Practice your English. Help and advice.

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nanaia
ixolan
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English friends:help!

Messaggio da nanaia »

don't worry, nothing serious, only a certain curiosity. Not for the first time, today our newspaper Il Piccolo reports of people intruding Windsor castle eluding security services. I was in Windsor, visited the castle and frankly I can hardly understand HOW this can happen. The castle is a fortress, or so at least seems to me. What's your opinion?
Bye
Nanaia


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

Ron and I are very impressed with the high quality of the A Trieste website. But we are not certain of the purpose of this English Section. Is it to practice your English language skills?

If so, would you be happy to have other native English speakers who may have no connection with Trieste? If it is to broaden your knowledge of English, we could tell a few friends about this excellent site. Who knows, in exchange you might get us to speak Triestino


nanaia
ixolan
ixolan
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Iscritto il: dom 6 ago 2006, 7:39
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for Peter G

Messaggio da nanaia »

Hi Peter, as to the purpose of this site: there are many sections, as you see and (at least in my opinion) sometimes part of the El Salotin comes to the English section. That is to say: in El Salotin we debate all kind of matters and if a matter of interest refers to English speaking areas, we take advantage of the courtesy of our new British friends :oops:
Have a good day!
nanaia


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PeterG
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Practice your English. Help and advice.

Messaggio da PeterG »

I am very impressed by the high standard of English in this section. But should any of you need help on any aspect of the language, from beginners to fluent speakers, Ron and I would be more than happy to help. Please don't hesitate to pose any question even if you think it might be trivial.

Peter


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refolo

pratice your English healp and advice

Messaggio da refolo »

I WISH YOU HERE, IN...DOWN UNDER.....

20.000.000.000 PEOPLE NEED YOU!

maria aka refolo


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

LOL

Peter :-D


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Capuzi garbi

Messaggio da Capuzi garbi »

Hi Peter,

If you ever take a stroll to Australia you will find that there are barely just over 20.000.000 inhabitants in this continent.

Actually you'll find that the greatest majority speaks excellent English, albeit with some quaint idiomatic phrases.

What does worry me however, is that with the modern method of teaching, grammar is no longer a prime concern, therefore people, and not only kids, do not know the difference between its and it's, there and their, your and you're and so on. As far as using the s to form a plural....nowaday most of the time one reads, for argument's sake, student's or apple's when it should be students or apples.

But I guess this is a problem that does not relate only to Australia.

Cheers. L


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

Hi Maria and L

Downunder is terra incognita for me, I'm a Pommy Ba**ard. But we do have the same problems here in the UK and the oldies are constantly moaning about low school standards of English and are bemused by mobile texting, such as <i>Ow R U?</i> .

But even reasonably educated people often misuse you and I and you and me, some wrongly assuming that it is superior and dignified to use the My husband and I form all the time. So you frequently hear grammatical howlers like It was given to John and I ..., balanced by the less educated saying Alice and me went to Blackpool.

Peter :-D


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Capuzi garbi

Messaggio da Capuzi garbi »

Ah Peter,

Regardless how little you may know of Australia, you could not possibly be as ignorant of this Southern Land as I was some short 46 years ago.

But you know, with a little willingness, all frontiers can be crossed and all problems can be overcome.

I found out that most migrants, regardless where they land, expect to be able to carry on as if they still lived in their country of birth, and that is an impossibility.

The great US writer Jack London (no relation to the English boxer of the same name, and father to Brian London, who fought Muhammad Ali for the world title) found that out when he landed in the Klondike and reported his experiencs in the short story "In a far away country".

Even a language problem, as serious as it may be at the beginning, is no problem at all if one wants to learn it.

In Australia there are English classes for migrants, and being instituted by the Commonwealth Gvt, are free of charge.

I attended to them for quite a while, and that is where I learnt my rudiments of vocabulary, grammar and syntax, before branching to more, ....ahem....formal studies.

Language is the greatest form of communication we can have. I really cannot understand why some people refuse to use it well.

As professor Higgings would say: Look at her, a prisoner of the gutter, condemned by every syllable she utters....

Take care. Lucio


refolo

pratice English healp and advice

Messaggio da refolo »

Dear P.G

learning English, it does not mean that I am one of yours. For my own convenience I had to do so, be aware of future voting or oblige to the Queen (at that time back in 1961).

Soon my daughter was born in 1956, I requested the citizenship, to be able to obtain the entry of my own parents.
Being the only child, I took opportunity to do so.
I did everything by the book, but, this doesn't mean that I felt Australian an less Italian.

You can have a transfusion of blood at any cost, but my blood is the same since the day of my birth.
I hate to be discriminated for what I am or come from. I think it stand even for the B.....d in the world.

I do had a father and mother, which they are resting in Melbourne Cemetery, and proud to be Australian. What I am really P...........off is my own fellow citizens try to be smart about either my ancestors or critisize about the bad English language. I wouldn't not allowed anybody to do this, from the first or last Australian, or any other person for that matter.

So, if my English is so bad? .......I DON'T GIVE A CRACK!!!!!!!!!

Ciao, be a good teacher for me, I appreciated a lot.....

Maria aka Refolo


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

Maria, I wouldn't dream of correcting you. :-D


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

Lucio

I fully agree with you, and you have certainly mastered English.

You ha scritto:Language is the greatest form of communication we can have.
Language, my friend, is the only means of communication we have.

Peter


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refolo

practice your English

Messaggio da refolo »

PETER.......PETER.....

You have trick me! were have you been all this years?
You are a WELL OF SCIENCE Going in your web-site is like attending OXFORD UNIVERSITY.

A discovery done here, in Kimberley region. One fossil, the Gogonasus fish 400-million years old, from Devonian period....that would be a story to talk about the human evolution? to add under Prehistory section.

Maria aka refolo


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AdlerTS
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Messaggio da AdlerTS »

A question to improve my english: is it better "dear my friends" or "dear friends of mine" ?

Thanks :P


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babatriestina
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Messaggio da babatriestina »

AdlerTS ha scritto:A question to improve my english: is it better "dear my friends" or "dear friends of mine" ?

Thanks :P
Why not simply " My dear friends"?


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Ron
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Messaggio da Ron »

Dear friends.......

I hope you noticed the opening line :lol:

If I wanted to be more formal I could have said "My dear friends"

I could also have just said " Friends"

Both are equally correct in this day and age when anything goes and we all express ourselves in our own style.

Finally, I could have also said " Wait until Peter gets up and he will give you the correct answer" but as I am up and about you have got a response from me :lol:

Isn't it good to have the forum back on line ?

Auguri

Ron


As a British soldier, I was stationed in the Trieste area from October 1945 until January 1947
refolo

practiced your English help and advice

Messaggio da refolo »

Hei Ron ...

when you say wait until Peter is get in up? whay do you mean? he's still a sleep?.......

Waking.....Waking.....If we sleep too much we might be as big as Jack and the stalkbeans........

Maria aka refolo


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

Good gracious me, is that the time?? I didn't realise it was so late, I really must get up in an hour or so. What day is it? Saturday? What, already? Can't be! :-D

Dear Friends,

My dear friends .. hum ... as Ron says, bit formal. On the Internet and emails we are fast lapsing into Americanese with Hi there.

A point of etiquette in correspondence you may not be aware of is that if you begin a letter with Dear Sir, or Dear Madam, you formally end it with Yours sincerely. But if you start it with the persons surname, such as Mr Smith, or Miss Jones, then the formal ending is Yours faithfully. An easy way to remember this is that two esses in Sir and sincerely, should not be together.

In letters to newspapers there is considerable variation. In The Times nearly all begin with Sir the majority, in a sample of sixteen, ended with Yours faithfully (9), Yours sincerely (2), I am, etc (1) and three other rarer endings.

In private correspondence to a person known slightly, even if beginning Dear Mary, end with Yours truly or more cordially Yours very truly. To a close friend or colleague end with Yours ever. Frequently these days the Yours ... formula is dropped in favour of ending with Best regards, All good wishes, and increasingly just plain Regards,

Regards, :-)

Peter


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babatriestina
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Messaggio da babatriestina »

PeterG ha scritto:
A point of etiquette in correspondence you may not be aware of is that if you begin a letter with Dear Sir, or Dear Madam, you formally end it with Yours sincerely.
Well, Peter! Do you remember when I said that sometimes in English I have a bit of difficulty in understanding for a lack of commas? Your phrase in an exemple, I had to re-read it to understand, and them I realized that it would be clearer to me if it was
A point of etiquette in correspondence (,) you may not be aware of , is that if you begin a letter with Dear Sir, or Dear Madam, you formally end it with Yours sincerely[/b
Of course, between the subject and the verbe a comma is not usual, but it would mark an illuminating pause


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PeterG
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Messaggio da PeterG »

babatriestina ha scritto:Well, Peter! Do you remember when I said that sometimes in English I have a bit of difficulty in understanding for a lack of commas? Your phrase in an exemple, I had to re-read it to understand, and them I realized that it would be clearer to me if it was A point of etiquette in correspondence (,) you may not be aware of , is that if you begin a letter with Dear Sir, or Dear Madam, you formally end it with Yours sincerely
Baba

I put it in a chatty style, I perhaps should have said A point of etiquette in correspondence that you may not be aware of is that if you begin a letter with ...

In English, plainly parenthetic clauses, phrases, or single words require commas before and after them. Some examples from Fowler's Modern English Usage: But the general tenor of life, even in Amsterdam, is peaceful and well organised; There were, to be sure, occasional eccentrics in nineteenth century novels; He saw, a moment later, that the game was up.

But a restrictive (or defining clause) relative clause does not require a comma. A non-restrictive (or non-defining) relative clause, i.e., one which by its nature supplies extra information, does. Here is an example (restrictive) The woman who is approaching us seems to be somebody I know. And non-restrictive: The book, which has been retranslated, remains a bestseller. The sentence I wrote (A point of etiquette in correspondence that you may not be aware of ... ) is restrictive and therefore does not need commas.

Wide variations can be seen in the work of many contemporary writers. But even here, what is termed 'comma splicing', is frowned upon: We had a holiday in Florence, it was very hot, we could hardly bear it .... Generally, we do not go in for long sentences with many subclauses as is common in Italian. Often an Italian sentence translates into an English paragraph of several short sentences with a minimal use of commas.


Peter


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