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

Re: difference between two sets of questions

Avangi — Wed, 08 Oct 2008 07:11:16 GMT

Hi chantelzn, welcome to English Forums! I thought I had a good answer, but realized I was wrong.

The questions in group A all begin with one of the famous interrogatives, who, where, what, when, how, and why. (b)'s an interrogative pronoun, the others are adverbs.

Hopefully, someone will come by with a better answer.

Best wishes, - A.

Re: Especially or Specially?

Anonymous — Sat, 27 Sep 2008 22:33:34 GMT

Sorry,they are not the ssame and you can not drop the (es) and say that for the following reasons:

Especially or Specially?

This is a favorite question of grammar checkers. Most of the time there is little or no difference between the words especially and specially.

Special is a common adjective. Specially is its adverb form. Special means "particular, distinguished in a distinct way, or designed for a particular purpose." Specially means "particularly, in a disintguishing manner, or for a particular purpose."

Especial is an uncommon adjective. Especially, its adverb form, is much more common. Especial means "exceptional, noteworthy, or particular." Especially means "exceptionally, in a noteworthy manner, or particularly."

In the sense of "particular" or "particularly," the words mean pretty much the same thing. Often they can be used synonymously. However, if you want to stress the exceptional or noteworthy quality, then especial or especially is a better choice. If you want to stress the distinctive purpose of something, then special or specially is the word you are looking for.

Example: This program has specially designed macros for word processors.
(A distinctive purpose)

Example: He did especially well in All-Star Game.
(A noteworthy performance

Many hanks

Re: Lack of emphasis on NPs in ESL

Kooyeen — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 20:38:55 GMT

I obviously agree with Forbes: it depends on your first language. I have never had any problems with passive sentences, subjects and objects, the difference between countable and uncountable, etc. because those are all features I have in Italian too. It is not difficult at all for me to use conditional structures (= modal verbs) in polite requests, like in "Could you lend me 1,000 dollars?", because very similar structures are used the same way in Italian too. On the other hand, I know some Asian languages don't even have past or future tenses, so it's easy to imagine how much more difficult it must be for them to learn English.

So instead of focusing on noun phrases, shouldn't we rather focus on the real difficulties, which happen to vary from learner to learner according to their native language and past experience with languages in general?

Anonymous

How about this student?

<<I assume many of you have watched the cartoon "Totally spies", right?
I just wonder why it is "Totally" here. "totally" is always an adverb, so what do they imply when using "totally" here? How can it go with the noun "spies"?>>>

Heh, good question! I don't know! Could somebody tell me more about that, as a side note here without going completely off topic? Otherwise I will open another thread. I would say "Total spies", but if I suspect that "totally" in "Totally spies" is used informally in some dialects to mean "definitely", like in, like " Are you, like, coming to my awesome party tonight? - Oh, yeah, totally!"
If that is the case, then I don't think that "totally" has anything to do with proving learners have trouble with noun phrases. It would suggest learners have trouble with informal English, and if you ask me, that's true.

Re: Too much modest

Cookiemonster — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 17:52:55 GMT

Thank you so much Avangi for correcting me!

Avangi
I would say, "far more successful than he," but perhaps that's old fashioned

John is rich but Chris is richer than him. Is it wrong,too?

Should it be " John is rich but Chris is richer than he/he is."

Avangi
a position at a bank which is much too modest for him.

Is "too much" wrong? I have never come across "much too" version of it.

Edit: I got it! "too much" is an adverb and when there is an adjective you should use "much too", right?

Avangi
At the end of the play, he sets himself apart by being a bit of a realist ??

Yes, that is what I want to say. If the word "realist" was "realistic", would it be possible to say " by being a bit realistic".

The last question, what is the difference between "more often" and "most of the time"?

Most of the time he sounds like he has a mouth full of toilet paper. (from google). Can I use "more often" in this sentence?

Best wishes,

Re: Is "There is the ..." an exceptional use?

jazzmaster — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 22:27:58 GMT

CalifJim

Probably not. There may be a better way to finesse this with a different wording.
Yes, but from the viewpoint of the authors and the teacher, this may be considered a harmless "white lie".
Out of curiosity, does the book actually use the words, "serious grammatical error"? Or is that your impressionistic paraphrase?

Thanks CJ

"Serious grammatical error" is my paraphrase. But when and if ESL students start to expressly state "this IS an exceptional usage", I suppose that means "these is a set rule on this and no one can break that in any shape or form".

"the simplification of the grammar at the beginning makes it much easier for them to navigate the language with confidence in the beginning stages" ... I fully concur with your view here. This indeed is the ideal way of teaching something to someone, I would say. However, the reality is that they will soon start feeding what a SVOC is, along with modifier/qualifier, the difference between a relative pronoun and adverb and all that good stuff to students who even cannot pronounce the word "English" correctly yet. I have an impression that they do present "grammatically acceptable" sentence structures, rock-solid rules and what not all at once. It is not a fun way to learn a foreign language. That is why some students grow not to like the subject after short while.

Let's say you are in a store with a hardcore grammatical ESL student, and you say:
*&@!#% !! I just realized I left my wallet home!!
... in stead of saying "It's all right, CJ, here, take $100. You can pay me back tomorrow.", (granting that he/she understood what you said), the ESL student will be too busy thinking "Why did he not say "I HAD left my wallet"? Because he is describing an event that happened obviously prior to the moment "he realized", it should be the past perfect tense, thus "I HAD left". It could be an exceptional use of the "realize ... that ...." structure but I am not sure. Or should I just point out his grammatical mistake?" ... this is the mentality of students who are being taught by those hardcore grammar books, and I am not exaggertating even a bit.

Thanks.

Re: Present Perfect (americans)

Diamondrg — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 07:40:10 GMT

Hi, YSchneider. I am not a native speaker and this is indeed a tough grammar point for non-native speakers.

Here is an extract from CGEL*:

Did you lock the front door? [5]

in a domestic situation where it is known that the front door is locked at bedtime every night. In that case, [5] is more or less equivalent to Did you
lock the front door at bedtime? (Incidentally, in [5], "the" in "the front door" is another case of situational definiteness; cfS.Uff.)

--

The ATTITUDINAL PAST, used with verbs expressing volition or mental state, reflects the tentative attitude of the speaker, rather than past time.
In the following pairs, both the present and past tenses refer to a present state of mind, but the latter is somewhat more polite:

Do/Did you want to see me now?
I wonder/wondered if you could help us.

--

Where did you put my purse ? [ 1 ]
Where have you put my purse? [2]

The purpose of both of these questions may be to find the purse; but in [1] the speaker seems to ask the addressee to remember a past action; while in [2] the speaker apparently concentrates on the purse's present whereabouts. There are many such cases.

--

Leaving aside such virtual equivalences, we may now focus on the difference between the two constructions, contrasting the meanings of the simple past given in 4.14 with the following meanings of the simple present perfective:

(a) STATE LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

That house has been empty for ages.
Have you known my sister for long?

(b) INDEFINITE EVENT(S) IN A PERIOD LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

Have you (ever) been to Florence?
All our children have had measles.

(c) HABIT (ie recurrent event) IN A PERIOD LEADING UP TO THE PRESENT

Mr Terry has sung in this choir ever since he was a boy.
The province has suffered from disastrous floods throughout its history.

Of these meanings, (a) corresponds to the 'state past' use of the simple past, but differs from it in specifying that the state continues at least up to the present moment (cf: That house was empty for ages - but now it's been sold); (b) corresponds to the 'event past', but differs from it in that the past time in question is indefinite rather than definite (cf: Did you go to Florence (last summer) ?); (c) corresponds to the 'habitual past', but, as with (a), the period identified must continue up to the present.

Note In AmE there is a tendency to use the past tense in preference to the present perfective, especially for the indefinite past; eg: Did you ever go to Florence ? (c/4.13 Note lb], 4.22 Note [a ]).

--

Have you seen the Javanese Art Exhibition? [yet]
Did you see the Javanese Art Exhibition? [when it was here]

The first of these implies that the Exhibition is still open; the second that the Exhibition has finished. From this concern with a period still existing at the present time, it is only a short step to the second implication often associated with the present perfective, viz that the event is recent. The simple present perfective is often used to report a piece of news:

_., , > the news? The president has resigned.

Because of this connotation of recency, B's reply in the following exchange must be considered absurdly inappropriate:

A: Has the postman left any letters? B: Yes, he did six months ago.

Since postmen in general deliver letters daily, the implicit time zone in this case would be no longer than a day.

[Note] In AmE, the simple past is often preferred to the present perfective for the variants of the indefinite past discussed in this section. Compare [6 ], for example, with Did the children come home yet? <esp AmE). Other AmE examples are: I just came back; You told me already; and without an adverb: /*m tired -1 had a long day.

* A Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language (Quirk et al.]

Re: What is the difference between âa dayâ and âthe dayâ?

26TMNTJG2PG — Thu, 17 Jul 2008 02:52:33 GMT

Both types of sentences tend to have the same meaning generally speaking.

Grammatically, sentence 1 has the meaning that tomorrow is the day on which I am to be off duty (if we treat 'tomorrow' as a noun)

whereas sentence 2 appears to mean that tomorrow I'm taking a day off without specifying which day (if 'tomorrow' here is treated as an adverb).

Re: Please, help me with this question

CalifJim — Fri, 25 Apr 2008 23:17:31 GMT

Anonymous
... I have read a magazine * today ,how to explain that we don't use the Simple Past, but the Present Perfect tense here? Because the action of reading a magazine happened today, time is definite! ...

The present perfect shows indefiniteness with respect to time, yes. But you can restrict the indefiniteness with a since clause.

I have read a magazine since I saw you last.

today is a special adverb that can be used in place of a since clause with the present perfect, because (unlike adverbs like yesterday) it includes the moment of speaking:

I have read a magazine [since the beginning of this day / today].

Anonymous
... what's the difference between:

I read a magazine today. ... and I have read a magazine today. ...

The difference is subtle. The present perfect is conceptually a step removed from the real action of the simple past. The present perfect is indirect compared to the direct simple past.

I read a magazine today expresses what happened. It tells what I did directly.

I have read a magazine today expresses the existence of a state resulting from what happened. It tells what I have on my list of 'things done today'. It tells what I did, but only indirectly through the implication of what's on 'my list', which is what the sentence is really focusing on.

Re: Help needed!

Philip — Thu, 10 Apr 2008 15:02:57 GMT

My dictionary makes no distinction between ironic and ironically; it does not offer narcissistical, except to form the adverb. Check your dictionary and see if it agrees with mine (American Heritage).

Re: can or could

CalifJim — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 18:22:20 GMT

Liveinjapan
Could anyone tell me the difference between the sentences below?

How do I look?

How do I look like?

What do I look like?

how and like are mutually exclusive. You cannot have both in these sorts of expressions. Once you use how, you must suppress like. So *How do I look like is impossible!

how? and like what? mean almost the same thing when the verb is look. But there are important differences. Note the groupings below.

Susan looks [sad]. *Susan looks [how]? [How] does Susan look?

Susan looks like [a clown]. *Susan looks like [what]? [What] does Susan look like?

Susan looks [like a clown]. *Susan looks [like what]? *Susan looks [how]? [How] does Susan look?

_______

[How] does Susan look? She looks [sad].

[How] does Susan look? She looks [like a clown].

[What] does Susan look like? She looks like [a clown].

__________

So How? substitutes for an adverbial expression -- which can be a prepositional phrase "like ..." or a single word adverb or any other appropriate adverbial expression.

And What? (in "like what?") substitutes for a noun -- which can only be the noun that fits after the preposition like.

_________

What makes this difficult if you are imitating the speech of natives is that the missing (fourth) pattern is not quite right logically, but people do use it anyway, treating the combination as an idiom.

[What] does Susan look [like]? She looks [sad].