I've been thinking for a while that it might be useful to have a thread where people can ask questions about the English language - spelling, grammar, punctuation and things like that. After getting the thumbs-up for this idea on the "Down Crack" thread, I've decided to give it a go. Also, if anyone has questions about specific texts they are studying at school, people who've read them might be able to help out with those, too.
I'll get things started with a quick explanation about something that confuses lots of people (English or otherwise) - the apostrophe (').
Apostrophes have two main functions:
1. to show that letters have been left out of a word
2. to show that something belongs to someone or something.
They should never be used for plurals, so writing something like "I love animal's" would be wrong.
Here are some examples with the correct usage:
It's raining.
I'm feeling fine.
He's very silly.
They've moved house.
The apostrophes are there to show that the writer means "It is...", "I am...", "He is..." and "They have...".
Incidentally, when writing about decades, we don't need an apostrophe, because no letters have been left out:
The 1980s
That's simple enough, now for the more tricky part.
When we want to say that something belongs to someone or something, we write an apostrophe after the owner, and add the letter 's':
The dog's bone. (One dog owns the bone.) John's house.
If the person or thing ends with the letter 's', or we want to talk about something with more than one owner, it's common to put an apostrophe after it, and not to add another 's':
James' football. The dogs' bone. (More than one dog owns the bone.)
We always put the apostrophe after the owner, so in the two doggy examples above, in the first one the owner is "the dog", in the second the owner is "the dogs".
Still with me? OK. Now for the confusing part - the word "its". How do we know whether to write "it's" or "its"?
The answer is that we only use "it's" when we mean "it is". If you want to talk about something that is owned by something else, use "its":
Every rose has its thorn. The dog was playing with its bone.
Right, I hope that's been useful for somebody. For now, bring on the questions...
hey! nice thread and thanks for the explanation above.
the main two tools that confuse me are the:
: and the ;
i dont understand when your supposed to use them, like are we supposed to use the one with the comma (;) if we're going to mention a list, and would we use the one with the double fullstop [colon] (:) if we're just going to eg. explain the definition of something.
I think commas are used in sentences to give a slight pause within that sentence, unlike full stops which are used as a slight pause but go onto another subject.
So for example; He went on the internet to visit the forum, it was really interesting so he stayed on longer than he had planned.
^^lol. If you look at the sentence above, it shows how the part after the comma could not make sense on its own, but you also need the slight pause in between for the sentence to make sense.
An example of a sentence is; He went on the internet to visit the forum. He really enjoyed his visit on the forum so he stayed on the net longer than he had planned.
Now from the example above, it shows how both sentences can make sense on their own, without having to be read together to make sense.
Allaah u a'lam. (Allaah subhanahu wa ta'aala knows best.)
Thanks for the positive responses. I'll try to cover commas in the near future - it's quite a large subject so it'll take me a little while...
Meanwhile:
format_quote Originally Posted by akhee
the main two tools that confuse me are the:
: and the ;
i dont understand when your supposed to use them, like are we supposed to use the one with the comma (;) if we're going to mention a list, and would we use the one with the double fullstop [colon] (:) if we're just going to eg. explain the definition of something.
please could you explain that.
thanks.
peace!
The colon (:) is often used for starting a list or giving an example, like this:
Here are the things I am going to talk about: blah, blah and blah.
So there I've given an example of a list, and I used a colon to introduce it, after the words "like this".
The semicolon (;) is often used to divide a single sentence into two, although its uses can vary a great deal. A vague rule of thumb is that it can be used when you want to signal a pause slightly longer that a comma.
Of all the punctuation marks, this one is most often used by writers in a variety of personal ways. Some writers use it to divide items in a list instead of commas, like this:
Here are the things I am going to talk about: blah; blah; and finally blah.
Most often, though, it's used to divide a sentence into two, where the two parts of the sentence are connected in some way:
He had no bodily co-ordination; that was why he couldn't dance very well.
In fact, in Akhee's example above, I would be tempted to use a semicolon, because the two parts of the sentence could indeed be separate sentences:
He went on the internet to visit the forum; it was really interesting so he stayed on longer than he had planned.
Since the use of the semicolon is often personal to the writer, it's difficult to give advice on how to use it beyond what I've said.
Fragments are incomplete sentences. Usually, fragments are pieces of sentences that have become disconnected from the main clause. One of the easiest ways to correct them is to remove the period between the fragment and the main clause. Other kinds of punctuation may be needed for the newly combined sentence.
Do your charity in the name of Da'wah and help us out
Firstly, your post was extremely helpful! Incidentally, I've just been writing my final draft of a poetry essay to hand in tomorrow, which leads me on to my question:
Do English teachers enjoy giving students essays to write or something? Seriously, there's only so much a student can take, especially when they have so many forums to visit and so little time to visit them in!
Finally, haben sie any tips for essay writing that you can share? It'd be invaluable!
Regards,
Der Grand Ozzenator
"I spent thirty years learning manners, and I spent twenty years learning knowledge."
the comma is used to emphasis a pause (like brother akhee mentioned) but its also used to list.
for example- The car, lorry, motor bike and the van.
the comma cannot be put BEFORE an 'and' because it signifies the ending to the list.
Yep - you're right on all counts.
Just a quick question though, if i were to say 'commas' would i put the apostrophe here --> commas'
You wouldn't need an apostrophe if you meant "more than one comma". Apostrophes are never used for plurals. If you meant "belonging to the comma" then you could do it like this:
The comma's shape is curved.
If you wanted to talk about something belonging to more than one comma, then you would write it like this:
The commas' shapes are all the same.
That would be quite an unusual thing to say, but that's how you'd write it anyway.
Here is an active sentence that I used to use with two rather excitable Saudi students of mine:
Nadir hit Fahad.
Here's a passive version of the same sentence:
Fahad was hit by Nadir.
The same verb features in both sentences ("hit"). We call the person (or thing) that is doing the verb "the agent". So, in the first sentence, Nadir (the agent) comes first, and in the second, he comes last.
That's the difference, but why do we use them?
We use the passive when the agent is obvious, unknown or we want to emphasise the person who the action is being done to. So, normally, we would use the first sentence ("Nadir hit Fahad.") because it is simpler. If we were more interested in Fahad, though, we would use the second.
Here is a passive sentence where the agent is obvious:
Six million hamburgers are eaten in America every week.
Who is doing the eating? People - it's obvious, so we don't need to mention it.
Here, the agent is unknown:
My bicycle was stolen last week.
So we can't mention the agent, because we don't know who did the stealing.
Hopefully that's clear - I'm teaching this very point with a Year 7 class on Tuesday!
Firstly, your post was extremely helpful! Incidentally, I've just been writing my final draft of a poetry essay to hand in tomorrow, which leads me on to my question:
Cool - what kind of poetry?
Do English teachers enjoy giving students essays to write or something?
Yes - we love it! Students have to be able to write essays in order to pass exams. That's the main reason you need to do so many of them! The reason they're valued in exams is that they are the best way to ascertain someone's view on any given question.
Finally, haben sie any tips for essay writing that you can share? It'd be invaluable!
Well, there's a lot I could say, and it depends what kind of essay you had in mind. If you were writing an argumentative essay, that would be different from a descriptive essay, and so on.
If you're writing about poetry (or any other text), the most important thing to remember is textual evidence. Every point you make has to be backed up with reference to the text. One way of building up paragraphs that I use with my students is called Point, Evidence, Explanation (or PEE for short).
You make your point; you back it up with a quotation; you explain how that quote relates to what you've said. Voila! A perfect paragraph is born!
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Muslimah inshal liked this post
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so your well popular masha Allaah! lol
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