{"id":6861,"date":"2018-11-29T13:03:14","date_gmt":"2018-11-29T18:03:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/english\/?p=6861"},"modified":"2018-11-29T13:03:14","modified_gmt":"2018-11-29T18:03:14","slug":"when-english-offers-choices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/english\/when-english-offers-choices\/","title":{"rendered":"When English Offers Choices"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Courtesy of Pixabay, CCO<\/p><\/div>\n

This past week I witnessed a customer at a store point to something and say, \u201cI\u2019ll have two of those.\u201d Before placing the items in a bag and finalizing the sale, the clerk said, \u201cThese ones?\u201d<\/p>\n

That response by the clerk was a redundancy<\/strong>, the use of an extra word which wasn\u2019t needed. Because the customer was asking for more than one of an item, it was not necessary to use a double plural. The clerk should have responded by simply asking the customer, \u201cThese?\u201d In a formal setting, it might have been more appropriate to say, \u201cAre these what you wanted?\u201d<\/p>\n

Actually, I heard the same response from another store clerk that very same day. It is a very common mistake.<\/p>\n

We tend to make mistakes like that because English offers us too many choices. English has many words which either mean the same or, in the case of something like these ones<\/em>, the speaker fears that the response, though proper, lacks specificity. In trying to be precise the speaker overcompensates. This is most often the case when we are speaking informally. If I am holding something in my hand, and I ask, \u201cThis?\u201d then I am being precise but informal.<\/p>\n

Redundancies can also be found in common English expressions when a modifier<\/strong> is unnecessarily used, or when the modifier is all that is needed. You have no idea how often I hear people say the phrase mix together<\/em>, when the word mix<\/em> is sufficient. What else would you do \u2013 mix apart?<\/p>\n

Here are other typical redundancies:<\/p>\n