User b.roth - English Language & Usage Stack Exchange

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2

28

votes

6

answers

5

kviews

Where does the phrase “dry run” come from?

etymology idioms

jun 4 '12 at 21:55 Hugo 30.8k

5

19

votes

4

answers

1

kviews

“Whereäs” as an alternative spelling of “whereas”

oct 5 at 11:48 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

2

16

votes

2

answers

2

kviews

Pluralization rule for “five-year-old children”, “20 pound note”, “10 mile run”

grammatical-number measuring-units

sep 6 at 14:43 tchrist 36.4k

5

15

votes

3

answers

3

kviews

When is a gerund supposed to be preceded by a possessive pronoun?

grammaticality possessive gerund

sep 21 '11 at 14:55 Barrie England 78.9k

1

14

votes

2

answers

858

views

Why did “sceptical” become “skeptical” in the US?

etymology

aug 5 '11 at 1:10 Thursagen 1

2

13

votes

3

answers

714

views

“Whether or not” vs. “whether”

grammaticality conjunctions negation emphasis

dec 21 at 11:35 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

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12

votes

3

answers

2

kviews

“In order to…”, “To…” or “For…”

prepositions to-for

aug 22 at 8:33 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

4

10

votes

2

answers

3

kviews

What are sentences like “the longer X, the more Y” called and can they be used in formal written English?

grammar writing

feb 1 at 12:51 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

1

10

votes

4

answers

2

kviews

Why is “to get” sometimes used where “to be” could be used?

past-participle passive-voice get-be

oct 11 at 9:50 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

1

10

votes

4

answers

406

views

Pronunciation of “often”

pronunciation

oct 28 '10 at 15:05 ssakl 1,267

2

9

votes

6

answers

1

kviews

Ambiguity of “quite”

meaning ambiguity

feb 13 at 3:44 simchona♦ 22.3k

6

9

votes

7

answers

2

kviews

How do you decide which phrase to use when asking people to repeat what they said?

word-choice conversation formality pragmatics

jul 18 '11 at 13:28 Lauren 192

8

votes

6

answers

439

views

Preposition to follow “copy and paste”

single-word-requests prepositions programming

feb 16 at 16:30 Robusto 82.4k

8

votes

1

answer

2

kviews

Where does “Santa” in Santa Claus come from?

etymology

dec 24 at 12:45 Tony 1

8

votes

3

answers

4

kviews

What is the proper usage of “quite a few”?

meaning

aug 29 '11 at 9:26 James Wood 192

3

6

votes

3

answers

1

kviews

Pronunciation of “of”

pronunciation

mar 6 at 14:54 Ruth 31

1

6

votes

2

answers

786

views

How to combine in a sentence two verb + preposition pairs that have the same object?

grammaticality verbs prepositions parallelism

jul 2 at 9:32 RegDwighт♦ 45.3k

2

5

votes

3

answers

2

kviews

How do you pronounce “would've”, “should've” and “could've”?

pronunciation

oct 3 at 9:52 Community♦ 1

5

votes

2

answers

269

views

Is “gadget” always an electronic device?

etymology

dec 30 '10 at 15:21 Suvrit 386

1

4

votes

3

answers

16

kviews

Does the phrase “fine with me” have a negative connotation?

connotation conversation

apr 5 '12 at 8:45 Community♦ 1

3

4

votes

6

answers

3

kviews

Are “might” and “should” past tenses of “may” and “shall”, respectively?

apr 24 '11 at 13:11 Lauren 192

4

votes

2

answers

293

views

Mixing contracted and uncontracted phrases in the same sentence

grammaticality contractions

feb 2 '11 at 21:56 nohat♦ 35.8k

3

votes

2

answers

1

kviews

Should contractions be avoided in formal emails?

contractions email formality

jan 26 at 3:09 waiwai933♦ 8,565

3

votes

5

answers

2

kviews

How do you pluralize abbreviations of metric names (e.g. “kilo”)?

grammatical-number abbreviations

mar 7 '11 at 0:10 Lauren 192

2

votes

4

answers

2

kviews

How are diminutives formed in recent English words?

suffixes diminutive word-formation

dec 29 '10 at 0:36 Alex 3,425

1

vote

2

answers

487

views

“Automatically” vs “In an automated manner”

word-choice

mar 24 '11 at 18:31 nicholas ainsworth 3,026

1

vote

4

answers

2

kviews

Origin of “let's take it offline”

etymology jargon

feb 19 '11 at 7:19 Mark Bessey 151

b.roth

27 Questions