a series of proper word usage

2007-06-12 15:13:35 / 天气: 阴雨 / 心情: 郁闷 / 个人分类：学习英文需知

Stop Playing Around!

When learning the nuances of another language, there are always bound to be difficulty, unnaturalness, and awkwardness in translation. Sometimes, even the simplest expressions can befuddle the native speaker when used inaccurately. Let's consider one example: play. Chinese speakers might feel quite comfortable telling others, "I am going to Beijing to play for a few days. Native speakers would never say such, unless they are children of kindergarten age going to meet up with their peers. Such an expression would be fine in Chinese but a disaster in English. A native speaker would most likely replace play with travel to, visit, or go sight-seeing in Beijing.

In most instances, play is used to describe child's play, musical instruments, and sports that use balls, board games like chess and cards. Avoid using play for places of recreation like beaches, tourist sights, and parks. As you learn English, I hope you don't play around with the language but have a good time making progress paying attention to your choice of words.

Open Carefully

Finding the right word when translating into another language always has its shares of challenges and mistakes. One common example native Chinese learners of English have is using open/close versus turn on/turn off. If every computer or cell phone were "opened", there would be a big mess everywhere. If a native speaker was told to open the TV, for example, he or she might be tempted to bust it open with a hammer.

Open and close are typically used for non-mechanical things using the hand such as a window, door, or book. It is okay to open and close these kinds of items, but for electrical or mechanical items like lights, TVs, water faucets, and computers, only turn on or turn off can be used. With constant work and practice, finding the right English word will become more natural and easier to use. Now open your mouth and English books and turn on your computers and get busy improving your English

Lost or Stolen?

"I lost my bicycle!" Tony ran out from the school declaring. How can anyone lose a bicycle? Our language point today will address this usage problem. Words like lost, stolen and misplaced are often confused in usage.

Lost is typically used when fault lies with the speaker. In other words, it is because of your actions. For example, if you have a hole in your pocket and your keys fall through, you have lost your keys.

Lost also implies the slim or unlikely possibility that the thing you lost will never be recovered. If money fell through a hole in your pocket, it is unlikely that it would be returned.
Stolen suggest that the item lost was due to someone else. If you wake up and find your bicycle missing, it is because someone else took it. Not too many people would take their own bicycle. In this case, the bicycle was stolen and not lost.

Misplaced usually means one has temporarily lost something and has a good idea where to find it. It suggests that there is a good chance that the item will be recovered. If you were in your house all day and could not find your keys, you know your keys are in the house and you have to look for it. Or if your house is messy, perhaps it may take some time to find your keys under all the mess. So in this case, your keys have been misplaced, not lost or stolen.

Keeping a dictionary handy might help to resolve some of your problems. If you should lose it, invest in a thesaurus which can also help in dealing with words with similar meanings. If you should happen to misplace your thesaurus, a dictionary of synonyms would even be better in finding the right word for the right occasion

Door to Door Salesmen

"Hey Fred, let's have lunch tomorrow. My treat." "Okay, when and where shall we meet?" "We can meet at the gate of McDonald's. I'm sure you'll enjoy it!"This is a typical mistake associated with improper word usage because different concepts are expressed with the same word. It appears that in Chinese, gate and door can be translated with the same word, causing confusion for the native English speaker.

It is important to remember that a door is an entrance to a building or room whereas a gate is an entrance to a yard, compound, or apartment complex. If a native English speaker was told to meet at the gate of McDonald's, they must be thinking that it has to be the biggest one in the world. It would be more appropriate to meet at the front door of a restaurant or building, not gate. Even in large buildings with multiple doors, it would still be called a door and not a gate.

Mastery of a foreign language takes time and practice. Pay attention to your word usage and you'll find yourself on the way to better English.

There's No Place Like Home

When learning another language, it is easy to assume others are understanding what you are saying in the same way you understand you are saying, but often is the case is when your words confuse the person you are talking to.

There have been numerous occasions when students have invited their foreign friends to their "family" for a Chinese dumpling dinner. It is important to remember that family refers to the people whereas home refers to the place where one lives. Many students can be heard saying, "We have a DVD player in our family," when in fact they mean home.

So be careful when using family and home. If you invite someone to your family for dinner, you might be understood as asking them to join your family through marriage! Be careful when choosing your words.

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