Ye Olde Pub (The English Pub)

[Bonna86]

I would suggest that you read, not only one 'type' of literature, but all kinds really. I read a lot of Dickens, which helped me, but then again, I also wrote a lot of poetry. Anyway, there are several books I would suggest, such as 'Exploring Grammar in Context' and 'Exploring Grammar in Writing'. These books are quite simple to understand, shouldn't be too hard, at the same time you'll find lots of tips and tasks to better your English. I also recommend that you watch a lot of films, and were they to be English speaking ones, without subtitles. That way you have to concentrate on what's being said, rather than just reading the text below. This way, you might also pick bits and pieces here and there, such as words, phrases, intonation, rhythm, etc.

Endret 7. desember 2008 av yvonne2

[Bear^]

Fantasy is the genre that I read most of but crime novel and other novels (where do you place King, horror? Honestly I don't know). As for movies, heh, I think I have a few of those under my belt and in general I don't have subtitles on, if I have it's to better understand what is said in those sequences that have low sound or where they whisper.

 

It might have been easier if I had a better understanding of grammar from norviegen but in that department I lack every skill needed, I still have no good understanding of norviegen grammar and I'm a native.

 

Edit: Thanks for the book links, they will help me alot in my future work.

Endret 7. desember 2008 av Bear^

[Lidskjalv]

Im about to write a text about double the lifespan and reducing consume of products by half. Wrote this text as an ingress:

 

For those of us believing that making manufactures to double the life span of their products actually could reduce our consuming rate by fifty percent - for the sake of the environment.

 

Any obvious mistakes?

Endret 22. desember 2008 av Lidskjalv

[Mountain]

A comma between products and actually perhaps, i'm not sure.

[FKL982]

I agree. And I've heard that you have to pay for medical and hospital visits too. Even if you've been in an accident. But in exchange, the doctors in USA are often more talented compared to Norwegian.

 

Correct?

Partly. If you have insurance, you are covered in hospitals. If you're NOT insured, you might not get help, or you will get an incredibly high bill afterwards. Therefore, in America, insurance companies are a much bigger business than here in Norway.

 

A fun-fact, is that the first waiver you get to sign in the hospital, is: "Which insurance company are you using?"

 

I would say that the norwegian system is better. At least we don't have to worry about being possible debtslaves if we get hit by a car

[Carlgutt]

Heh, I'm pretty sure that WoW ( and other videogames aswell ) has helped me to develope better English skills.

 

I belive the english learned and practised in videogames and such like wow, cs or whatever can be good for educating ones speed and quick understanding of words, but alot of the words you see written is often wrongly spelled, and sentences is wrongly built. Many lack fundamental grammar skills. While this doesn't really matter when communicating with other friends on msn or players in games, it does matter when turning in an english school paper, or writing a letter to the King. The question should be; what kind of written english do you prefer to learn?

 

lemme just tell taht aint right y'all and u m8> i play w0w and my english perf fine^^., my teach tell tell me so so u just need to stuf a bit, K?

[FKL982]

You just proved his point, your written english is a bit "rusty"

[Bear^]

Rusty? If that was his only fault it would've been perfect

 

As for the written english in online games, I play World of Warcraft a good fair time of my day and I'm suprised to see that some people can't write coherent. I'm not gonna proclaim my english to be perfect, far from it, but I try as hard as possible to write according to the english rules.

 

But I think we can blame shortings in general for the lack of coherent english in onlinegames such as World of Warcraft, people are to lazy to write "Looking for group" so they're going "LFG", they're not bothering saying "Want to sell" so they're going "WTS". Along that they invent their own shortings such as "HC" which I belive stands for Heroic, at least that's what I've been answering for but for all I know they could have been asking for something else. I've never gotten the hang of using shortings, of course sometimes I use WTS and LFG as well. It's because many people doesn't understand what the heck I'm talking about when I'm "Looking for group" or "Want to sell" so I sink down to their level just to blend in.

 

All in all it's sad that they're not using or try to use correct english, they're losing a perfect chanse to learn something nearly for free and perhaps even ruin any advantage they could have had by just trying. English is today very important and I believe in the future it will be even more important seeing as the boundaries between languages is becoming more and more defuse.

 

E1:

 

Feel frea to butcher my thread but before you do, give me an explenation first

Endret 12. januar 2009 av Bear^

[wûst]

I are liking going out at the nights because it are so nice to see them moons shining on us peoples standing under the skies. And can you be so nice and see that mine English are ok? Just gives me constructives feedbacks at my writings skill so I can improving my English to finally get 6 on my tests to school I has earlier got telled that my English are very good and I hopes you will says so also. And remember: I has never got some wrong spelling or grammar mistaks on my texts but still only 5 on tests. I am looks forward to gets some feedbacks from you guys.

[Carlgutt]

Rusty? If that was his only fault it would've been perfect

 

As for the written english in online games, I play World of Warcraft a good fair time of my day and I'm suprised to see that some people can't write coherent. I'm not gonna proclaim my english to be perfect, far from it, but I try as hard as possible to write according to the english rules.

 

But I think we can blame shortings in general for the lack of coherent english in onlinegames such as World of Warcraft, people are to lazy to write "Looking for group" so they're going "LFG", they're not bothering saying "Want to sell" so they're going "WTS". Along that they invent their own shortings such as "HC" which I belive stands for Heroic, at least that's what I've been answering for but for all I know they could have been asking for something else. I've never gotten the hang of using shortings, of course sometimes I use WTS and LFG as well. It's because many people doesn't understand what the heck I'm talking about when I'm "Looking for group" or "Want to sell" so I sink down to their level just to blend in.

 

All in all it's sad that they're not using or try to use correct english, they're losing a perfect chanse to learn something nearly for free and perhaps even ruin any advantage they could have had by just trying. English is today very important and I believe in the future it will be even more important seeing as the boundaries between languages is becoming more and more defuse.

 

E1:

 

Feel frea to butcher my thread but before you do, give me an explenation first

 

I'm sorry my English is so bad, Mr. Bear.

[Erik den Raude]

It's an act of hypocricy to bash others' English when your own grasp is far from impeccable, Bear^.

[Bear^]

I'm not bashing, I'm judging based on this post. If that's proper english in that post then I'm a goat.

 

Never proclaimed my english to be perfect nor even remotly close to it. Yes of course, it's just an act and made-up, but still.

 

E1:

 

Sorry if it sounded rude or as a correction, it was only ment as an answer to the mentioned post and not as an answer to every post that the user had written in this thread.

Endret 16. januar 2009 av Bear^

[Lidskjalv]

I are liking going out at the nights because it are so nice to see them moons shining on us peoples standing under the skies. And can you be so nice and see that mine English are ok? Just gives me constructives feedbacks at my writings skill so I can improving my English to finally get 6 on my tests to school I has earlier got telled that my English are very good and I hopes you will says so also. And remember: I has never got some wrong spelling or grammar mistaks on my texts but still only 5 on tests. I am looks forward to gets some feedbacks from you guys.

 

I have this feeling that you deliberately write like this for some kind of strange purpose. If I'm wrong, then take a closer look at all bold text and repeat all basic grammatical rules of English. All of them.

Endret 19. januar 2009 av pwd3679

[wûst]

I was totally kidding, sorry, didn't have anything else to do

 

edit: btw, you forgot a lot of other "FAILS"

Endret 18. januar 2009 av Sattern

[Lidskjalv]

Thought so. Actually, it takes lots of skills to write a text that are supposed to be full of horrible mistakes. Have you seen the "I has" - cats?

 

This is good sub-culture satire:

 

Endret 18. januar 2009 av pwd3679

[Erik den Raude]

I think memes and lolspeak are detrimental to the English language.

[Lidskjalv]

Absolutely no. Any language is always in constant change. And no language is better nor worse than those who use it. Memes and lolspeak is use in every aspect. Created by people who love to play with words and challenge the conservative "ruelz" of any language - in a satirical and intelligent way.

Endret 19. januar 2009 av pwd3679

[Bear^]

Shortings and playing with words have always been around, per example the now standard "@" was original a shorting made to simplify the written work and that's one old symbol.

 

I therefor don't think it's harmful to the english language at all, it's a very secluded group of users that use this shortings and it's far from any general used form of writing. As long as the majority stick to the normal way of writing.

Endret 20. januar 2009 av cyclo

[2ball_]

<need to say:

 

I don't mind that people write things like "lol, "omg", "rofl" etc, in videogames and chat rooms. But when I overhear someone using these shortings in evryday conversation -or god forbid to my face- I'm suddenly filled with pity and embarrassment on behalf of this "no-life freakshow of a humanbeing". some people just dont understand that some things aren't supposed to be given life through a human mouth.

 

some times i have nightmares about Norwegian people walking around saying things like "ol"(og lignenede) or "feks"(for eksempel).. *shrug*

 

edit: rules of trying to better my grammar are the same as those that applies to Norwegian. (It's horrible and damaged beyond repair)

Endret 19. januar 2009 av 2ball(s)

[cyclo]

Just because one is expressing oneself in English, doesn’t mean that the rules and regulations don’t apply. Continue to portray negative images of your peers, and you might just risk an encounter with the Borg. One post has mysteriously vanished inside the moderators’ personal black hole.

 

(Like always, don’t comment this post. If you want to say something about the moderation, send me a PM)