Questions tagged [phrase-usage]
This tag is for questions about how to use a particular phrase. If your question is a request for a phrase to use, you should use the "phrase-request" tag.
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What's the correct reply to “nice to meet you”?
I’ve learnt all my life replying to “nice to meet you” as “me too” or likewise and so on. But maybe I am learning wrong or whatever, I have seen people replying in American soaps and movies as “you ...
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what is the difference between "ship", "deliver" and "send", e.g. "we will ship/deliver/send the item to your house"?
According to my study, it seems "to ship" means to take an item to a carrier who will "deliver" it to your house.
If a shop said "we will ship the item to you/ your house&...
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Can "put (someone) down" be used to mean "to kill a person" in a humurous context?
I have a line of dialogue in a scene I'm writing that is meant to be funny/humorous. Two people ride on horses, and one of them says as a joke:
“We have a long way ahead, and you’re already depleting ...
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So we have heard!
When you want to say that you have come to know of a certain information from others, I have seen people first narrate what they have heard and then finally say something like, "so I have heard ...
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" ...syntactically, being rather a matter of pragmatics, dependent... " - Can we delete 'being rather' in the parenthetical?
In the non-parenthetical construction the matrix verb and its subject
may also be backgrounded, but this is not signalled syntactically,
being rather a matter of pragmatics, dependent on context and ...
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Is this called a math problem or a math question or a math exercise?
This text from a first-grade textbook
"Tom had 20 eggs and his friends gave him 30 eggs. How many eggs did
Tom have?"
Is that text called a math problem or a math question or a math ...
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Is it correct to say "that is a backward seven" or "that seven is backward""?
"upside down" is an adverb but also an adjective. So is "backward".
And the dictionary says
upside down adjective [not usually before noun]
The painting looks like it's upside ...
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Do we use "rapport" for only transactional relationships (teacher/student; seller/buyer; doctor/patient...)?
I see this pattern in several dictionaries
build/ establish rapport between:
-teacher/student
-seller/buyer
-doctor/patient...
-coworker
Do we use "rapport" between friends? For example,
I ...
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Does "I rushed to do homework" mean I quickly went to my homework and did it at any rate (maybe be fast or slow) or I did the homework quickly?
The dictionary says
rush to do something: to do something very quickly and without delay
I rushed to pack my suitcase before she came back.
He rushed to help his comrade.
Does "I rushed to do ...
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Do you say "We have company" even though that person was just a stranger to you?
In the dictionary
company: guests in your house
I didn't realize you had company.
However, in several movies, I often hear people say "we have company" or "we've got company" even ...
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Phrase request for the idiom "frog in a well"?
I was arguing with my Indian friend, and he called me frog in a well in my native language (hindi)
I had not heard that phrase before, and found it very clever and on-point (not for me, but in general)...
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Does the proverb "having your cake and eating it too" imply hypocrisy?
Does the phrase/proverb "having your cake and eating it too" imply hypocrisy?
Does it have the same connotation as "Rules for thee, not for me"?
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Do you really distinguish the difference between "the shirt's rumpled" and "the shirt's wrinkled" and "the shirt's creased"?
I can not tell the difference between "the shirt's rumpled" and "the shirt's wrinkled" and "the shirt's creased" by just looking at the definitions in dictionaries.
In a ...
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Is there a subtle difference between '...would be not [12iib] but something...' and 'would not be [12iib] but something'?
From Rodney Huddleston Geoffrey K Pullum. (2017). The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language. p.827.
The informal way to express the positive counterpart of the claim in
[12iia] would be not [...
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Is it correct to say "he gave me a bookshelf" or "he gave me bookshelves"?
The dictionary says a bookshelf is a shelf that you keep books on
My dad gave me this one which has 5 shelves:
What is this whole thing called? a bookshelf or bookshelves
Is it correct to say "...
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