Ask questions or just talk about different languages. Since BrainKing is an international game site supporting many languages, this board can be kind of useful.
Hrqls: the only real reason i can think of would be to study ancient texts in their original language Or to better understand how a certain language evolved.
For instance, if you study latin, you may have an easier task finding similarities between french, spanish, italian and portuguese and understand them easier, since you'll know a strong common root between them.
(It doesn't mean you'll know how to speak them well. Linguists in so many languages are rare - but you'll understand them fair enough)
pauloaguia: *nod* thats the main profit that i have from having learned ancient latin and ancient greek .. some languages look like latin, but more importantly i learned how certain language groups are built and can expand on that when i hear a new language .. it certainly helps me when i am in a forgeign country :)
Lamby: I'd agree with you in all but the second. My first intinct would be that Smoking is strictly forbidden on underground trains in London.
But then again, I'm not an expert in proper english grammar ;)
pauloaguia: I agree with Lamby. I think it should be 'prohibited' since it was forbidden by the authority of the city of London. Great post, Lamby, BTW...thanks for that.:)
Pedro Martínez: I won't rebate it, after all my English comes mostly from the movies ;). My answer just sounds better to me that's all.
Or maybe it's just another one of those british/american things and Smoking is prohibited in London and forbidden in New York?
pauloaguia: Then again, googling on the subject I found both versions. Though the word prohibited shows up in 90% of the cases vs about 10% for forbidden
Lamby: Thanks. It's a great board because there are a bunch of great people posting on it.
Thnaks for the explanation you gave us. So let me see if I've got it correctly:
If the government bans something, it means we're disallowd or not permitted to use it anymore. So basically it's forbidden from then on to use that thing and if they see us by chance that we're gonna use it, they'll prevent us from doing that.
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Hrqls: Try this link Pedro is currently using an dyou may like it :
last holiday i had troubles finding the english word for 'square' : an area surrounded by houses.
As very few squares are actually square (at least in the netherlands) it was very tough to think of the word, whenever my mind came close to the word 'square' it discarded it because it wasnt logical ;)
There's a very interesting article I have about these problems with English:
Crazy English
English is crazy language. There's no egg in eggplant or ham in hamburger, neither apple nor pine in pineapple.
English muffins were not invented in England or French fries in France. Sweetmeats are candies, while sweetbreads, which aren't sweet, are meat.
we take English for granted. But if we explore its paradoxes, we find that quicksand can work slowly, boxing rings are suare and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig!
And why is it that writers write, but fingers don't fing, grocers don't groce and hammers don't ham?
If the plural of tooth is teeth, why isn't the plural of booth beeth? One goose, two geese. So one moose, two meese? One index, two indices? is cheese the plural of choose?
If teachers taught, why didn't preachers praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what does a humanitarian eat?
In what language do people recite at a play and play at a recital? Ship by truck and send cargo by ship? Have noses that run and feet that smell? Park on driveways and drive on parkways?
How can a slim chance and a fat chance be the same, while a wise man and a wise guy are opposites? How can weather be hot as hell one day and cold as hell another?
When a house burns up, it burns down. You fill in a form by filling it out and an alarm clock goes off by going on.
When the stars are out, they are visible, but when the lights are out, they are invisible. And why, when I wind up my watch, I start it, but when I wind up this essey, I end it?
Now I know why I fluncked my English. It's not my fault; the language doesn't quite know whether it's coming or going.
Eriisa: "You do not know the Chinese language can be used to communicate with you? I want 85B, section suitable? A suitable allocation of pants? Thank you"
I am by no means a scholar or the best at grammar in the English language but I can't get over how many people make these common mistakes!
It is You're welcome, not your welcome!
It is congrats or congratulations, not congrads!
I can hear you, not here you!
It is their car, not there car!
they're going away, not there going away!
Rose: And about Congratulations, my assumption is:
The word Congratulations, according to dictionaries is pronounced /kengratsuleisnz/, with a CH sound, but people read it with a J (as in jam) sound which can occure just if a D sound and a Y sound come together, like in soldier which has originally been soldYer. So people think there must hav ebeen a D in congratulations too!
رضا: Yes, I realize that part. I think a lot of it is lack of written use in every day life. Most folks don't normally write or type very much except at sites like this. Maybe showing them the difference will help them to learn the difference. Just a thought.
With congratulations... I saw a banner at a wedding one time that read "congradulations on your wedding". I was floored. I couldn't believe that mistake got by the printers. Does it mean that maybe folks are so lax in their English that many, many don't know the proper words/spelling etc?
Rose: According the way they read the word, in my opinion congradulations is a better spelling. Just as in during that is really pronounced with a J sound. But that's the way it is. Congratulations is written with a T, not a D.
Fencer, a while ago, I asked you to add Phonetic Symbols to the smileys or somewhere else on the site. Now that we have this board, I think it's quite benefitial to have them. Here's a link to them as the appear in Oxford Advanced Learners Dictionary:
Lamby: They're all pronounced the same, so I'd go with the accent theory. :)
rain, rein, reign
to, too, two, 2
for, four, fore, 4
lead and lead are pronounced differently!
lead, led
feat, feet, fete
read and read are pronounced differently!
read, red
read, reed
I'm surprised you guys didn't have the peeve with "our" and "are" as I see them mixed up all the time.
And why is it in English some words have acceptable alternate spellings and others only have one accepted spelling?
Honour or honor are OK, but don't you dare spell congratulations with a "D"
the reason is : being lazy ;)
i hardly use ' on the internet .. i will always write 'dont' and 'your' etc because i am lazy :)
in official messages i will use better english though :)
at the university we were allowed to write our work either in american english or in british english ... but not in a mixture of both .. so if we started with 'analyze' we had to continue with 'color' as well ... the professors were quite strict on that
Hrqls: It made it a little difficult for me when I was learning basic html. I would make a page with the colour tag and it never worked. Once I realized it was all 'set' in American English then I had no problem
(hjem) Taper du ofte på Time-Out? Betalende medlemmer kan aktivisere Automatisk Ferie. Da settes det automagisk inn en feriedag når spillene dine ellers ville timet ut. (pauloaguia) (Vis alle tips)