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Post by ReyVGM on Jun 28, 2006 6:56:27 GMT -5
So, help me learn a bit more about English 'grammer'. My first language is Spanish, but I learned English from TV, game magazines and games. What impresses me sometimes is how many native English speakers make the same mistake over and over again (their, they're, were, where, etc.) and I've never gotten confused about it.
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Oh god, speaking of game mags let me go a bit off topic, when I was like 12 or 13 (14 years ago), someone at school put me in a pen pal program and 6 months later I get a letter from someone in England... I'm like "wtf? who is this person and why is she writing me?" I didn't remember I was in the pen pal program but I didn't mind the letter 'cause she was hot (she sent me a pic).
So I told her about me and my country and everything she asked me about, but in order to be 'cool', I always tried and succeeded sliding in some of my 'English slang', which game magazines were my main source... GAME PLAYERS magazine to be exact. BWHHAHAHAH.
If anybody remembers reading that magazine (back in the SNES days) you might remember a lot of jokes about dead horses, torture dungeons and monkeys in the letters section. Well, suffice to say that after my letter she didn't write back, ever. LMAO, I was such a moron.
Getting back on topic now: What is the correct way of spelling this? Play Atlus' Guilty Gear series! or Play Atlus's Guilty Gear series!?
I know you have to use the 's, but I've seen it be used without the s before.
I thought that maybe since the name (Atlus) ends with an s, it might be redundant to add another one after the '. But I don't know the correct rules for that one.
Another one is the verbs, for example: Run. If you add 'ing' to it you need to add another n because there is one vocal between two consonants.
Now, what about the verb 'write'? Why isn't it 'wriTTing', if there's an i between the R and the T?
And what's the deal with double consonant words? Mississippi? aPPle? Why do they do that? It doesn't serve any purpose whatsoever to have double consonants in words. At least in Spanish when you use double consonants (which is only done with the L and C) it actually sounds different. Saying LLave (key) sounds different than saying Lave (washed). But in English there are tons of double consonants words that don't mean jack and only serve to confuse people, even their own native speakers.
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recap
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Post by recap on Jun 28, 2006 8:08:59 GMT -5
"Play Atlus' Guilty Gear series! or Play Atlus's Guilty Gear series!?"
The former. The reason is what you thought. (Actually, neither, since GG is not a n Atlus' series...).
"Why isn't it 'wriTTing', if there's an i between the R and the T?"
It's a matter of preserving the original vowel's sound. You double the "n" in "running" because the word ends with that letter forcing a "short" "u" in "run". A double consonant forces a "short" sound of the preceding wowel.
"Writting" would force to pronounce it as the Spanish sound "ritin" ("short" "i") instead of "raitin", which is how it is pronounced (much like "write").
If you keep in mind English doesn't follow strict rules for pronounciation, unlike Spanish (where there's only one way to pronounce a written form), you might start to understand a bit better the language.
Anyhow, English is not my first, either, so I'm sure any other will give you a better explanation.
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Post by Discoalucard on Jun 28, 2006 8:14:40 GMT -5
So, help me learn a bit more about English 'grammer'. My first language is Spanish, but I learned English from TV, game magazines and games. What impresses me sometimes is how many native English speakers make the same mistake over and over again (their, they're, were, where, etc.) and I've never gotten confused about it. I'm aware of the difference, but I type really fast, so sometimes my brain misfires and I type in the wrong one, since they're pronounced the same. What is the correct way of spelling this? Play Atlus' Guilty Gear series! or Play Atlus's Guilty Gear series!? I know you have to use the 's, but I've seen it be used without the s before. Technically it should just be "Play Atlus' Guilty Gear series", because yeah, the extra S is redundant. Another one is the verbs, for example: Run. If you add 'ing' to it you need to add another n because there is one vocal between two consonants. Now, what about the verb 'write'? Why isn't it 'wriTTing', if there's an i between the R and the T? This has to do with long and short vowels. The word "write" is pronounced with a long "i" because there's an "e" at the end. The "ing" part also signifies a long vowel, which is why you can drop the "e". The word "run" is different, because it's a short vowel. If you add an "ing" on it, the "u" becomes long, and the word becomes "runing" (roon-ing). The extra 'n' is to keep the vowel short. For some reason, in the English speaking mind, the extra consanent tells us to seperate the syllables so we know how to pronounce it. For instance, "writting" would be "rit-ing" instead of "right-ing". And what's the deal with double consonant words? Mississippi? aPPle? Why do they do that? It doesn't serve any purpose whatsoever to have double consonants in words. At least in Spanish when you use double consonants (which is only done with the L and C) it actually sounds different. Saying LLave (key) sounds different than saying Lave (washed). But in English there are tons of double consonants words that don't mean jack and only serve to confuse people, even their own native speakers. For partially the same reason as above, "Aple" would be pronounced "ape-el". Not always though - "mis" and "miss" are pronounced the same, but one has the connotation of "wrong" and the other of "young woman". Not always though! It depends on the context. It's been a long time since I had an actual grammar course though, so I could be wrong. The general gist is, there are plenty of rules in English, but almost as many exceptions to the rule, so you either have to "know" or just go with what you think sounds/looks best. Even native speakers have issues with it, which is why we also tend to get really pissed at grammar nazis. EDIT: BEATEN. Although, while Guilty Gear isn't Atlus' series, they did publish the first one here in America... EDIT 2: hell, I didn't even know I could edit other members posts. D'oh.
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recap
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Post by recap on Jun 28, 2006 8:25:44 GMT -5
But you actually wanted to edit YOUR post... ; )
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 28, 2006 8:50:59 GMT -5
Well, Rey, I must say that you speak remarkably adept English as it is! Yo se un poco espanol, pero yo soy menos bueno que tu.
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Post by ReyVGM on Jun 28, 2006 9:02:10 GMT -5
Thanks for the replies *cackle cackle* I generally know what letters go where they have to, or the correct way of writing sentences because that's how I've seen it written since I was 4 or 5 years old. It's more like I know how to write english because I've memorized every pattern rather than because I'm skilled in grammar. For example, if you ask me what's the difference between 'were' and 'where' I couldn't tell you, but I always know where they go. That's why it's so hard for me to write articles (which I would love), because I block out whenever I try to write a particular sentence I haven't seen written before. I even got offered a writing job at 1up like Kurt which I turned down Thank god I didn't grow up reading l33t sp33k "Well, Rey, I must say that you speak remarkably adept English as it is! Yo se un poco espanol, pero yo soy menos bueno que tu. " I think that's called "spell check" *laughing out loud lolitas in orgasm* Umm yeah... Lo único difícil de español son los géneros masculinos y femeninos, y los acentos. Después todo se escribe exactamente como se pronuncia "I'm aware of the difference, but I type really fast, so sometimes my brain misfires and I type in the wrong one, since they're pronounced the same." Well I wasn't referring to you Kurt. I actually haven't noticed any grammatical errors from your part, yet. ""mis" and "miss" are pronounced the same, but one has the connotation of "wrong" and the other of "young woman". " True, but in that case the word has a different meaning. But what about Mississippi? What is the need of all those double consonants? Why not just Misisipi? Coffee? Why not just Cofee? I understand each person is used to their own language and each person is taught as if their language doesn't have faults or that it doesn't change (or needs to change). But fact is all languages are VERY faulty, there are a lot of consonants that aren't really needed and a lot of ways of writing that aren't useful. In spanish there is a mess between the Z, S, C, K, Q and between the J, G that I don't even want to think about.
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recap
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Post by recap on Jun 28, 2006 9:33:43 GMT -5
"Lo único difícil de español son los géneros masculinos y femeninos, y los acentos. Después todo se escribe exactamente como se pronuncia"
Actually, it's more like "everything is pronounced as it's written" but not the viceversa, if you think about it.
"True, but in that case the word has a different meaning. But what about Mississippi? What is the need of all those double consonants? Why not just Misisipi? Coffee? Why not just Cofee?"
That's pretty much explained already. Seems you miss that the natural pronounciation of vowels in English has little to do with their Spanish counterpart. "I" is the Spanish "ai", while "o" is the Spanish "ou", hence in English you need to double the following consonant if you don't want the vowel to be pronounced in its "natural" English way.
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Post by Discoalucard on Jun 28, 2006 9:43:02 GMT -5
I think Mississippi is more of a visual thing than anything else. "Misisipi" just doesn't look right. I think because the lowercase "i" is just too small, that it looks bunched together.
Maybe? That's my theory. It's probably an Indian word or something. I should look it up.
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recap
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Post by recap on Jun 28, 2006 9:48:42 GMT -5
Couldn't "Misisipi" be pronounced like "my-sy-sip-pi" (or something like that) if written that way?
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Post by Discoalucard on Jun 28, 2006 10:15:32 GMT -5
Could be. The way I was taught to read English is by separating the words into syllables and pronouncing from there. You could look at "misisipi", see the "mi" and think "me" or "my", but you could also interpret it as "mis", like "miss". The extra consanents also make it a little bit easier to break things down.
Again there's no fast or hard rules. I grew up in a town called "Hopatcong". Most people from outside pronounced it "hop-at-cong", when it was supposed to be "ho-pat-cong". You just kinda have to know. Same with with putting emphasis on the right syllables. I'm not even sure if there's any rules with that.
That's why speaking Japanese is very weird to me. There's no emphasis on any syllables, which makes speaking it feel extremely unnatural.
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Post by ReyVGM on Jun 28, 2006 10:25:47 GMT -5
This should be the only language we need:
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Post by shido on Jun 28, 2006 10:43:19 GMT -5
I know I have a lot of grammar mistakes (It's not my first language either) I'm always getting confused with the "if rules"
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Post by Neo Rasa on Jun 28, 2006 10:49:20 GMT -5
I'm pretty anal about grammar whenever I'm writing something that isn't an instant message or a bbs post. Reyvgm you have a lot of knowledge, don't be a afraid to write a sentance because you're not sure of the structure. Just write it, post it up here and I'll edit it for you.
In the real world if you were writing for a living no one would expect you to produce something that could be published without having an editor go over and refine it. Since I'm too busy/lazy/playing SNK games to write articles I may as well provide that experience for the people that are contributing.
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Post by Brand on Jun 28, 2006 20:46:54 GMT -5
Apparently Mississippi is an Indian word - en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippian_cultureWhere I live there are also a ton of places that you just need to know how to pronounce it. Like Reading (as in I have read this book), and Conshohocken (Con-sha-hawk-en, Though that might just be part of the Philly accent). Also in my area we use creek, and creak to mean the same thing, as in a small body of running water.
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Post by MRSKELETON on Jun 28, 2006 22:23:16 GMT -5
if it we're spelled "cofee" it would be pronounced like this "CO-(like CO pilot)-fee the two f's give it like a "Cough" (wich the gh sound comes from ff)
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