playBunny:Oh O.K.  One so small an 'e' changes the meaning so much!  I meant negative questions!

playBunny:Thanks good Bunny.  I now have a very good image of what I say transferes to others.  Yes.  i was talking about the nagative questions, not eating dinner!  So based on what you say:

If I ask " Isn't he out of town?" or "Is he not out of town?" the hearer gets the same impression, but if I ask "Is he not out of town?" it gives the hearer the impression that I expected the person I am asking my question about, he, to be out of town and now I'm perhaps surprised at hearing that he's not.


R's!  Well, I know that British people drop R's everywhere in a word except where they're followed by a vowel.  So "car" is actually /ka:/ while "car accident" is /ka:r aeksident/.  So I was wondering if in the States there are people who speak like that.

bouncybouncy:So both "Why doesn't he eat dinner?" and "Why does he not eat dinner?" are used and with exactly the same meaning.  How about this one:

Why does not he eat dinner?

I think it's not a very good question since I cannot recall having heard it anywhere.

Is there a particular difference between "Why doesn't he eat dinner?" and "Why does he not eat dinner?"

I mean, do they give different impressions ?

pauloaguia:But this is just the opinion of a non-native speaker...

And most appreciated.  Thanks. 

Is there any particular difference between "in the end" and "at the end" ?

I know that shirts which are striped, are called Striped!  If the stipes are thin, then they are called pin-stiped.
But as far as I have noticed, all these stripes are vertical.  Is there any special name for shirts or pieces of clothes in general, if the stripes are horizental?

Pedro Martínez:I just did.  Very interesting.  Thanks.

Czuch Czuckers:Ok, now I'm confused.  Do people in the States drop 'r' sounds just like  British people?
Do you have intrusive R's too?

Like do you ever say something like "Law r and order?"

Czuch Czuckers:I thought you were American!  Yes, I'm very familiar with the British accent.  I used to have major problems understanding even what the whole sentence pronounced was about, but I've gotten quite used to it.  In fact, I always use Oxford Advanced Learners and think it gives better pronunciations for words.  Just checked' Been' with it.  It says:

Been: /bi:n/ or AmE: /bin/

Bin: /bin/

So I think I was somehow right.

Czuch Czuckers: Very interesting.  I have indeed noticed that some people have their own special accent.  Some pronounce certain vowels shorter than other people do, some pronounce them longer.  Thanks for the examples.

Carl:That's why I was asking!  I as a non-native speak English far better than some of the guys in American movies. 

Thanks for the link.

Hi.  I know that words "been" and "bin" have different pronounciations.  Now, in movies or generally spoken english I fail to notice any difference between them.  Is there still a difference there or am I right in thinking that in fast and connected speech, 'bin' and 'been' are pronounced exactly the same?

Pedro Martínez:Yes, after studying English for a year, one can really speak it to a great extent.  I would say that doing so about Farsi can result in a satisfactory progress, but I also agree that it takes much longer time to understand Farsi, especially the written form. 

On the other hand, farsi is a language whose written and spoken form have gone too far from eachother.  You write Hendavaane, but in a normal speaking, you'd say it Hendoone!

So just enjoy yourself with Farsi.  I'm glad I can fully understand and speak and write it and don't have to 'study' it .

Rose:That's true that English is tough to master, but not very difficult to learn to speak and understand to a great extent.  Pedro knows hoe tough Farsi, my language, can really get considering the fact that we do not write down the short vowels!  So in a word, all you see is the consonants and long vowels while depending on how short vowels are changed, many words are produced which are written exactly the same in farsi.

ببر

is a very good example.  It can be read:  Bebar, Bebor, Babr meaning "take, cut, tiger" respectively.  I can imagine how confused a non-native may get when he/she comes acroos this word in a text.

KotDB:I think if one understands how exactly the native children get to know their new knowledge of the language, one is able to learn the language just as well.

Cinsidering the fact that many verbs in English are irregular and many words are made plural in ways other than adding 's' or 'es' to them, I was wondering if it ever happens that the natives make mistakes too.  For example children.  Has any native ever noticed a child say 'goed' for example, instead of went, etc. ?

WatfordFC:And here it's a word meaning OR.

Walter Montego:Is it a joke?

yoyudax:

Walter Montego:I think I have to disagree that 'inexpensive' is the opposite of 'cheap.'

However, you puzzled me with your post.  I know that the prefix in makes words negative, or changes them into their opposites.  Like : Appropriate ---> Inappropriate

But I also know that sometimes, it adds more to the quality of the word instead of changing it into its opposite word.  Like: valuabe ----> Invaluabe which means very much valuable, not cheap.

So I'm not sure which one of the above is true about 'inexpensive.'

Pedro Martínez:

 yoyudax: untorn may technically be a word but it is in common usage

So why are using 'but' in that sentence?  I'd use 'but' if the sentence were : Untorn may technically be a word, but it's not in common usage.

pauloaguia:Yeah, I did think of 'intact' myself, but wasn't sure if it'd be O.K..  To my non-native ears, whole isn't proper there, but I'm not sure.

No, we don't use that sentence very often.  The only situation I could think of that would make me use it i sthe following conversation:

A:  Hey, your shirt is torn!
B:  Torn? Naah!  It's not torn.  It's in fcat very much Untorn (If that's a word!)

*****************************

I was teaching my students some new adjectives and for each one I was introducing an opposite to them.  When  I came to 'torn,' I couldn't think of anything so thought I would like to ask the natives.

BIG BAD WOLF:  Well, when you as a native speaker say you'd never say 'untorn,' and another says that she thinks 'untorn' is a word, how can I have any idea? 

WatfordFC:When you have a tear in your shirt it is torn!  Is it not?
And every single reply helps.  Thank you.

Is there an opposite for the word 'torn' in English?

For example I say "My shirt is torn."

Now if my shirt is not torn, is there a way to say it without saying "is not torn."

Like the opposite of expensive is cheap.

hexkid:

I have forgotten how to make links that show not the URL, but a word without using my rich text editor.  When I want to edit the written part on top of this page I don't have access to rich text editor.

Walter Montego:Done.

Fencer:May the best Moderator win .....

yoyudax:Not a problem at all.  I'll wait for about a week or two until we have a thorough list, then I'll put all of the items in one single post and then we'll start translating.

Mr. Shumway: Sure thing.  Let's first have a list of what people may want to know in every language, and when the list is complete, each native speaker of a language can create a post and give us the equivalents.  And I'll put the links up here!

yoyudax:No there isn't.  But I guess I agree that it's a useful list.  Maybe we can make one here.

Czuch Czuckers:That's what it sounds like to me too.  I'd ask the second question --What do you think is the cure for cancer?-- indeed with a stress on YOU.

KotDB: Thanks for your reply.  Yeah, good suggestion about that throne!

Czuch Czuckers:What would I do without you natives, man!  Thanks.

I am fully aware of how embeded questions are made, like:

Do you know?
What time is it?

Do you know what time it is ?

But I heard a sentence in a movie : What do you think the cure for cancer is?

I think at least in this very example, the other option is possible too.  So it can be said as:

What do you think is the cure for cancer?

Am I right?

Doris:  How tough English sometimes becomes!  All I need in the middle of talking to an important person there in the U.S., is having to use that sentence with those consonants!

Last night I came by a sentence like this:

It's Lui the sixth's throne.

I was wondering if the native speakers really pronounce all the 5 consonants that I have shown in red.  It's really difficult for me to pronounce them all, though not impossible.  I really have to concentrate to pronounce them fully and without a mistake!