Generate the answer for a given question. The question requires common knowledge of English. Make sure that the answer is in detail, long, consistent with the context, and requires general knowledge of English. To be less repetitive, please vary your language for each question. Give a proper explanation to answer, and if necessary, provide the definition of various terms. And conclude your answer if it's long. If you have used other resources (e.g., Merriam Webster's.) to answer the question, include citations in your answer. You don't need to paraphrase the context of your resources, but make sure that your answer is consistent and complete.

[EX Q]: I wrote this sentence: Why wouldn't it be valid? --and I realized that without the contraction it becomes: Why would it not be valid? As opposed to 'why would not it be valid,' as the contraction would imply. What's going on here? Why can I contract across the middle word this way? Or, to put it the other way, why can't I 'de-contract' this without moving the not over by a word?.
[EX A]: Even though the standard term for these combinations of an auxiliary + -n't is 'contractions', grammatically they act like single, indivisible words*; rather than like two words slurred together (though that was evidently their historical origin). This single word is a auxiliary, so it goes in the normal position for an auxiliary in an interrogative sentence: after the question-word and before the subject. Why wouldn't it be valid? Question word - auxiliary - subject - [rest of sentence] When you use 'would not,' on the other hand, you have two words: the auxiliary 'would', and the distinct word 'not' (a word that doesn't fit very well into the general part-of-speech categories). The auxiliary again goes into the normal position for an auxiliary. The word 'not' has its own, different rules for where it goes in a sentence. Why would it not be valid? Question word - auxiliary - subject - [rest of sentence] *In fact, some linguists think the negative suffix in these words is best analyzed as an inflection in modern English, like the suffix '-s' used in third person.

[EX Q]: The synonym of trope is defined as metaphor, but there seem to be some other implications when using the word trope that metaphor does not have. Can anyone explain this simply and sensibly?.
[EX A]: The word trope has shot to prominence in the last couple of decades... And as this article points out, 'Trope is the New Meme', which I read in two ways. Use of the word itself has become a meme (pattern of behavior that spreads throughout a culture). But also, the meaning of the word has shifted for many people. To quote from that article... trope has to do with an agreed-upon narrative, an archetypal reading of a story or situation according to the simplest and most widely-held beliefs, a kind of narrative stereotype. Or, as the excellent site tvtropes puts it... tropes are devices and conventions that a writer can reasonably rely on as being present in the audience members' minds and expectations. I actually studied literature over 40 years ago, but I can't say I remember us using the word in the 'typical' dictionary sense as given by OED... A figure of speech which consists in the use of a word or phrase in a sense other than that which is proper to it; also, in casual use, a figure of speech; figurative language. So far as I'm concerned, if someone wants to use it like that, I'm not going to argue with them or their dictionaries. But most current usages are more in line with my first two definitions above. Here's how tvtropes knits the two definitions together... Merriam-Webster gives a definition of 'trope' as a 'figure of speech.' In storytelling, a trope is just that a conceptual figure of speech, a storytelling shorthand for a concept that the audience will recognize and understand instantly.

[EX Q]: What is the proper way to write this term when writing product documentation? Hyphenated or not? drop down list or drop-down list?.
[EX A]:
If it's just the compound adjective, use drop-down list. Note, however, that there are classes of components in various frameworks that are called DropDown or DropDownList or various alternatives of the same thing. In such cases use the framework name as is.

