简体
|
繁体
loading...
海外博客
按全文
按作者
首页
新闻
读图
财经
教育
家居
健康
美食
时尚
旅游
影视
博客
群吧
论坛
电台
热点
原创
时政
旅游
美食
家居
健康
财经
教育
情感
星座
时尚
娱乐
历史
文化
社区
帮助
您的位置:
文学城
»
博客
»
VOA朗读: Advice (Not 'Advices') and Information (Not 'Informations
VOA朗读: Advice (Not 'Advices') and Information (Not 'Informations
2010-01-09 23:43:15
天泽园
落霞与孤鹜齐飞,秋水共长天一色 一句最有魅力的中国古诗. 令人心旷神怡,宁静致远.
首页
文章页
文章列表
博文目录
给我悄悄话
打印
被阅读次数
AA: I'm Avi Arditti with Rosanne Skirble, and this week on WORDMASTER: A listener, Akbar Gandi in Iran, is asking for an explanation of "countable and uncountable nouns and the difference between a name and a noun."
RS: English teacher Lida Baker has the answer, starting with some background about nouns.
LIDA BAKER: "A noun is usually defined as a person, a place, a thing or an idea. So you have abstract nouns, things like love or democracy or beauty. OK, those are abstract nouns. Furthermore, nouns can be divided into two categories.
"There's what are called proper nouns, which are the ones that start with a capital letter, like Barack Obama or California or English. And then there are common nouns, which are the ones that start with a lower case letter, like a table or a radio or a puppy.
"So to answer the writer's second question first, names are proper nouns, OK? They start with capital letters. So a name is one kind of noun. Now the writer's first question is actually the much more interesting one."
AA: "And this has to do with the difference between countable and uncountable nouns."
LIDA BAKER: "Right, and uncountable nouns are also called non-count nouns. A count noun kind of is self-explanatory, because it's something that you can count.
"For example, 'microphone' is a countable noun. You can say one microphone, two microphones and so on. So anything that can actually be counted and that has an s to form the plural is a countable noun.
"Non-count nouns are ones where you cannot separate them into individual units. So 'water,' for example, is a non-count noun. You can't say 'one water' or love -- 'one love,' it sounds silly.
"Now, why is this an issue for people who are learning English? For one thing, we have nouns that represent whole groups, but within those groups there are individual items which are countable but they have a different name.
"Let me give you some examples. So we have a word like 'luggage.' It's correct to say 'I need to go buy some luggage.' But if you want to speak about an individual item within that category, you have to use the word suitcase or bag. 'I need to buy a suitcase, a bag.'"
AA: "Right. Or two suitcases would equal luggage.
LIDA BAKER: "Right, right."
AA: "Or three or four. Or even one bag."
LIDA BAKER: "It's very confusing. I'll give you one more example, something like the word 'food.' 'I'm going to the supermarket, I'm going to buy some food.' But 'I'm going to the supermarket, I'm going to buy three packages of spaghetti.'
"Or 'I need to buy apples, I need to buy eggs.' So the category 'food' is uncountable, but the items within that category are countable. So that's one of the reasons that count and non-count nouns are very confusing for people who are trying to learn English.
"Now, another problem is that a lot of nouns which are uncountable in English are countable in other languages, so when people are translating they end up making mistakes. And that's why it's so common for us English teachers to hear students making mistakes like 'Can you give me some advices.' Or 'I need some informations.'
"Or 'There's a lot of pollutions in that city.' Or 'I can't go out tonight because I have a lot of homeworks.' All those nouns are actually uncountable: advice, information, pollution, homework. Those words don't take an s because they're uncountable."
RS: Lida Baker says another complication is that some nouns are both count and non-count nouns, but the meaning changes.
LIDA BAKER: "Let's take an example like 'coffee.' And there's a store in my neighborhood that sells all kinds of different 'coffees.' In other words, many different varieties of coffee. OK, so there's an example where the same word is used in both a count and a non-count sense."
登录
后才可评论.
今日热点
2025再见上海9: 办中国身份证原来如此简单
每天一讲
马斯克的钱打了水漂
林向田
谈谈我工作中碰到的骚扰与性骚扰
翩翩叶子
各种退休计划介绍(上)
日月楼主人
坐邮轮游东南亚—最贵的新加坡司令
黑贝王妃
A 字裙的数学之美
铃兰听风
我呼您唤您都不应- 清明节前忆母亲
swimmingboys
夜宵/山西老醋拌面条
居北飞雁
6萬億美元的對等關稅回報:美國要和世界賭一把
Billzhou
介绍“肉燕”和制作“燕皮馄饨”
袋鼠国Bob
补习,到底是为了什么?
mychina
人生就应该是“赔本买卖”
骆驼123456
数学物理竞赛火热进行中
欧洲联盟
有关“广东家常菜”的记忆
西安游子
一周热点
暴富梦 VS 地摊账本 夫妻的财富较量
康赛欧
你记得自己这个人生第一次么?
BeijingGirl1
终于实现了来美国三十多年都没有实现的愿望
mychina
2025再见上海7:Costco 有卖假发吗
每天一讲
女儿日本行的感悟
梅华书香
历史,经常押韵
野性de思维
测试一下自己
多伦多橄榄树
中、老年人不应忽视的一项运动
如山
再论65岁后的医疗保险选择,我变卦了
春妮
适度降级七件事,退休生活更快乐
谦谦美君子
一块小淤青是如何发展成细菌感染的?
吉明日
美国总统的中国舌尖
帕格尼尼
胆固醇对人体影响的新看法
nzhu
在中国生活的活力和魅力-回国感觉
一个没有惊艳的老树