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1500 questions
36
votes
4 answers
Changes in English names of people
Why is Robert called Bob and John called Jack sometimes? What is the history of or reason for this practice in changing the English names of people?
user2683
36
votes
6 answers
Does one use 'a' or 'an' before the word X-Ray?
I was asking this question on Area 51: "How do I tell if an airport scanner is a X-ray scanner?", but I keep wanting to put an 'an' in front of X-ray because it starts with the 'eh' sound.
So is it 'a' or 'an'?
Mark Rogers
- 580
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36
votes
2 answers
Why are clothes “hung” but men “hanged”?
It is said that clothes can be hung but men are hanged.
Is this correct, and if so, why?
Ryan Shripat
- 483
36
votes
4 answers
Is "prepone" being used outside India?
Prepone is a great word - it's the opposite of postpone. When you prepone a meeting, you change its scheduled time so that it occurs sooner than originally planned. Has this usage spread beyond India? Would other English speakers understand it?
Evan
- 1,236
36
votes
1 answer
When to use "cannot" versus "can't"?
When is it best to write "can't" versus writing "cannot"? Are they interchangeable in every situation?
tenfour
- 6,661
36
votes
5 answers
36
votes
7 answers
What does "darkest Africa" refer to?
Many times in my life, I have heard phrases such as "in darkest Africa...", seemingly to refer to somewhere in Africa. It is never explained, and appears to be considered so obvious as to not require an explanation... except it does, for me.
Why…
R. Aue
- 369
36
votes
15 answers
What is the equivalent in English of the French "pipotron", which refers to meaningless filler content that looks like it was written by a bot?
I cannot find a good translation in English of the French word "pipotron". Could you help me?
In French, it refers originally to an automated process to randomly generate sentences. Now it is a pejorative word describing a text mostly void of…
A. Hersean
- 440
36
votes
2 answers
"Their hunt the roast vegetable sauce": can you parse this?
An old A 2002 magazine sports the ad pictured below, juxtaposing
Their hunt the roast vegetable sauce.
with "Our roast vegetable sauce." There's something funny going on in the syntax of the former phrase, that actually made me pay some attention…
anemone
- 6,216
36
votes
4 answers
"Translate into" vs. "Translate to"
Does one translate a word or phrase into another language or to another language? For example:
Translate the following phrase to Spanish.
Translate the following phrase into Spanish.
jrdioko
- 1,041
36
votes
2 answers
Why is there paternal, for fatherly, fraternal, for brotherly, but no similar word for sons?
If paternal is "relating to someone's parents", and fraternal "relating to someone's brothers", is there, or why isn't there, a word for "relating to someone's sons", i.e: sunternal
Sentence example: "sunternal love"
Andrea Rowlatt
- 333
36
votes
7 answers
How come people say “Would of”?
I often read the expression “would of” used instead of “would have”. Each time I read it I get annoyed so I googled it and found out -as I expected- that it is an incorrect way to say “would have”. Now, there are a lot of brilliant slang…
Marybnq
- 745
36
votes
5 answers
What is the difference between "Have you seen this?" and "Did you see this?"
What's the difference between these two phrases?
Max
- 1,287
36
votes
3 answers
What do you call these "rolls" on old clothes?
Below is the picture of what I mean. So, I wanna know the name of these "rolls", what are they called? Pellets? Rolls?
As you can see, some people use razors or fabric shavers to get rid of them.
Pavel Orekhov
- 1,450
36
votes
4 answers
Regulatory bodies and authoritative dictionaries for English
Some languages have a "regulatory body" issuing recommendations and guidelines regarding the use of that language.
For example in the case of Spanish it's the Real Academia Española whose status is recognised in all Spanish-speaking countries. The…
Jonik
- 4,145