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Help proofreading "A Doll's House"

Anonymous — Sun, 24 Feb 2008 03:40:25 GMT

I have finished writing an essay, which is due tomorrow. As an ESL student, I have the feeling that I have a lot of grammatical mistakes. Is there any sentence where you wonder what the heck I am trying to say? Hope anyone can help!

The Woman Within the Doll

The Baltimore Sun wrote that back in 1879, âA Doll's Houseâ by Henrik Ibsen âshocked and offended people wherever [it] was played,â and that the dramatist assured it was not about a woman, but about âanyone who had to live according to the rules created by othersâ (Hyder). Society thought to be outrageous that a woman would get involved in manly things, for her role in society was exclusively to care for the family and please her husband. Women did not enjoy the rights women do now. They were not taken seriously, and decisions were made by the man who was and still is considered the head of the family. Nora's choice to become free, independent and leave her husband, along with some of the characters' actions made this play to be scandalous for its time.

Ibsen wrote in a letter that the story in âA Doll's Houseâ was about a woman who feels:

ppressed and bewildered by belief in authority, she loses her faith in her own moral right and ability to bring up her children... [She is bittered because,] like certain insects, (ought to) go away and die when she has done her duty towards the continuance of the species... [she shakes] off of cares, [but then she feels] a sudden return of apprehension and dread. She must bear it all aloneâ (Doll).

Nora had a beautiful life, she had a husband, beautiful children, and everything she wanted. Earlier in her marriage, his husband suffered of an illness of which he needed to recover somewhere in the south, but this was concealed from him by the doctor and Nora. Not having the means to afford a trip so costly and out of love and desperation, Nora decides to ask for a loan without letting Tolvard know. She forges her father's signature to obtain the loan because she does not want to trouble her father either, who is very ill himself too. However, she is responsible and works secretly from home in order to make the payments. Eventually, Tolvard finds out about her secret and feels that his life, happiness and reputation will be lost once Krogstad, who lent the money, publishes the then scandalous situation out of revenged for having fired him from the bank he now manages. He quickly turns against her. That is the moment when Nora starts to understand things she did not understand before; she realizes she does not love Tolvard anymore just as he does not really love her as she thought, and decides to leave for good to discover herself.

The scenery consists of the Helmer's apartment and nowhere else. The description of the apartment depicts the decision that Nora will have to make. There is a door to the right which leads to the entryway and another to the left which leads to Helmer's study. Nora will have to decide which door to take: freedom or Helmer. The place is not âexpensively furnishedâ, but it is comfortable, just like Nora's marriage, she lives a comfortable life, but there are certain things she lacks that are more important than riches. No woman could even consider back in the 1800s doing such a scandalous things as to leave not only the husband, but her children too.

The main character in the story is Nora, a seemingly selfish, materialistic woman who cares a lot about money and in living a good life. This is to be expected since her father liked to spend money himself and live a life he could only could afford with credit. He used to called her his âdoll-child, and he played with [her] the way [she] played with [her] dollsâ (Ibsen 1041). She was obviously very protected and spoiled by both, her father and her husband, who provided anything she needed or wanted. Her father raised her not think for herself and just play her role in society. âWhile [she] was at home with [her] father, he used to tell [her] all his opinions, and [she] held the same opinions. If [she] had others [she] said nothing about them, because he wouldn't have liked itâ (1041). This repeated again as a married woman; she would not express her opinion to Tolvard, for they never talked seriously, but seemed to have trusted Dr. Rank better. Norah was greatly misunderstood. She was a loving person, she loved her husband so much that she was willing to forge her father's signature to obtain a loan to take her husband south in order for him to recover from a deadly illness. She is willing to do anything for him. Eventually she realized she does not have to play the doll anymore. One can only imagine people's reaction throughout the play's events.

Tolvard Helmer seemed to be an ideal husband. He is loving, admirable, honest, ethical, hard-working and successful, but there seems to be a dark side of him. He is a prideful man, he won't ask for money to anyone, to do so would be humiliating. To him, honor and appearances are more important than family. He does not believe people can change and become good, as he did not believe Krogstad was a good person although he had been honest for a long time already. Also, he is so affectionate that makes one wonder of his sincerity; he calls Nora diminutive names such as featherbrained, spendthrift, a squirrel, a song-bird, lark, strange little being all the time (994). One cannot think of a woman who would like being called like that and who would not be affected emotionally. Tolvard's reaction after finding out Nora's secret is amusing. He had told Nora that sometimes he wished â[she] was in some terrible danger, just so [he] could take [his] life and soul and everything, for [her] sakeâ (1038), yet he quickly turns against her calling her a wretched woman, a criminal, unprincipled, untrustworthy of raising her children, incapable, etc. His hypocrisy is clearly revealed when as soon as he realizes that Nora's mistake won't affect his reputation he forgives her (1039-1949). There's a saying that goes something like a good friend is hard to find, specially during difficult times; Tolvard was nor a good friend neither that perfect husband he seemed to be. He loved to have control of his wife's life, and his conversations usually tend to imply that Nora would be lost without him; that she needed his guidance and teaching. Tolvard did not love Nora, â[he] thought it fun to be in love with [her]â (1041).

Dr. Rank is in love with Nora, and that seems to have been the main reason he visited the Helmer's house. This character is not essential in the play, but it causes outrage when he dares to reveal Nora his secret. This is almost vulgar for him to do, and very dishonorable, specially during those times in which people were very conservative. It is as if he had taken advantage of the trust the family had in it and ended up tarnishing his reputation.

Mrs. Linde is one of Nora's old friends from school. She gave up her true love for money, but in the end things did not turn out the way she had expected. Her husband died leaving her in a terrible financial situation making it necessary for her to work in order to sustain her mother and brothers. After her mother passed away and her brothers did not need her help she left town. Not to have someone to take care of made her feel âcompletely alone in the worldâ, and it frightened her âto be so empty and lostâ (1032). She needed âsomeone to take care ofâ, she wanted to be a mother and wanted the companionship of a husband. In the end, she was supposed to have helped Nora hide her secret. She could have convinced Mr. Krogstad to get the letter back, but she did not intercede (1033). She might have been envious of Nora, after all, Nora had all she was longing for; a husband, beautiful children, and a good life.

Lastly, Krogstad is the one who lent Nora money to save her husband, and threatens her to tell her husband if she does not convince Tolvard to let him keep his job at the bank, but just as Nora did, he once made a mistake, which caused him to loose his reputation. He was a man who seems to have been harden by life's difficulties. When he was left by the woman he dearly loved âit was as if all the solid ground dissolved from under [his] feetâ (1031). This might have caused him to become the âhalf-drownedâ kind of man, as he refers to himself. After finding love in his life he turns from the revengeful person into a forgiving one.

In conclusion, Nora realized of her true value as a human being and as a woman. She decides to leave everything and everyone, husband, children, luxuries to a journey to liberate herself. To do such thing was unthinkable at that time and caused turmoil, but it was the best choice she could ever make. To leave one's children is a terrible things to do and was not necessary, but looking beyond that, without prejudices, it is not hard to understands she is trying to figure out who she really is and what she believes in. This is essential to one's happiness; therefore she is determined to make necessary changes in her life even if people think bad of her. It seems that daring to do so back in the 1800s was just as bad as selling drugs or prostituting oneself.

Works Cited

"A Doll's House." Triton College. 21 Feb. 2008 <http://academics.triton.edu/uc/files/dollshse.html>.

Hyder, Willian. "A Doll's House is No Toy Effort." Baltimore Sun. 15 Feb. 2008. 21 Feb. 2008 <http:// www.baltimoresun.com/news/local/howard/bal-ho.chesapeake15feb15,0,4775242.story>.

Ibsen, Henrik. "A Doll House." The Norton Introduction to Literature. New York: Norton & Co., 2006. 993-1045.

Re: When I have trouble...

Kooyeen — Mon, 26 Nov 2007 17:36:17 GMT

Hi Anon,
what Jim said makes a lot of sense, and we discussed it a little in another thread, I think.
The point was that teaching completely descriptively is impossible. The teacher would have to say: Mr X says this, Mr Y says that, and Mr Z says another thing. Now learn what they say and then decide what to do by yourself.
Every time a teacher gives advice or suggest something, they're being at least a little bit prescriptive.
So if you want a good teacher, you need a teacher who "prescribes" the most appropriate English for you.

Now, suppose I'm 17. The better you know English, the more it should sound like English spoken by native speakers (this should be true for every language). How can I be as similar to a native as possible? If am learning American English and I imagine I am a native speaker, I should imagine I am a 17-year-old American guy. If I found an American teenager to imitate, I would learn how to speak like my imaginary native clone.

So, why would a ESL student who is 17, listen to punk rock and don't care much about school and rules in society... why would he want to have a teacher who is 50, listen to classical music, and is a literature professor? Learning English from a punk like him is probably the best way to learn the best kind of English for him.

And as for females... sometimes girls talk a little differently. Vocabulary might be different, tipical topics in conversations are definitely different, and sometimes intonation might vary (example: uprising intonation).

Re: Helpful / Useful

Vorpar — Thu, 15 Nov 2007 04:17:15 GMT

I suppose that a person can be helpful, while a tool can be useful.

There's no rule that says when to use either, try to pick up the uses of these words in literature, movies, conversation, etc.

I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't tell someone that they were useful, at best, it sounds sarcastic, at worst, it implies that at other times, they were useless.

help!! help!!!

MissUAE — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 20:50:28 GMT

hi everyone,

could any one check my body paragraph about " hypertext fiction ",plz??

i did already, but i need to improve it more because the teacher put many comments in it?

the teacher wants from me to fix the resources??

i tried hard to express my opinin but the teacher said write more you opinion, so could u fix this problem too

the teacher commnt that i should i used a background based on length citation and my own analysis and voice is absent

Also, she wants from me to use APA for reference. and use MLE style

Thats all and wish your help..

here the teacher doesnt want this introduction which underlined"First of all, I will talk about a hypertext poem "as a type of hypertext fiction which published in websites (Electronic hypertext poem). The definition of electronic poem as "Lillington Karlin" says is a new genre of literature that uses the computer screen as medium, rather than the printed page. The literary works rely on the qualities unique to a digital environment, such as linked World Wide Web pages or effects such as sound and movement. Also, hypertext "poetry" can consist of words, although not necessarily organized into lines and stanzas, as well as, sounds, visual images, movement or other special effects. Although the poem may great" teacher didnt accept this sentence, i dont know why?? with sounds, perhaps of a lawnmower, while the words "mowing," "stop," "Sunday," and "morning" floats across computer screen in pseudo-three dimensional letters, one will have be hard pressed to identify the use of any formal poetics." Lillington, Karlin."

Bill Seaman is one example of electronic hypertext poem. If we observed that there are many differences between electronic Bill Seaman Poem and the written ones. There are many qualities available in the electronic poem which help people to interest in it and trust it " the teacher said i should change this word" trust" it. Also, electronic poem provide for us digital action like music, picture, light,â¦,etc. In addition, there are more details about poem information like the author life, the reason of the poem and some comments or critics about the poem. Also, there are some linked words which are difficult and the site provides the word translation. A poem form or style is very organized way which attract the reader. At the end of electronic hypertext poem there is analyzing of the poem as in Bill Seaman poem" my teacher said i should provide a print screen qraph for that and give a summary of content what does it talk about the Bill Seaman poem and i dont know how. There are more than 1030 poems which published as electronic poems.

Although there are many people depend on it, but there are many critics which say that electronic poem assaults readers with floating neon fonts and crude literary strategies, if any literary skill is present at all and critics view hypertext as a threat to the overall integrity of literature because most anyone, without any training or editing, can post hypertext "poetry" .(3)

So, Poems and collections of poems, can be composed as, or into, hypertext, using the many specific capabilities of hypertext software, which itself comes in many flavors .As Stephanie Strickland describes how he composed his book of poems, True North, into hypertext in a moment, so he says becomes possible in an electronic environment, and it is only possible.

The best known example of a hypertext is the World Wide Web, an enormous structure, almost biological in the way it communicates and publishes by proliferating links. The electronic space, often called cyberspace, has some very unusual qualities, to judge by pre- electronic categories. It is characterized as tidal sea, web, sky, and solid. Thus, people surf it, send out web-crawlers to explore it, gophers to tunnel through it, engines to mine data from it, and they fly through and above it in game simulations. They establish "home" pages in it, as though it were rooted, although at their own location distance has disappeared--New Zealand, New York, St. Paul, equally present, and equally speedily present.

In brief, as Stephanie says when a set of poems is composed in or into hypertext, the space in which they exist literally opened. Released from the printed page into this floating space, readers are often uneasy. With print, does encounter pages 1--85 differently at each reading because of being in a different frame of mind, but in hypertext, the pages change too--both you and your counter player, the hypertext, bring difference to the table. What you find are not really pages, of course. In hypertext, the unit that replaces the page is called the writing space which not only holds text as does a page, but unlike the page, has its own title and also an embeddable interior. New little text spaces can be implanted in it to the memory depths of the program. Rather roughly, what pages and their numbering are to books, writing spaces and their titles are to hypertext. In Stephanie poem True North he says, and why hypertext was appropriate for it. True North, as a manuscript, rings the changes on two image/themes--that is, themes which are also images. He plays with image/themes across five different registers, so of course each of them imitates the other.

Second, electronic hypertext novel is similar to electronic hypertext poem. It relies on the qualities unique to a digital environment, such as linked World Wide Web pages or effects such as sound and movement. As Philippa J Burne says, he worked in electronic space, he felt the book come to resemble an album, whose chronology may be strict or casual or a combination of both, its main use being to prompt conversation about shared experiences. Movement through the electronic screens, by comparison with print, was more whimsical, more riffling, more waiting for something to catch your eye, more like riding melodies through silence, and less like lockstep. One of the most interesting pieces was based on Goethe's novel, Elective Affinities. Four separate pedestal stands were erected in a pattern representing the four seats of a car. On each pedestal was a screen on which was projected a film of a person speaking. On the wall behind the four, a moving highway was projected, giving the convincing sensation that "the car" was moving. Coming close to any one pedestal enabled you to hear that person's voice tape. As we came to understand, each was a member of one, or more, of the possible couples. These cinematic images that don't leave their separate pedestal screen stands but do continuously "move" in their car, that appear to glance at each other, refer to each other, but never touch, never engage in conversation, made a powerful and disquieting image of electronic "connectedness." Overhearing was the main action permitted the spectator in this case. We have an example of electronic hypertext novel which is Patchwork Girl novel Blok who says in his book Reinventions of the Novel the hypertext novel gives readers a spatial model of narrative. It offers writing made of parts or pieces that can be manipulated and layered and organized and re-organized according to the reader's interests or needs. If, for example, a particular student wishes to see every instance of character L in a text, as well as the ways those instances link to each other and writing spaces not immediately about L but immediately connected for some reason (as in one link away), she can do so. She can have all the relevant writing spaces open simultaneously on her screen, if she wishes, and she can choose from several different charts that will illustrate the ways the writing spaces circulate around each other. And she's not limited to character, but can track down plot points, settings, allusions, and so on. What's the value here? The student can literally take a finished, polished text apart to see its constituent elements and where they emerge in the work as a whole.

In addition, the hypertext novel brings our attention to the medium, which is, in no small part. Also, the hypertext novel invites and encourages different reading experiences that lead to different conclusions. It helps a student discussion of not just the text, but how she or he has engaged the text, so the relationship between reader and hypertext is only an exaggerated version of a necessarily interactive relationship between a reader and conventional print texts. "Bluk"

Finally, I will talk about electronic hypertext story. Hypertext allows the story to develop in different ways, a kind of exploration. The writer can improve their works in creative ways. They can publish their works in a way which is different from the one. In electronic hypertext story the writer can change the style, organization and form of a story. In electronic hypertext fiction the writer can publish further information for example, details about him, summarize the story in easy way, and put pictures to explain an idea. It will be more interesting if the reader use electronic hypertext story because it will avoid boring as most people answered in my questionnaire. Also, the most people use this kind of fiction to spend their leisure time in advantage way.

Re: overtake/pass the car in front of us

CalifJim — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 19:41:05 GMT

In the U.S., the only version you'll hear in typical conversations is pass.
overtake has the same meaning, but it's in a higher register, used in official literature such as driving manuals issued by the goverment, such as

Be particularly cautious when attempting to overtake another vehicle,

which in ordinary conversation is

Be careful when passing.

I'm not aware of any other alternatives.

CJ

Re: visited + object OR visited + adverb of location

ClarkePeters — Wed, 24 Oct 2007 06:54:49 GMT

Thanks Clive,
This is my first foray into grammar with my adult students (I usually teach conversation, literature, news English and the like). So this question really threw me for a loop. I was teaching adverbs at the time (using "soon" in " I will visit Europe soon") so this is how the question came up.

Your examples are great.

Re: Out of Question VS Out of The Question

Tam Sadek — Sat, 29 Sep 2007 13:01:50 GMT

Hi GG Did you actually read my post? For if you had you would have see the following:

The fact that other posters appear unaware of the existence 'out of question' as a collocation should show you that this phrase is not common in modern spoken English. Therefore I would recommend that you refrain from using it in general conversation even/especially with native-English speakers, otherwise they may think you have got the collocation 'wrong' as it is not used now.

And 'No!' I don't teach archaic literature and never have. In fact I never recommend to any student that they should read any English literature. The last time I told someone about literature was a Russian a couple of months ago who asked me whether reading Sherlock Holmes in English would help him improve his English... Yes, I replied... if you want to talk to 19th Century English speakers; otherwise forget it!

However, the poster Teo I would guess is from Taiwan as he referred to a Taiwanese domain... If you've ever taught Chinese speakers out in Asia you'll have noticed that their dictionaries throw up a lot of archaic terms and vocabulary; usually because the dictionary itself is very old - I once came across a 2002 reprint of an English-Chinese Dictionary written by a German in 1899 being used by one of my mainland Chinese students in class!

Also, you have probably noticed that many foreigners love over-formal language and many foreigners, especially the Chinese, view the written form of English as the most correct and view all spoken forms as being inferior or slang.

This is why they get off on Shakespeare, etc. And it is also why we have to tell them why it is 'not correct' now rather than wrong. As you know yourself there are no such things as absolutes in English as English ain't science. What we have to enable people to do is to encode their message in the appropriate manner for their target audience, which is why I don't teach literature to EFL students and proactively tell them not to read any if they don't want to.

After all, generally, we're teaching people to communicate in modern English in the 21st Century - not trying to train wannabe authors aren't we?

And as an afterthought; just because I don't teach it, doesn't mean I don't about it... Mind you, I'd never call myself a guru of anything, would you?

Re: How to refrace a sentence so it doesn't have so many I's

WesternAmerican — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 16:59:47 GMT

~~Not knowing.~~
Knowing not.

Knowing not how to play this game, I would rather not give you tips.
I think I've got the hang of it; I'll keep in mind that this style is not commonly used in everyday conversations, and that it is mainly used in literature.

Many kudos, Clive!

WA goes Shakespheare!

Re: subjunctive or past conditional

Goodman — Mon, 07 May 2007 23:03:25 GMT

Hi Bokeh,

Becasue of your reply, it made me take a second look at the original question. I also did some research and found this paper written on the subject of Semantic Composition of Subjunctive Conditionals by Michela Ippolito of MIT/TÃ¼bingen University. I am not completely sure if I understood all thwt he wrote, but I do agree whole-heartedly with his view from what I understood. It's obvious that there are several subjunctive moods and conditionals discussed in great legnth which was exactly the reason causing the confusions on this thread. I find it absoulutely useful so I've extracted a small portion which I beleive was related the posted question.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=type+of+subjunctive

michela@alum.mit.edu

3. The Semantic Analysis of Subjunctive Conditionals

In answering the question of what the correct semantic analysis of subjunctive

conditionals is we will raise and answer the following questions too: (1) What is the

difference between indicative an subjunctive conditionals? (2) What is the role of the

past morphology in the composition of the meaning of a subjunctive conditional? (3)

What is the contribution of the second layer of past to the meaning of subjunctive

conditionals? As Iatridou observes, the past morphology in subjunctive conditionals is

not interpreted temporally, as the event of playing baseball in example (2) is supposed

to take place in the future (tomorrow). What follows in this paper is inspired by her

work and by the intuition behind it, i.e. that the temporal morphology we see in modal

constructions actively contributes to the construction of the modal meaning. However,

I depart from her idea that tense morphology has a âcore meaningâ that can apply to

different kinds of entities (i.e. her idea that if it applies to times, it is interpreted

temporally; if it applies to worlds, then it is interpreted modally). My claim is that

tense (aspectual) morphology has a single, definite interpretation: the temporal

(aspectual) one. The way tense morphology contributes to the composition of modal

meaning is by being interpreted in different positions in the structure of a modal

sentence, i.e. either in the restriction or in the nuclear scope of the modal operator.

Recall that I am arguing that accessibility relations are of type <s<i<st>> (where i is

the type for times and s the type for worlds): the notion of accessible world is relative

not only to a world but also to a time so that a world will be accessible if it satisfies

certain conditions with respect to an evaluation world and an evaluation time. The

past that we see in subjunctive conditionals such as If Charlie played baseball

tomorrow, we would lose the game is the morphological realization of a perfect

operator interpreted in the modal domain. I will develop an analysis of the meaning of

subjunctive conditionals and show how it solves the puzzle of the presupposition

projection for subjunctive conditionals discussed in Heim 1992; finally, I will answer

the three questions I raised above.

3.1 Felicity Conditions for Conditionals

Recall what the puzzle was. The antecedent of a subjunctive conditional can be

inconsistent with the common ground, and consequently, the set of worlds the modal

operator quantifies over cannot be restricted to the worlds in the context set (the

epistemically accessible worlds) (see (19) below). Furthermore, this set cannot be the

empty context (W) either because, if it were, we would expect conditionals with

antecedents with presuppositions to be infelicitous since the modal base does not have

the right entailments. However, this is incorrect: subjunctive conditionals whose

antecedents have presuppositions are felicitous, which means that the antecedentâs

presuppositions can be entailed by the modal base (cf. (20)). In fact, they must (cf.

(21)).

(19) Jack is dead. If he were alive, he would come to the ceremony.

(20) Jack smokes. If he quit smoking tomorrow, which he wonât, he would run

the marathon.

(21) Jack quit smoking last year. If he quit smoking tomorrow, he would run

the marathon.

Heim 1992 concluded that the only way to reconcile these two requirements of

subjunctive conditionals is to stipulate that the modal base is neither the set of

epistemically accessible worlds (the main context) nor the totally empty modal base

W, but the (largest) set of worlds obtained by suspending all the speakerâs

assumptions except the presuppositions of the antecedent, which then remain entailed.

However, I showed above that this stipulation does not work for all subjunctive

conditionals: in particular, it does not account for the difference between one-past

subjunctive conditionals and mismatched two-pasts subjunctive conditionals, as

shown below.

(22) Jack died last year.

a. #If he came to the ceremony tomorrow, he would be proud of Sally.

b. If he had come to the graduation tomorrow, he would have been proud

of Sally.

We are back where we were: how is the set of worlds to which modal operators apply

selected? Clearly, the felicity conditions for indicative, one-past and two-pasts

subjunctive conditionals are all different. But what is the difference and how is the

difference determined?

It seems correct to hold that for a sentence to be felicitously uttered in the

context c, c must entail the presuppositions of . In the common ground theory of

presuppositions developed by Stalnaker (1973, 1974, 1975), the common ground is

the set of all the propositions known or assumed to be true by all the participants in

the conversation, and the context set is the set of worlds where all the propositions in

the common ground are true. Assertions are meant to update the common ground. If

the assertion is made and accepted, the common ground expands and the context set

shrinks. Thus, if a sentence presupposes p, then asserting requires that the

common ground entail p, i.e. it requires that the speaker assume that it is true in the

common ground that p, modulo accommodation.10 It is explicit in Heimâs context

change semantics (and implicit in Stalnakerâs idea of a derived context) that a clause

(that is to say, the structural description of a clause at the level of Logical Form) is not

always evaluated with respect to the context of utterance: the context with respect to

which a structure is evaluated depends on the level of embedding of the clause, the

most unembedded clause being interpreted with respect to the main (utterance)

context. We can then reformulate the principle above: what is responsible for the

felicity of a sentence is not whether its presuppositions are entailed by the utterance

context but whether they are entailed by the evaluation context (which may be

identical to the utterance time in some cases). Call this principle PREP.

10 Stalnaker (1972, 1973, 1974, 1978, 1988, 1998). Kartunnen (1974), Lewis (1979), Heim (1982,

1983, 1992), Thomason (1990) and von Fintel (2000) also contributed important work in the tradition

of the common ground theory of presuppositions.

3.2 What Looks Like Past is Perfect

I propose that the past morphology we see in subjunctive conditionals in English is

the morphological realization of a perfect operator. The English perfect, and

especially the present perfect, has raised a lot of interest in the linguistic literature

because of the properties that distinguish it from both the present and the simple past

tense. McCoard (1978) offers a survey of possible theories of the perfect: the current

relevance theory, the indefinite past theory, the embedded past theory and, finally, the

theory that he argues to be the best, the Extended Now theory. Very briefly, according

11 The claim that the presuppositions of the antecedent of a conditional have to be entailed by the

context is a standard claim of a dynamic approach to meaning (Heim 1992). However, we will see later

that the issue is more intricate and I will have more to say on this topic later on in the paper.

Re: Need Ideas for (english) conversation topics with woman aged 35 - 45.

Anonymous — Sat, 24 Mar 2007 03:27:54 GMT

Nona The Brit wrote:
If you think about The word "Perhaps" it still have a bige problem .
That depends on her personal interests I'm afraid. Why don't you ask her? Stop thinking of her as someone from another planet () - I know she is a woman and older than you but you can't stereoptype her any more than I would a man in his 20s. Perhaps she loves cooking. Perhaps she never cooks. Perhaps she is interested in politics and current affairs. Perhaps she isn't. Perhaps she loves animals and the natural world. Perhaps she doesn't. Perhaps religion is important to her. Perhaps not. Perhaps she is interested in the arts and literature. Perhaps she isn't. Perhaps she goes sailing every weekend and would like to work on her conversation regarding that. Perhaps she doesn't.

She might appreciate expanding her vocabulary and conversation practise related to her employment? Other than that you'll have to find out what interests her as an individual.