Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with English Questions tagged with 'English' at Ask MetaFilter. Mon, 05 Oct 2015 20:46:39 -0800 Mon, 05 Oct 2015 20:46:39 -0800 en-us 60 Android games for pre-teens learning English I'm looking for more games to play in my weekly English tuition classes. The class is for working-class children in a multilingual country (Malaysia), so they have some proficiency that is age-appropriate, but they're very used to codeswitching, so I'm trying to get them to be more able to express themselves comfortably in one language as needed. Right now they have played Boggle (which is tabletop) but especially enjoyed Heads Up. Anyone has recommendations for similar party games on Android (that is free or cheap) that would help them in English? The biggest problem with Heads Up I find is its American cultural references which limits the categories they can comfortably play. I do have Taboo and Pictionary in my arsenal but I haven't introduced them to it yet.,2015:site.286724 Mon, 05 Oct 2015 20:46:39 -0800 cendawanita Strengths and weaknesses of different languages? What are some of the strengths and weaknesses of certain languages? I'm most interested in English and French but if you have knowledge of another that would also be fascinating! Off the top of my head, English has a vast vocabulary which enables a lot of nuance in meaning - but that's something of a downside too, because it makes mastery of the language quite difficult, even as its relative grammatical simplicity makes intermediate skill easy to acquire. English and French both have orthography that doesn't match pronunciation - my understanding is this is actually quite rare and frustrating for language learners.,2015:site.286641 Sat, 03 Oct 2015 20:51:28 -0800 nicolas léonard sadi carnot Why are people still saying 'spicket' instead of 'spigot'? I've said and written 'spicket' my entire life and only this morning discovered it was non-standard. Some dictionaries give a cursory redirect to 'spigot'; some don't even list the 'ck' variant. The apparent root of 'spigot' [Latin <em>spica</em>] would seem to obviate this discussion, but the change from /k/ to /g/ had taken place at least by 1590 (both forms co-existed for a while). When did 'spicket' become non-standard, and why has that /k/ persisted to the present day? My research:<br> -Historical instances of <a href="">'spicket'</a> and <a href="">'spigot'</a><br> -An <a href=""> American map</a> showing no correlation between region and word usage.<br> -<a href="">A Note on 'Spigot' and 'Spicket'</a> (1948) by William Edgerton [first page only - full download behind a paywall]<br> -Anecdata: My family lineage is Swiss via the Alsace-Lorraine region (immigrated to the US around 1850). My grandparents always said 'spicket' but it wasn't a word that was ever written down, so it could have been a weird pronunciation quirk.,2015:site.286440 Tue, 29 Sep 2015 13:41:43 -0800 smokysunday Universal English Is there any sort of dictionary or text corpora that outline which of a number of synonyms are the most universally understood by other language speakers or the least colloquial? The question comes to me as I work with a translation and am choosing between, about, around, approximately, circa, and a few other similar words. Surely one of them is more likely than the others to be the word taught, or the word most similar to other languages. I am thinking like how <em>orange</em> is a very "international" word. Other interesting phrases would include many vs. a lot, etc. <br> <small>I am aware of <a href="">Euro-English as used in EU and CoE etc. settings,</a> but that is not what I am looking for. </small>,2015:site.285717 Mon, 14 Sep 2015 01:32:01 -0800 Iteki Recommendations for enjoyable, easy-to-comprehend short stories I’m looking for recommendations for conventional short stories that are reasonably easy to read and have some literary merit. When I say “conventional”, I mean stories that have a distinct plot, with recognizable characters, and some kind of clear resolution at the end. The types of stories that I don’t like are stream-of-consciousness, avant garde, description-heavy, laden with symbolism, hard to understand or interpret, or plain bizarre – the sorts of stories where you finish reading them, scratch your head, and say, “What the !$*# was all <em>that</em> about?”.<br> <br> Here are some examples. I liked “<a href="">Flowers for Algernon</a>”, by Daniel Keyes, “<a href="">Gift of the Magi</a>”, by O. Henry, and “<a href="">Dog Star</a>”, by Arthur C. Clarke.<br> <br> I hated “<a href="">A Perfect Day for Bananafish</a>”, by J. D. Salinger, “<a href="">Araby</a>” by James Joyce, and “<a href="">The Lottery</a>”, by Shirley Jackson. And I pretty much hate anything William Faulkner ever wrote.,2015:site.285685 Sun, 13 Sep 2015 07:20:37 -0800 akk2014 Is there a good English language school w/ home stay in NYC? I'm looking for my cousin, who would like to come here for 2 months or so and study English. I was hoping to find a program that would put her with a family here (I don't really have the space or lifestyle for it). And of course, I need the program to be reputable and safe :) I imagine this sort of thing HAS to exist. Do you know of one?,2015:site.285467 Tue, 08 Sep 2015 11:41:46 -0800 wooh Is my plan to change careers feasible? If not, how can I improve it? Objective: Career change to technical writing. Obstacles: My current demanding job. Needing to relocate to place that actually has technical writing jobs. **Please help me determine the feasibility of my plan to relocate and change my career. Details inside.** Background:<br> My job pays very well but is highly demanding in terms of hours (on call, forced overtime, rotating shift work) and effort. We are seriously short-handed, so 1 person does the job of 3-4. It only gets worse with advancement. I'm stuck in fieldwork, which is a square hole to my round self. It's hurting my morale and killing my chances for advancement. <br> <br> I want to do technical writing. It’s what I was originally hired for and what I did at first, before I had qualifications to do field work. Also, I like technical writing. I like it even more after going to the STC summit this year, reading extensively about it, and creating my first portfolio pieces.<br> <br> However, I live in the country far from STC chapters (the nearest is Houston). There is no one to network with in person. And work is all-consuming. I rarely have time for networking online, let alone adding to my portfolio and applying for jobs. At the rate I’m going, it will be 10+ years before I ever change jobs. I’ve been investigating technical writing and working on my portfolio in stolen moments for a year already.<br> <br> The Plan:<br> My plan thus far is to quit my job, move to Houston, and finally network and secure a technical writing job there. I'm aware that though I've written technical reports at my current job, companies will want to see portfolio pieces that use software like FrameMaker instead of just Word, which is the extent of my experience. So it may take a while to get a "real" technical writing job (not an internship or volunteer work). I have enough money saved for a year of not working, much longer if I actually budget. No kids or debt. <br> <br> To make my savings last longer during the transition, I plan to substitute teach, tutor, and/or temp. (My English M.A. should help with the first two.) Originally I had planned to start this in Houston, but then it occurred to me: it would be better to start in my home state so there isn’t a work history gap. I.e. starting in Louisiana should grease the skids for me in Texas (right?). And I can stay at my current job during the search.<br> <br> Questions:<br> But what if I go to Houston and no one hires me for technical writing or my contingency jobs, and I ruin myself financially? Once I leave my job, I won't be able to come back. I have no familial support, either. How can I increase my chances of success with this gamble? <br> Is there a specific amount of time I ought to do my contingency jobs in Louisiana to improve my odds of finding similar work in Houston? <br> What can you tell me about Houston's job scenes in technical writing, teaching, tutoring, and temping work? Or other relevant points about moving for career changes etc?<br> <br> Is the plan feasible in the current job market? If not, is there something I can do to improve it?<br> <br> Thank you for reading and especially for your advice.,2015:site.284426 Sun, 16 Aug 2015 10:06:55 -0800 glass.hourousha Help translating a flyer from English to Portuguese I have volunteered to help out with a thing, and now I have a (short) bit of text that I am hoping someone can translate from English into Portuguese for me. Here it is:<br> <br> <em>-----offers free English classes on Tuesdays from 7:30-9:00pm. Classes run from September to May and are located at ----- in ------. Students are welcome to join our beginner, intermediate, or advanced classes at any time. Childcare for babies/children between the ages of 0 and 10 is available on location. Free rides to and from classes are also available to students requiring transportation. For more information, contact us at --- or at---.</em><br> <br> Thanks, everyone!,2015:site.283592 Tue, 28 Jul 2015 16:57:30 -0800 janepanic Help me find a quote like this? I'm trying to find a quote that fits a romantic (but not overly saccharine) mood that basically says "I do this because of my love for you, I believe in it because you believe in it, I stand by your side against adversity because I know I am with you.",2015:site.283270 Tue, 21 Jul 2015 21:59:54 -0800 cyrusw8 What is the meaning of the -core suffix? In words like normcore, krishnacore, and <a href="">all the words on this list</a>, what do you think the meaning of the suffix <em>-core</em> is? What do you think people are trying to signify by adding <em>-core</em> to the end of words? Also, can you think of other examples of words that end in <em>-core</em>? I ask because I'm trying to make an argument about the word <em>hurtcore</em>, which is a type of illegal porn that features actual rape, torture, and sexual abuse, as opposed to the consensual sex featured in S&amp;M and BDSM. I'm trying to argue that the presence of the suffix <em>-core</em> in the term <em>hurtcore</em> influences how people think and feel about that type of porn. I don't want to tell you exactly what my argument is, because I don't want that to influence your answers. I'm not writing an article or an academic research paper or any other kind of formal writing. I just want to be able to make informal arguments in online forums and in casual conversation. <br> <br> I tried looking up what <em>-core</em> meant, but other than being told that it originated from the word <em>hardcore</em> I didn't get very far. I understand that this is slang, but the fact that native English speakers use it so often to modify English words means there must be some kind of meaning, even if it doesn't have a strict definition.,2015:site.282658 Wed, 08 Jul 2015 18:13:02 -0800 sam_harms O, to be in England... I recall having seen something on TV maybe a decade or two ago in which a female character (or a male with a very high-pitched voice) was reciting the line, "O to be in England now that April's there[...]" several times with a very exaggerated/attempted British accent ("Eauuuugh to be in EEEEEEEEEEngland..."). I don't remember much more, and all my Google searches turn up is the actual poem that the line is from. I'd like to find this again; does it ring a bell to anyone? I thought it might possibly have been from Monty Python, but I did a pretty thorough search of their canon and couldn't find it. Any leads will be much appreciated.,2015:site.282326 Wed, 01 Jul 2015 08:59:54 -0800 Juffo-Wup Exercises to improve reading comprehension for a 13-14 year old I volunteer as an English tutor for school age children in the UK. I have recently started work with a pupil who has serious problems with reading comprehension. What can I do? Based on our sessions, the problem is not lack of vocabulary but not reading the text in consecutive order or seeing its logical structure clearly. I can point him towards a couple of sentences that contain the answer to a factual question and he'll skip from the first sentence to three paragraphs down and miss the answer that way. He seems to be looking for keywords in sentences anywhere in the text, without seeing one sentence following on from another. He rarely gets to the end of a paragraph when reading before skipping elsewhere. (I know this from asking him to underline certain words as he reads.) The school tells me he doesn't have dyslexia or any other learning disability. English is his first language. He is very bright and imaginative and gets bored easily. <br> <br> Constraints: it's an 8-week long commitment, where I see him for an hour a week. There are 5 weeks left. I can, in theory, set exercises for him to complete at home but there's no way for me to enforce that and my sense is that he's unlikely to complete anything I ask him to take home. <br> <br> What kind of exercise can we do in a one-hour session that helps him to get a clearer sense of sentences and paragraphs as units of meaning and to read a text with a sense of its structure and logic?,2015:site.281941 Tue, 23 Jun 2015 06:49:55 -0800 Aravis76 Grammar Help! Dealing with "s" with nouns and possesion My friends are are debating the appropriate use of an apostrophe in light of nouns ending in "s". I am many years away from my grammar classes and a bit unsure. Test sentence inside the fold. From my perspective this sentence is correct:<br> Lars apartment is conveniently located in the city center.<br> <br> Others think that I have to use the apostrophe to to indicate possession correctly:<br> Lars´s apartment is conveniently located in the city center.<br> <br> Google has been a mixed bag. The top results for nouns indicated possession are flaky, some support dropping the apostrophe and others support it with the additional "s".<br> <br> Any guidance appreciated!,2015:site.281906 Mon, 22 Jun 2015 12:45:06 -0800 Funmonkey1 Russian-English Dictionary for Kindle Is there a good/functional Russian-English dictionary for the iOS Kindle app? Or any other iOS e-reader? Basically, I just want it to work exactly like any other built-in Kindle dictionary: I poke a word and I get a definition (or, in this case, translation.) <br> <br> The <a href="">Slovoed</a> one seems to not be terribly compatible with grammar and has a ton of bad reviews. I'm totally fine with downloading a different reader to read Russian books, but I just want to make sure the dictionary feature works well and Googling this has been not great at best.,2015:site.281461 Fri, 12 Jun 2015 09:13:36 -0800 griphus Need a New Career What things can I do that actually pay a living wage? I have a BA in English and an MFA in creative writing. I can adjunct, but that doesn't pay a living wage, and where I live, would require a 2 hour round trip commute. I'm considering changing careers, but ideally, I'd like to make sure I'm choosing something I can actually live off. The main industries in my area seem to be aerospace and health care. I'm considering a few options, and I'd like some advice. I'm on the lower slope of my 30s and I haven't had a full-time job since the early 2000s. I've worked multiple concurrent part time jobs in that time, though, but juggling schedules is very stressful and with a little one at home will probably just break me. I'm ready to give up on cobbling together a life out of academia's scraps. <br> <br> I'm an introvert, but I'm very good at faking it in customer service interactions, though I find myself very tired by them. I'm fine doing repetitive tasks as long as I can sustain the other bit of my brain with a bit of music, a podcast or whathaveyou. I have ADD, inattentive type that's mostly under control with medication. I have weird-colored hair and I'd really rather keep it that way (it's one of my hobbies). I'm interested to a fault in researching. I can read/process complex information very quickly. I'm not a very fast typist, but I can work on that. <br> <br> 1. Librarian. Pros: Experience. Actually interesting and enjoyable to me. Would hope to use my writing skills somehow, through grant writing or writing journal articles. Cons: Very few employers and positions available. I'd probably have to get an MLS to qualify for full-time jobs. Salaries are low. <br> <br> 2. Medical coding and billing. Pros: Plenty of employers in my area. I hear that once you get some experience, you may be able to work remotely, which I'd love to do as a total hermit. Cons: will have to obtain training and certification. Potentially boring. Conservative employers. (Can my writing skills be of any additional use here?)<br> <br> 3. Freelance writing. Pros: Uses the skills &amp; credentials I already have. Largely enjoyable. I can work mostly at my own pace and schedule. I get to work alone. Cons: I am not good at hustling. I've done a bit of this in the past few months, and I'm not making much money. Competition seems quite thick. <br> <br> 4. Office Management. Pros: Experience. Cons: I'm not actually naturally organized, so this would be somewhat stressful for me. Office environment. <br> <br> Which if these options provides the better ratio of reward to effort? <br> Oh, and before anyone suggests it, I can't code or do any Cmdr Data-type work. I've tried to learn, but it all just bounces off my brain while I daydream about bunnies.,2015:site.280951 Tue, 02 Jun 2015 09:04:41 -0800 Kitty Stardust Word similar to 'abreast' that describes walking in a line? Walking 'abreast' means walking side-by-side. What equivalent word means walking single-file? My brain is ticklish with the notion that there is a similar or similarly-used word, but I can't think of it!,2015:site.280695 Wed, 27 May 2015 11:50:13 -0800 chudmonkey Training as a noun When did people start saying "a training" to mean "a training session/workshop/meeting/program/etc"? What dialect of English did training-as-a-noun originate in? How did it spread?,2015:site.280450 Thu, 21 May 2015 13:06:29 -0800 jedicus Would Wittgenstein distinguish between "all that" and "that which"? I've most often seen the first proposition of the Tractatus quoted as "The world is that which is the case." (The 2014 film and the line in the chorus from The New Pornographers' Chump Change, eg.) But Ogden translates it as "The world is everything that is the case," and Pears/McGuiness as "The world is all that is the case." Is there an important difference here? <small>Asking cuz potential tattoo.</small>,2015:site.280219 Sat, 16 May 2015 14:47:21 -0800 PMdixon If I'm not bemused, what am I? Bemused: I do not think it means what you think it means. So what word does? Okay, so the real definition of "bemused" is confused or bewildered, but pretty much everyone associates it with a sense of wry amusement, like the way you feel when a drunk friend is talking gibberish and has no idea how silly she sounds but you really can't blame her for it. I can accept that "bemused" is not the correct word for this feeling (although some dictionaries are starting to grudgingly accept it), but my dilemma is that I can't seem to find an acceptable alternative to use instead. Just "amused" isn't quite right because it leaves out the wry part and indicates a more jovial sense of finding something funny or being entertained. So does this word really exist, or are we stuck using "bemused" technically incorrectly until we all just accept that this is what it means now?,2015:site.279969 Mon, 11 May 2015 16:49:00 -0800 Starling Two countries divided by a common language Seeking novels that have been "translated" from British English to American English. The Harry Potter books are the most <a href="">common example</a> - they changed things like "car park" to "parking lot" and "jumper" to "sweater" and things like that. I also have a British edition of <em>Bridget Jones's Diary</em> in which she records her weight in stones, whereas in the American version they changed it to pounds. What other books have been localised/localized for Americans?,2015:site.278897 Sat, 18 Apr 2015 23:18:37 -0800 donajo Need help for correct translation of two words from English to Italian. What is the proper translation of the words <em>balance</em> and <em>autonomy</em>? I am male with Calabrian heritage. I would like to get the words <em>balance</em> and <em>autonomy</em> tattooed on either side of my chest. What would be the proper translation of the words from English to Italian? From my limited grasp of the language I know there are gender specific translations and want to get this right. So far I see <em>il bilancio</em> or <em>le armonia</em> seems OK for balance. For autonomy <em>la autonomia</em> is the only word I get back from Google. So is there not a male specific word for autonomy? Please advise so I don't become a tattooed moron with the wrong translation permanently inked on my body. And yes have thought about this for years and am in no doubt that I want to be tattooed. I have no other tattoos FWIW. Also lastly, can I safely drop the <em>il</em> or <em>la</em> from the translation and the words will still make sense? Thank you. Nice to be back on AskMe!,2015:site.277194 Thu, 12 Mar 2015 20:41:23 -0800 sjvilla79 Recommendation to prepare the paper-based TOEFL Hello, I'll pass the paper-based TOEFL in a few months and I'm almost fluent in English so my main objective is to get a perfect or near-perfect score. I have learned English through immersion so I think that my main weakness is grammar mistake identification. Can you recommend me a book or some other resource to help me prepare for the test? Would the books aiming at preparing the internet-based be appropriate for the paper-based test? Thank you!,2015:site.276251 Sat, 21 Feb 2015 13:48:56 -0800 lite What's your favourite suspenseful short story? I'm creating a short story unit for my grade 12 students and so I'm looking for 5 or 6 good, suspenseful ones that will (hopefully) really pique their interest--even the ones who hate reading. I've used "The Most Dangerous Game" in the past with great success and will be including it in the collection. Can you help me out by suggesting some other ones? Ideally with a link where I can print it out.<br> <br> Thanks!,2015:site.275122 Wed, 28 Jan 2015 14:47:31 -0800 figaro How do I get certified to be an interpreter in Austin,TX? I am from China and my first language is Mandarin Chinese. I also speak excellent English. My SO is an American. I just moved to Austin,TX, USA. I am trying to become an interpreter for Mandarin/English. I have a bachelor's degree in English language from my university in China and I worked as a full time interpreter in a UN wetland protection project in china in 2014. Could you please help me find more info (websites, books etc.) about how to get certified as an interpreter and a translator between Chinese and English in Austin? How and where can I find work? Thanks,2015:site.274895 Fri, 23 Jan 2015 11:41:42 -0800 denimchair Most efficient way to translate audio to subtitles I've volunteered to translate a few talks, from English to Spanish, so the translation can be included in video as subtitles. I was just given the audio to work with. I've only ever done text-to-text translation before, so I have no idea how to start on working with audio-to-subtitles. Please help. I was expecting to be given the videos to work with, but I only got the audios, so that's an extra difficulty. I was present at the actual talks (a series of conferences about education and child development), so that helps. <br> I don't know if it's better to transcribe the audio first, then translate the text, or if I should just listen bits by bits and translate as I go. <br> (I have no idea how they're going to match the subtitles to the relevant parts of the video but that's someone else's job to worry about.<br> <br> Any ideas and practical tips are welcome.,2015:site.274880 Fri, 23 Jan 2015 07:23:39 -0800 CrazyLemonade