More Confusing Words

Effective writing requires the correct use of words,  which sometimes may be confusing to writers. 

Sensual / Sensuous

Sensual: related to the body; sensuous: related to the five senses.

e.g. It is difficult to be spiritual when one focuses too much on sensual pleasures.

e.g. The painter is able to provide some sensuous images in his painting.

Common / Commonplace

Common: shared or used by many; commonplace: ordinary, not unusual.

e.g. English is a common language used in Europe.

e.g. Nowadays, carrying a gun is commonplace.

Habitable / Habitual

Right / Rightly

Right: immediately; rightly: justly, correctly.

e.g. Do it right now.

e.g. Do it right away.

e.g. I rightly canceled the trip.

e.g. We refused the offer, and rightly so.

Defer / Infer

Defer: give way or yield to; infer: conclude.

e.g. He is a good kid: he always defers to his parents' wishes.

e.g. We can infer from your statement that you don't like this policy.

Mediate / Meditate

Mediate means to act as a peacemaker; meditate means to think deeply.

e.g. The Secretary of State is trying to mediate between the two warring nations.

e.g. He meditated revenge after he was insulted by his coworkers.

Potent / Potential

Potent: strong, powerful; potential: power that could be, but is not yet.

e.g. He is a potent politician.

e.g. He has great potential in American politics.

Compare to / Compare with

Compare to: state a resemblance to; compare with: put side by side to find out the similarities and differences.

e.g. The poet compares living in this modern world to riding on a bullet train.

e.g. If you compare Plan A with Plan B, you will know that Plan B is much better than Plan A. 

Reverend / Reverent

Reverend: worthy of respect; reverent: showing respect.

e.g. Have you met the Rev. Mr. Johnson?

e.g. He gave a reverent speech on drug addiction.

In regard to / As regards

Both mean with reference to.

e.g. As regards your performance, I think you did a good job (no “to”).

e.g. She is very generous in regard to charity donation.

Effective Writing Made Simple

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Confusing Words

PUNDIT / PUNT

Pundit: a scholar; a learned person.

e.g. My neighbor is a pundit he seems to know everything.

Punt: a flat-bottomed boar, moved by a long pole.

e.g. In Venice, people move around in punts.

LIGHT / LIGHTEN

Light: (as a verb) come across; happen to find.

e.g. I lighted upon a very interesting book in the library.

Lighten (as a verb) brighten up; make something less heavy.

e.g. Can you lighten the dark corridor?

e.g. Your financial support lightened my burden.

 NEURAL / NEUTRAL

Neural: having to do with brain cells or nervous system.

e.g. My brother is a neural scientist.

Neutral: not helping or taking any side.

e.g. He remained neutral in this controversial issue.

CONTRARY / CONTRAST

Contrary: the exact opposite

e.g. You think I did not help him. On the contrary, I did everything I could to help him.

Contrast: comparison.

e.g. Contrast may make you see things very differently

PORTEND / PORTENT

Portend: foretell.

e.g. These minor quakes might portend a big earthquake in the near future.

Portent: a sign or warning; a marvelous thing in the future.

e.g. A bright future is your portent.

CONTRIBUTION / CONTRITION

Contribution: donation; an act of helping and supporting.

e.g. Thank you for your contribution to the project.

Contrition: sincere sorrow for sin.

e.g. The convicted criminal showed contrition when he apologized to the family of the victim.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

The Correct Use of Verbs

Effective writing means a good understanding of the correct use of verbs, especially with respect to tenses.

Verbs govern person as well as number (whether the verb is singular or plural in form). 

Person refers to the person or the thing that is a subject or an object.

First person refers to I and we, with me and us as the object, respectively.

e.g. I go. (subject)

e.g. We go.(subject)

e.g. They speak to me. (object)

e.g. They speak to us. (object)

Second person refers to you with you as the object.

e.g. You go. (subject)

e.g. They speak to you. (object)

Third person refers to he, she, it, and they, with him, her, it, and them as the object, respectively.

e.g. He goes.

e.g. She goes.

e.g. It goes.

e.g. They go.

e.g. They speak to him. (object)

e.g. They speak to her. (object)

e.g. They speak to it. (object)

e.g. They speak to them. (object)

Verbs affect the moods or attitudes of the writer. Verbs have three moods:

Indicative mood indicates a statement or a question.

e.g. He loves to paint.

e.g. Do you believe in God?

Imperative mood indicates making a request or command.

e.g. Please tell me the truth. (The subject “you” is understood.)

e.g. Go out! (The subject “you” is understood.)

Subjunctive mood indicates making a hypothetical statement (i.e. not true).

e.g. If I were you, I would do it. (Past tense for a present action to indicate something contrary to the fact)

e.g. If he were the president, he would do it. (He is not the president, and therefore he will not do it.)

e.g. If you worked hard now, you would pass the exam. (You are not working hard now, and so you will not pass the exam; it is merely an assumption. Compare: “If you work hard, you will pass the exam.” Here, it becomes a condition, and therefore there is a probability that you will pass the exam.)

e.g. If pigs had wings, they would fly. (Pigs do not have wings, and therefore they will never fly.)

Subjunctive mood can also be used in the past tense. In that case, the past perfect tense (instead of the past tense) is used to show the hypothetical statement in the past.

e.g. If he had been the president, he would have done it. (He was not the president, and so he did not do it.)

e.g. If you had worked hard last year, you would have passed the exam. (You did not work hard last year, and so you failed in the exam last year.)

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Learning English Resources

American Idioms

Far cry from: very different from

e.g. Your achievement this time is a far cry from your previous one.

Sit on one’s hands: refuse to give any help

e.g. When we needed your help; you just sat on your hands.

Alive and kicking: living and healthy; okay

e.g. I had been sick for some time, but now I am alive and kicking.”

e.g. “How are you?” “Well, alive and kicking.”

Slang and Colloquial Expressions

Pardon my French: excuse my bad language.

e.g. Please pardon my French: I was so angry with his remarks.

All the rage: fashionable.

e.g. Wearing a hat will be all the rage this summer.

Slow on the uptake: slow to understand.

e.g. I'm a bit slow on the uptake. Can you explain it once more?

Choice of Words

Await / Wait

Await means wait for an event, an occurrence, or a development; it does not require a preposition, such as for. Wait always carries the preposition for.

e.g. We await your decision.

e.g. The people were awaiting the outcome of the election.

e.g. He is waiting for your reply.

e.g. Don't wait for me; just go ahead.

  

Prepositional Words and Phrases

Follow on: die at a date later than someone.

e.g. His wife passed away. He followed on a few months later.

Follow through: continue to supervise.

e.g. I hope someone would follow through on this project until its completion.

Follow up:  check something out.

e.g. Please follow up this lead, and see what will happen next.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

                                Learning and Mastering English

Why Learning Slang

Language is forever changing. What is currently acceptable or popular may be replaced by something else in years to come, and the use of slang is a strong testament to that. Slang is just an alternative way of saying something. It is sometimes hard to identify what is slang and what is not. Slang and colloquial expressions are often acceptable in informal writing because they are used in communication in movies, newspapers, radio, television, and the media.

Easy on the eye: good looking.

e.g. I say, your girlfriend is easy on the eye.

Beefcake: a muscular man.

e.g. She has been dating a beefcake.

e.g. He goes to the gym regularly because he wants to be a beefcake.

Caught short: caught at a disadvantage.

e.g. The market plunged, and we were caught short just as thought we were on the road to recovery..

Daylight robbery: too costly.

e.g. That’s daylight robbery; to pay $300 just to fix this!

Not in the same street: of a different quality (usually inferior).

e.g. These two dresses may look similar, but they are not in the same street. This one looks much more elegant than that one.

Alive and kicking: in good health.

e.g. "How is your grandmother doing?" "Very much alive and kicking."

Bad shot: wrong guess.

e.g. “He came with his wife, didn’t he?” “Bad shot: he came all by himself.”

Not so dusty: quite good.

e.g. Well the performance was not so dusty; much better than I expected.

Whistle for: wish in vain.

e.g. The stock market has fallen sharply. You can whistle for your money invested.

Break a leg: good luck!

e.g. "I'll have my first piano competition tomorrow." "Break a leg!"

English Slang and Colloquial Expressions

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Correct Use of Prepositions

A preposition is a word that shows the relationship between a noun or pronoun and that of another noun or pronoun.

e.g. The book is on the table.

e.g. This telephone message came from your wife.

e.g. Everybody can go except you.

e.g. The house is situated between the river and the wood.

e.g. That piece of cake was shared among the three boys. (NOT between: between is for two; among is for more than two)

Some words can be a preposition as well as a conjunction.

e.g. He stood before the window. (preposition indicating the relationship between the man and the window)

e.g. Before the police came, the man had fled. (before is a subordinating conjunction joining two otherwise independent clauses the police came and the man had fled)

Consider the following sentences:

e.g. The police came, the man had fled. (incorrect: without a conjunction)

e.g. The police came, and the man had fled. (correct with a conjunction)

e.g. Before the police came, the man had fled (improved: showing the sequence of events with the addition of the subordinating conjunction before)

Do not use prepositions unnecessarily.

e.g. Where are you going to? (NO to)

e.g. Don’t go near to the lake. (NO to)

e.g. The child fell off from his bike. (NO from)

A preposition can introduce a word group called a prepositional phrase or verbal idiom:

     Accompanied by

e.g. All children will be accompanied by their parents.

     Accompanied with

e.g. His speech was accompanied with slander and accusation. (linked with; containing)

     Accountable for

e.g. As an adult, you are accountable for your actions. (responsible for)

     Accountable to

e.g. Your are directly accountable to the manager, and not your supervisor. (reporting to a person)

     Agree on

e.g. This is something we can never agree on.

     Agree to

e.g. I agreed to paying the damages.

     Agree with

e.g. I can never agree with you as far as this is concerned.

     Angry at

e.g. I was angry at your irresponsible behavior.

     Angry with

e.g. Are you still angry with me?

     Contend for

e.g. The job situation is bad: more than fifty applicants contend for that position. (compete for)

     Contend with

e.g. To succeed, you must contend with your lack of confidence. (overcome an obstacle)

     Differ from

e.g. Your account of the event is different from that of your brother.

     Differ with

e.g. You differ with your brother on this issue. (disagree)

     Grateful for

e.g. We should all be grateful for our blessings from God.

     Grateful to

e.g. You should be grateful to your parents for what they have done for you.

     Impatient at

e.g. Now I am becoming more impatient at your lack of enthusiasm. (angry)

     Impatient for

e.g. We are impatient for a response from the government. (waiting eagerly for a result)

     Reconcile to

e.g. My grandfather reconciled himself to old age. (accept an outcome)

     Reconcile with (resolve differences)

e.g. The two brothers finally reconciled with each other and resolved their differences.

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau

Common Sentence Errors

Which of the following sentences are incorrect?

(1) He is one of those few students who get into an elite college.

(2) She is the only one of the students who get into Harvard University.

(3) Everybody thinks they are smart.

(4) None of us is perfect.

(5) None are so wrong as those who think they are always right.

(6) In the burglary, every window, door, and mirror were smashed.

(7) The long and the short of this proposal are that it is easy but costly.

(8) Give and take is important to a healthy marriage.

(9) Politics are something that many like to pursue.

(10) The police are coming.

Incorrect sentences:

(2),(3),(6), (7), and (9)

Go through these sentences once again, and try to see why they are incorrect.

Explanation:

(2) She is the only one of the students who gets into Harvard University. (Improved: there are many students, and she is the only one student who gets into Harvard University. In sentence (1), a few students get into an elite college, and he is one of them.)

(3) Everybody thinks he or she is smart. (Improved: “everybody” is singular. A singular verb is used when “none” means “no one” or “not one” as in(4); a plural verb is used when “none” suggests more than one, as in (5).)

(6) In the burglary, every window, door, and mirror was smashed. (Improved: “every” is singular.) 

(7) The long and the short of this proposal is that it is easy but costly. (Improved: certain common compounds are often considered singular, requiring a singular verb, e.g. “bread and butter”, “give and take” as in (8); and “the long and the short.”) 

(9) Politics is something that many like to pursue. (Improved: some nouns, although appearing plural, such as “economics” and “politics” as in (9), require a singular verb. Likewise, some nouns, appearing singular, such as “police” as in (10), may require a plural verb.)

Stephen Lau

Copyright© by Stephen Lau