Problems with English? Questions? Vocabulary, grammar... Post here :)
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I'm not prejudice but when I call customer service or tech support, I hope it's someone who speaks English or someone without a heavy foreign accent. For example, a person from a Pakistani or similar descent may have a heavy English accent. If I talk to someone like this, I occasionally have to ask he/she to repeat themselves because some words you will get and others will be like, what was that word???
I repeat again, I am not prejudice. I will still talk to people who's native language is not English.
I'm not prejudice but...
I repeat again, I am not prejudice. I will still talk to people who's native language is not English.
I guess it's good that you'll still talk to someone who's native language is not English. What is your native language? It doesn't appear to be English.
Last edited by netcrawl; 09-13-2014 at 07:20 PM.
Reason: Speeling lol
You can get real problems over a phone line, where you're getting a partial signal anyway. Even face-to-face accents can be a nightmare. I remember a man from north India who said that he'd had a terrible time at a conference down south — and they were all university lecturers!
I'm not prejudice but when I call customer service or tech support, I hope it's someone who speaks English or someone without a heavy foreign accent. For example, a person from a Pakistani or similar descent may have a heavy English accent. If I talk to someone like this, I occasionally have to ask he/she to repeat themselves because some words you will get and others will be like, what was that word???
I repeat again, I am not prejudice. I will still talk to people who's native language is not English.
I agree. It doesn't really matter to me where they are on this planet. I just want to be able to understand 99% of what the person says. Unfortunately (and no fault of them) the people who I usually get connected to have a very thick accent, and I literally only hear about half of what they say. But on the other hand, when they send the email survey asking about how the issue was handled, I don't want to say anything too bad about them because I realize that it must be diffucult for them to even speak English, and they probably only understand half of what I say.
(I would like for them to be in the US and that US companies stop outsourcing to India, but that's off-topic).
I don't worry too much about my grammar since I am not a professional writer. Writing for the internet is different from writing for newspapers, magazines and other mediums where grammar is very important.
Most of us who are not professional writers, write in a conversational voice i.e. we write the way we talk.
Even though we write this way, we try our best to use the proper grammar and punctuations as much as possible. Awhile back I tried to refresh my grammar skills, but it was just too much to remember all those grammar rules like prepositional phrases, object of prepositions, different types of sentence clauses...well you know what I mean.
My brain was becoming like the egg from the TV commercial, "This is your brain on drugs, any questions?". That's how I felt trying to refresh my grammar skills.
- later...
Last edited by AnonymousGuy; 09-26-2014 at 11:58 PM.
Distribution: Cinnamon Mint 20.1 (Laptop) and 20.2 (Desktop)
Posts: 1,669
Rep:
The thing that really "rips ma knittin'"... (No, that's a Scottish phrase rather than English, it means, "Gets me really annoyed") is the incorrect use of the word "Myself" in both spoken and written English
Quote:
"Myself and John are going to the pub."
Nooooooooo!
Quote:
"Can you forward a copy of that email to myself?"
Aarrgghh!
It's usually misused in place of either "I" or "me".
The general rule is that "Myself" is only used in a sentence preceded by "I"
Quote:
"I did it myself"
"I, myself, am a member of LinuxQuestions."
"I" is used as the subject of a sentence, "me" is used as the object which works out as "I" at the beginning and "me" at the end
Quote:
"I went to the pub alone."
(Which is a bit of a shame. )
Quote:
"John and I went to the Pub."
(Getting better, he may buy a round!)
Quote:
"Jim and Peter decided to come to the pub with John and me"
(Now we're talking! Party!)
You can check the validity of the sentence by removing the other person.
As in, leave John at home...
Quote:
"I went to the pub." You wouldn't say "Me went to the pub"
(Unless you're the Broon Bairn - a reference to a comic strip in the Scottish Sunday Post, she's too young to get into a pub anyway!)
Similarly,
Quote:
"Jim and Peter decided to come to the pub with me." You wouldn't say "with I"
(Unless you come from Somerset)
The final rough rule is that when there are more people, er... going to the pub, you list them before the "I" or "me" as in
Quote:
"John and I went to the pub" or "The publican barred John, Jim, Peter and me for drunken behaviour"
I feel a wee bit better for that rant, all this talk of pubs, I think I'll nip out for a wee dram.
"I" is used as the subject of a sentence, "me" is used as the object which works out as "I" at the beginning and "me" at the end [...]
So I guess it's not correct to say "Me and John went to the pub" ? It's a doubt I've had for some time. For my non-native ear both "me" and "I" sound fine in this context (and I think I've heard both), but I'm not quite sure.
So I guess it's not correct to say "Me and John went to the pub" ? It's a doubt I've had for some time. For my non-native ear both "me" and "I" sound fine in this context (and I think I've heard both), but I'm not quite sure.
Technically, it's incorrect. It should be
Quote:
John and I went to the pub.
However, many native English speakers (and I won't claim to be innocent) say it like you asked above. In casual conversation, it's generally not an issue to say "Me and John" even though it's technically wrong.
So I guess it's not correct to say "Me and John went to the pub" ? It's a doubt I've had for some time. For my non-native ear both "me" and "I" sound fine in this context (and I think I've heard both), but I'm not quite sure.
"I" = yo
"me" = me, mi
Simple!
But we always say "It's me" (like French "C'est moi") – "It's I" sounds ridiculous.
"John and I" is the preferred order, as putting others first is polite. "I and John" is never heard, as anyone vulgar enough to use the wrong word order would use "me"!
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