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votes
3 answers
Intonation difference between restrictive and nonrestrictive relative clauses
He had four sons who became doctors. He had four sons, who became
doctors.
Is there any difference in intonation between restrictive and nonrestrictive relative clauses?
Listenever
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14
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4 answers
Difference between "I'm in the school" and "I'm in school"
What is the difference between these two sentences??
I'm in the school.
I'm in school.
Do they have the same meaning or not?
Ice Girl
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14
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6 answers
Is saying "I figured it out!" (past tense) correct usage?
Could a native English speaker use the phrase "I figured it out!" in an internet forum if he/she has suddenly understood something? Or would he/she say something like "I've got it!"
The matter is, one fellow (Russian native) translator said that an…
CowperKettle
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14
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A different concept of difficult English words
I’m interested in building up my English vocabulary, but whenever I look for “difficult English words” or “advanced vocabulary” I’m presented with a list of polysyllabic words such as: aberration, abhor, acquiesce, amiable, appease, arcane, avarice,…
Toli
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4 answers
Meaning of "doesn't even begin to cover it"
I saw the movie Ice Age 4, in which there was the quote "Okay doesn't even begin to cover it". After searching on the internet, I couldn't find the meaning of the sentence at all. Is that "Begin to cover" an idiom? What's the meaning of the…
santanu bera
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4 answers
interested in/to: what's the difference?
As title suggests..what's the difference?
I heard that the difference is that with "in" you are talking about something that will or is lasting in the time, while "to" is something you do just one time.
So, the sentence "I am interested in starting…
user2358943
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14
votes
5 answers
"You first" "You second" "You third"
Suppose I'm telling a bunch of people to do something. I'm about to tell a person :"You first", can I say to the others :"You second", "you third" ... ? And is there another way to say that ?
quintana43
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Difference between "I like swimming" and "I like to swim"?
So what is the difference between "I like swimming" and "I like to swim"? Do they mean the same?
Rifpan Afriansyah
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Why is it "you lied TO me" and not "you lied me"
Why do we say
You tricked me
You fooled me
You deceived me
You offended me
You kissed me
And so on and so on
BUT you lied TO me and not you lied me?
user165427
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2 answers
Can "it's down to him to fix the machine" and "it's up to him to fix the machine"?
This is from a dictionary
be down to somebody
if an action or decision is down to you, it is your responsibility
It’s down to me to make sure that everyone is happy.
And to be up to somebody has 2 meaning
a) used to say that someone can decide…
Tom
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What sense does "I approve of this message" make?
I am sure the correct way would be "I approve this message", however there are a lot of mentions on the Internet that say "I approve of this message". I assume people say it just for fun, unless there is a good reason to say it this way, is…
Trident D'Gao
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14
votes
7 answers
What do you call a partner that you don't live with?
Married people are called "spouses" and people that are in a romantic relationship and live together without being married are called "cohabitants" – but what do you call people who are in a romantic relationship that is, for all intents and…
Helen
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votes
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Students doubt the usefulness of the Present Perfect tenses
I've got the same questions from different students recently. They question the necessity of learning Perfect tenses (even the Present Perfect Simple) claiming that as rumors say or as they hear in serials (e.g. Sex in the city, it was the last…
NadinSh
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Is the word "ball" omitted in " hit the post"?
I understand the meaning of the word "hit", which in football it means kick the ball. But here it's sort of awkward. "Hit" should be used with the object "the ball", however the writers uses it with "the post" instead. Does the writer leave out "the…
Jembot
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Why can't I grammatically repeat the object with the pronoun "it"?
Someone told me that this sentence is wrong grammatically:
Where is the calculator that I lent it to you yesterday?
I've read the feedbacks from many people that I shouldn't include "it", one person said it is because there's already "that" so…
user516076
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