This poster is keen to stress how fat-free the advertised product is. But somehow, the drafters mixed up their directions. The text says, in both Spanish and English that the product could contain ‘up to 0% fat’. So, the product has 0% fat, or even less—but wait, ‘less than 0%’ is a negative number. That…… Continue reading Up to 0% fat
Tag: Usage
Due, owing, owed
A couple of months ago, a radio presenter was talking about the then imminent stock market flotation of Elon Musk’s company Space X. The presenter said that the estimated valuation of SpaceX was [amount X], and that [amount Y] of this amount ‘is owed to’ the valuation of SpaceX’s artificial intelligence (AI) business Grok and…… Continue reading Due, owing, owed
A place that you know where it is
The other day, I heard a man say to his young daughter: ‘Where are you putting that? Put it in a place that you know where it is.’ Although that 2nd sentence is perfectly clear, I would never write it myself. I probably wouldn’t say it either, though I quite often hear similar sentences. Why…… Continue reading A place that you know where it is
From words to meaning
Before we can decode a written text or spoken comments, we often need a deep understanding of the context. The literal meaning of the words often does not give us enough to decipher the intended meaning. I found myself thinking about this after reading the following: ‘Man of the match in space on heading…… Continue reading From words to meaning
Please leave your room until 11 o’clock
We saw this sign at the front desk in our hotel on a recent trip to Luxembourg. Please leave your room till 11:00 a.m. One thing the sign says is: ‘Please leave your room till 11:00 am.’ That says the opposite of what is intended: intended meaning: please leave your room permanently before 11:00 am.…… Continue reading Please leave your room until 11 o’clock
Welsh challenge (4)
This post is the 4th instalment of the Welsh leg of my current Celtic challenge. It covers chapter 3 of Colloquial Welsh. For earlier instalments, please see Welsh Archives – Language Miscellany Possession Welsh has no transitive verb meaning have. Instead, the verb mae is used with the preposition gyda (‘with’), or in speech often…… Continue reading Welsh challenge (4)
Intrusive ‘of’: is it that big a problem?
In the last few years, I’ve increasingly heard people including the preposition ‘of’ after an adjective in creating phrases such as not that big of a deal and how big of a problem. To my ear, ‘of’ after adjectives in such phrases is unnecessary and sounds completely wrong. I’ve heard this construction mainly from Americans,…… Continue reading Intrusive ‘of’: is it that big a problem?
Some French false friends
The French language has many faux amis (French for ‘false friends’)—words looking like English words but having different meanings. Here are a few of many false words listed in Thody & Evans (1985) or Worth-Stylianou (1992). All are words I have come across in France or when I lived in Luxembourg. French wordMeaningCommentsActionshare (in a…… Continue reading Some French false friends
Only last year
I was thinking recently about 2 apparently different uses of the word only. I had found myself writing example 1. (1) I’ve had a copy of Teach Yourself Welsh for about 50 years. It was only last year that I discovered that pages 97-144 are missing. I started wondering how that use of only contrasts…… Continue reading Only last year
Recording regional and hyper-local swear words before they disappear
Linguists at the University of Sheffield have launched a project to create the UK’s first national repository of regional swear words. UK’s first-ever national swear word census to capture real use of English language | News | The University of Sheffield The researchers say they aim to preserve a record of regional and dialect words…… Continue reading Recording regional and hyper-local swear words before they disappear