Archive for 'English Language'
It’s time for spring cleaning! Posted by carol on Mar 31, 2020
Spring has come, readers! But along with it, the rise of one of the biggest pandemics in recent history, the coronavirus, a disease better known as CoVid-19. Drastic measures are being taken worldwide to curb its spread, one of the main and most effective ones being self-isolation, which means spending the majority of your time…
English Words in the News: Coronavirus Edition Posted by Gary Locke on Mar 19, 2020
How’s your week going? The world, it seems, is having a singular experience. That is to say, we’ve never seen anything like this before. Before anyone argues that the so-called Spanish Flu epidemic of 1918, or the events surrounding 9/11, were similar, let me stop you right there. The world is far more interconnected than…
Expecting a baby in English Posted by carol on Feb 29, 2020
Good morning, dear readers! We all know how important and delicate it can be to express ourselves in a foreign language. Even simple, everyday things in our native language become more complex when we try to communicate them. And it so happens that a couple of my students over the past couple of months had…
The Many Ways of Anyway Posted by Gary Locke on Feb 27, 2020
As you probably know, Americans are very good at abusing the English language. We fall into habits of misapplying words when speaking and, if we do it often enough, the wrong word becomes part of common speech. This is called a colloquialism. The problem with some English colloquialisms, though, is that they can confuse anyone…
English Idioms Inspired by Blacksmiths Posted by Gary Locke on Feb 20, 2020
With only an estimated 500 – 1000 professional blacksmiths in the US today, chances are excellent that you don’t think about the craft all that often. It is likely, however, that you have heard some of the most common phrases associated with blacksmiths sometime in the last month. In fact, these idioms are so widely…
Online shopping in English Posted by carol on Jan 31, 2020
Hello, everyone! January is drawing to an end, and although all the Christmas holiday shopping is finally behind us, this does not necessarily means that we have been spending any less! After all, shopping online is now part of our daily lives and many people nowadays even get their grocery shopping done without leaving the…
That or Which? Posted by Gary Locke on Jan 30, 2020
Years ago, this blog addressed the problem of when to use that or which in a sentence. Are they interchangeable? Is there a rule to follow? What’s the difference? Unfortunately, this continues to be one of the most common mistakes in English grammar. In fact, it’s so common that people tend to ignore it. But…