51:40 GMT

"The Change of the Characteristics in the passage from The Hours"

The passage from the novel The Hours by Michael Cunningham is intriguing. The passage illustrates the difference between the character's characteristics in different time settings: past and present. This difference is clearly shown through the contrasting structure, imagery and language.

The structure reflects the division of the time setting and helps to contrast the different characteristics. The passage has two paragraphs, each describing the character's thoughts and perception about a same place, of the past and present. The length of each paragraph is different; the one from the past is much longer than the other one from the present. This can be related to each of the paragraph's sentence construction. In the first paragraph, about the past, the lengths of the sentences are very long. The first sentence takes eight lines, lengthened continuously within commas, semi-colons and colons. In fact, in one sentence, there are five commas, five semi-colons and a colon. This overly-continued sentence gives a sense of unfiltered, informal, and unrestricted flowing of thoughts. Moreover, the use of brackets, âsome sort of wood(cedar? Camphor?),â seems to be less sophisticated, compared to using dashes or other punctuations of the same function. However, in the second paragraph of the present, the sentence construction is shown contrastingly. The paragraph starts with a short simple sentence: âShe turns down Bleecker, goes up Thomson.â Also, in this paragraph, there are four sentences in six lines, and three of the four sentences are written in simple sentence, including the example above. Although there are a few commas in some of the sentences, there is no semi-colon, but only a colon in the last sentence. The colon is used in a very appropriate way, functioning to introduce the list of âthingsâ, such as âjewelryâ and âjackets.â Thus, within the brief and concise sentence construction, the character in the present appears to be more mature, filtered and sophisticated than in the past. However, as a result of that, the sense of youthful, unfiltered freedom cannot be found anymore in the present.

In addition to the structure, the contrasting imagery of each paragraph demonstrates further differences of the characteristic in the past and present. As both paragraphs are of the same setting, the image of the same place is described at each time. So, the consistent place makes the comparison between the two more distinctive and reliable. The imagery of the place is very vivid in the past, not only within the visual sense, but also within the auditory and olfactory senses, whereas that of the past only relies on the sense of sight. For example, in the past, âthe neighborhoodâ is depicted as âthe center of something new and wildâ in âthe city where the sound of guitars drifted all nightâ and âwhere the stores â¦ smelled the way â¦ Arab bazaars must smell.â This is detail, imaginative and lively, even the âArab bazaarsâ creates a somewhat mystical and adventurous atmosphere. This interesting and passionate depiction is being minimized in the present into three words: an âimitation of itself.â It is now âa watered-down carnival for tourists,â which gives a sense of inactivity and boredom. Also, the stores now âall sell essentially the same things,â such as âsouvenir T-shirts.â This seems to be dull, with no excitement or creativity or passion. This changed imagery, depicted by the character, rather shows the change in the character's perception. The change in perception is demonstrated more clearly within the notion of the âdoorâ and âalley.â In the past, she says, âif you passed through the wrong door or down the wrong alley you would meet a fate,â however, in the present, she âknows that behind these doors, and down these alleys lies nothing more or less than people living their lives.â In the past, she seems to be more concerned with the 'inner' world of thought or imagination. Whereas in the present, she seems to be more grounded in the external world of physical reality. As like the previously discussed change in the sentence structure, she is now more sophisticated, knowledgeable and realistic than the past. Also, as like the image of the place, her perception changed from the creative, interesting and adventurous to the boring, predictable and filtered way. Thus, the contrasting imagery of the past and present reflects the similar change in the character's perception.

While the structure and the imagery convey the distinctive change in the characteristics of the character, the contrasting use of language supports those differences. More specifically, the diction [dash]shown in the past and the present[dash] is comparable. Reflecting the imagery of the varied senses, the words and expressions used in the past are also varied and animated, such as âincense and richâ and âdung-y dustâ describing the smell of the stores. These two expressions, âincense and richâ and âdung-y dustâ are contrasting; they express the diversity of the object. Moreover, the speaker creates a non-existing adjective, âdung-y.â The extra adding of â-yâ grants a more animated image, and it gives a sense of freedom and even somewhat childishness. The âsmellâ is then described as âsomething fruitily, fertilely rotting.â Again, she creates a non-existing adverb, âfruitily,â expressing the scent rather vividly, which would be sour as it ârots.â The other adverb âfertilelyâ contributes to create a sense of abundance and richness of the imagery. However, the use of those two positive adverbs, modifying the negative verb ârottingâ seems to be oxymoron in âfruit[full]â or âfertile,â as well as the use of adjective âdisreputable,â following ânew and wild.â The oxymoron adds an unpredictable sense to the imagery and hence to the depicter's thoughts. On the other hand, in the present, the adjectives used to describe the âcityâ and the âstores,â are ânothing,â âless,â âsame,â and âstill.â All of them are negative and reflect the boredom, dullness and hopelessness. More significantly, the speaker uses the adverb, âGrotesquelyâ before describing how âthe same bars and coffeehouses are still [th]ereâ, showing the character's cynical characteristic. So does the use of the adjective âcheapâ for the goods at the stores. Thus, in the past, the character uses language interestingly [dash] it is diverse, lively and creative [dash] whereas that of the past is inactive, hopeless and cynical. These differences are directly reflecting the character's contrasting, changed characteristic.

The change of the characteristic seems to be abrupt. As a cause, something would have happened to her, that is not shown in the passage. However, an assumption can be drawn within the evidences from the passage. There is a shift in the first paragraph within âHere,â showing the shifted tense from the past to the past perfect. In the past perfect, there is a scene of Clarissa, the major character, and her boyfriend Richard. She seems to appreciate Richard a lot, for example, she does not use the pronoun 'he' for âRichard,â even though he is the only male character. So, in a sentence, Richard is successively repeated three times, âwith Richard, when Richard â¦ when Richard.â Moreover, she describes his appearance in detail; he âwas nineteen,â âa firm-featured, hard-eyed, not-quite-beautiful dark-haired boy with an impossibly long and graceful, very pale neck.â So, to describe Richard, she combines an adjective and a noun to create a single adjective, such as âhard-eyed.â This shows her seriousness about describing him precisely. His âimpossibly longâ and âvery paleâ neck would seem negative, if not for the complementary adjective âgraceful.â Also, the adverb âimpossiblyâ gives a sense of special and unusual feeling for the person. Besides the use of language, the use of punctuation should also be noted. There are many commas, causing the sentences to seem choppy. This would be imitating the feeling of uncertainty and the tension in the situation. The uncertainty of the situation is shown in the line, ââ¦about what? A kiss? Had Richard kissed her, or had she, Clarissaâ¦,â also the tension created as they âhad certainly argued.â Then, the reason for the âargu[ment]â is explained: âClarissa wanted her freedom and Richard wanted, well, too much.â It is notable that as Richard âwanted â¦ too muchâ relating to the âkiss,â the pronoun 'he' is used as âdidn't he always?â In this case, however, the pronoun 'he' seems to more likely indicate every 'man', rather than particularly âRichard.â Thereafter the paragraph ends, and the paragraph of the present starts. It is not sure whether the abrupt change in Clarissa's characteristic is due to âRichardâ or not. Although it is not, it is evident that Clarissa once considered and cared about him quite specially.

Despite of the uncertain reason, the change in the Clarissa's characteristic from the past to the present is shown clearly throughout the contrasting structure, imagery and language. The characteristic includes the thoughts and perception, which were unrestricted, unfiltered, creative and animated in the past; whereas in the present, they are shown restricted, filtered, dull and inactive. The change is extreme, but no particular evidence for the extremity is being suggested, except the short scene with Richard. Thus, this passage not only introduces the setting and the character, but also evokes the reader's curiosity: What has happened to Clarissa?

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I really really really appreciate for your help... Thank you..!