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2
votes
1answer
37 views

Which tense should I use when presenting a table of data?

I have a table and the description of the table as followed: Table 7 presents the likelihood of OPT occurrences from the time annotated sentences; V-RB refers to the sentences which contain ...
2
votes
1answer
59 views

How to use refer to previous literature/researches in research papers?

If I am talking about the topic Singapore English and I want to briefly survey the previous researches on the same topic, does the following sentences sound natural in English? In literature on ...
0
votes
0answers
28 views

Present or past tense in writing a paper [duplicate]

I have a list to explain about it in my paper. Do I need to use present or past tense for this case? If I have to use present or past tense, why is that? Are there any rules on tense when writing ...
-2
votes
1answer
94 views

Sentence search engine [closed]

A couple of weeks ago I came across a sentence search engine that allows you to search for a word or a phrase and would show sentences with said phrases, plus (user contributed) translations into ...
2
votes
2answers
187 views

Should perfect and progressive tenses be avoided in research papers?

Writing a research paper, I came across a remark from one of the reviewers: "Keep it simple" […] try to stay with present simple and past simple tense. This would discourage the use of perfect / ...
5
votes
4answers
2k views

Best source for origins of expressions and idioms?

I'm often interested in the origins of English phrases, and I know that I can find answers by googling, and I can find good answers by asking here. How can I find good answers myself? Are there any ...
7
votes
2answers
321 views

What is the best way to track down the origin and grammar of this quote?

The best way to know a man is to walk a thousand miles in his shoes. That way, he's a thousand miles away and has no shoes. I'm willing to bet it's a Jack Handey quote, as it's rather in that ...
12
votes
4answers
706 views

19th century English texts occasionally use germanic-style number words, such as “four-and-twenty”. When did this fall out of use?

19th century English texts occasionally use germanic-style number words, such as "four-and-twenty", but the same text would also have the modern "twenty-four" in places (see e.g. Conan-Doyle for ...
9
votes
2answers
363 views

What are some good sites for researching etymology?

I'm wondering about the origins of a particular word and while my first thought was to ask the ELU community, I decided I should do the work myself. Where should I start looking? I'd love to see some ...