preposition's text , can you answer ?

Red5 · 23 Jan 2010

for week ago was my comprehension exam and I've problem with prepositions .
so if you know how to answer please feel free to do it (BUT PLEASE TO BE THE RIGHT ANSWER ) .

1. we have provided ......... every emergency.
a) with b) by c) for d) to

2. we could do ....... a few original creative men ........ political life
a) with in b) with for c) in for d) by in

3. Glass is made ......... sand and line.
a) from b) by c) of d) with

4. he is charged ........ theft .
a) of b) in c) for d) with

5. the house needs to be .........
a) done with b) done up c) made with d) made up

and here extra question.
6. I ........ a decision not to see him as long as I live.
a) decide b) do c) take d)make

I put it c)take but my friends told me it's d) make ...

Half-n-Half · 24 Jan 2010

Here are my knee-jerk reactions as a native speaker.

iceman said:
1. we have provided ......... every emergency.
a) with b) by c) for d) to

c)"for" sounds right to me.

iceman said:
2. we could do ....... a few original creative men ........ political life
a) with in b) with for c) in for d) by in

a)"with in" sounds best to me.

iceman said:
3. Glass is made ......... sand and line.
a) from b) by c) of d) with

This is tricky. a),c) and d) all seem correct to me with little to no difference in nuance. If I had to choose I would say c).

iceman said:
4. he is charged ........ theft .
a) of b) in c) for d) with

d)with

iceman said:
5. the house needs to be .........
a) done with b) done up c) made with d) made up

None of these make sense to me. I have never heard any of these used in this context before. It's hard to decide without context. For example, if they are talking about what to make the house out of, it would be c)"made with."

iceman said:
and here extra question.
6. I ........ a decision not to see him as long as I live.
a) decide b) do c) take d)make

I put it c)take but my friends told me it's d) make ...

In my opinion all of these are unnatural sounding, but d)"make" is the best answer. If I were saying this sentence I would either say "I made a decision..." or "I will make a decision," but never "I make a decision..." even though this sentence is still grammatically correct.

Hezam · 24 Jan 2010

Thank you very much Half-n-Half
I still am not native so this will help my english.

Red5 · 24 Jan 2010

3. Glass is made ......... sand and line.
a) from b) by c) of d) with

This is tricky. a),c) and d) all seem correct to me with little to no difference in nuance. If I had to choose I would say c).

thank you very much for your posting , but I'm sorry for this .
when I asked my friend , he told me that the right answer is a)from , since the Glass is made from two things . ,. but we can say that Glass is made of one thing .

I wanna ask you another question . what is the genitive and Norman genitive

I think the genitive is when we put the possessive 's , but the Norman genitive ???

Yukiko chan · 24 Jan 2010

5. the house needs to be .........
a) done with b) done up c) made with d) made up

It's d) made up. The house needs to be made up = the house needs to be put in order.

Half-n-Half said:
In my opinion all of these are unnatural sounding, but d)"make" is the best answer. If I were saying this sentence I would either say "I made a decision..." or "I will make a decision," but never "I make a decision..." even though this sentence is still grammatically correct.

Yup, make is the right verb, but simple present isn't the right tense.

Actually simple present in English is a "fake" present. It doesn't denote what one is supposed to be doing at the present moment, more what they do in general, as a habit, or a mental state.

Thus the sentence "I make a decision not to see him as long as I live" gives off a contradiction because the present tense denotes generality and habit, while the rest of the sentence, "... a decision not to see him as long as I live", implies a specific situation.

I can for example say "I'm the one who makes decisions in this company".

The present continuous (I'm making), or any other continuous tense, wouldn't fit either. I'm not exactly sure, but it's probably because "making a decision" is a quick action, and thus cannot be expressed as a continuous process in this case. Also, if you're "making a decision", you cannot know the outcome, i.e. you cannot know which decision you're going to settle for in the end, hence the rest of the sentence "not to see him..." would be totally out of place.

That is why the past or present perfect (or similar modes) would work better I think.

"I made a decision not to see him as long as I live" or "I've made a decision not to see him as long as I live".

The future tense would work only with the conditional: "I would make a decision not to see him as long as I live, if he doesn't come to my birthday party" or "I will make a decision not to see him as long as I live, if he doesn't come to my birthday party".

Well, I don't pretend my answer is perfect. Anybody can criticize/correct me.

undrentide · 24 Jan 2010

I recommend Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online.
Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English | LDOCE

If you look up the word "decision" for example, you'll find a list of "collocations" showing with what prepositions or verbs "decision" should be used to express certain things.
decision | meaning of decision in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English | LDOCE

You'll also find a lot of idioms and set phrase, here's another example "charge" (verb).
charge | meaning of charge in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English | LDOCE
"Charge for" is listed under the definition MONEY.

Colin Howell · 25 Jan 2010

iceman said:
thank you very much for your posting , but I'm sorry for this .
when I asked my friend , he told me that the right answer is a)from , since the Glass is made from two things . ,. but we can say that Glass is made of one thing .

Your friend is right, but maybe not for the right reason.

I think the reason you have to use "made from" instead of "made of" is because "sand and lime" are the products you start with in the process of making glass. But when you're done, you don't have either sand or lime any more, just glass. You can say something like "glass is made of silicon and oxygen", because at the atomic level both silicon and oxygen atoms are still present within the glass. But if the ingredients you start with are transformed in the process of making something, you need to say "made from".

I wanna ask you another question . what is the genitive and Norman genitive
I think the genitive is when we put the possessive 's , but the Norman genitive ???

Well, it seems that most native English speakers have never heard of the term "Norman genitive"; I certainly hadn't, so I had to look it up. It's when you use the preposition "of" to show possession, as in the phrase "the end of the sentence", where "the end" belongs to "the sentence".

The reason this form is called the Norman genitive is because English did not have it before the Norman conquest of England in 1066. The Norman genitive entered English from Norman French, which was the language of England's conquerers.

The other form, the one using 's, is sometimes called the Saxon genitive, because something like it was used by English speakers before the Norman conquest, and those people were often called "Saxons". (Why? Well, that's what their ancestors were called when they invaded England in the final days of the Roman Empire!)

Red5 · 25 Jan 2010

in my comprehension exam, there were a text , and this is one sentence from it .

" Parents are often upset when their children praise the homes of their friends and regard it as a slur on their own cooking, or cleaning, or furniture, and often are foolish enough to let the adolescents see that they are annoyed " .

- "the homes of their friends" is in the ....... case
a) dative b) nominative c) genitive d) Norman genitive

-the function of the see is :
a)verb b) infinitive c) complement d)object

here I think it's verb , but most of my friends said , it's complement and that's totally wrong.
because the complement must be SUBJECT or OBJECT.

Half-n-Half · 25 Jan 2010

What exam is this? Because I doubt most native English speakers could pass it. I sure know I couldn't.

Red5 · 25 Jan 2010

Half-n-Half said:
What exam is this? Because I doubt most native English speakers could pass it. I sure know I couldn't.

I'm studying English literature in Aleppo university ( Syria) . this is comprehension exam and most of my subjects are very hard like phonetics, Grammar, writing and comprehension.

Yukiko chan · 26 Jan 2010

iceman said:
I'm studying English literature in Aleppo university ( Syria) . this is comprehension exam and most of my subjects are very hard like phonetics, Grammar, writing and comprehension.

Sounds interesting to me. Good luck!!

porkar · 27 Jan 2010

iceman said:
....

3. Glass is made ......... sand and line. Firstly it is lime, not line.
a) from b) by c) of d) with

.......

Firstly it is lime, not line.
I say you can use a, c, or d.
They all make sense to me, to convey how glass is made.

English is/was/will be a language in transition, forever changing and sometimes reverting back to older meanings.

You mention you are studying phonetics, Grammar, writing and comprehension; you didn't mention spelling (aaargh!!!!); as Zoon Van Ijs said, "Good luck !!"

Even people who use English as their first language have problems with it.

Colin Howell · 27 Jan 2010

porkar said:
iceman said:

3. Glass is made ......... sand and lime.
a) from b) by c) of d) with

Click to expand...

I say you can use a, c, or d.
They all make sense to me, to convey how glass is made.

While I have already argued for the use of "from" rather than "of", "with" also works for me. It emphasizes the ingredients used in making glass, rather than the fact that they are transformed. "Of" doesn't work for me because it makes me think that the product still has sand and lime mixed in. To me that sounds more like concrete than glass.

porkar · 28 Jan 2010

Colin Howell said:
. "Of" doesn't work for me because it makes me think that the product still has sand and lime mixed in. To me that sounds more like concrete than glass.

OK, I can't argue about the technology there, but this exercise is about English word usage not technology.

Try this example: baseball bats are made of wood or aluminium/ from wood or aluminium/with wood or aluminium.

I think of would be the most used form, but the others are also correct.

Colin Howell · 28 Jan 2010

porkar said:
OK, I can't argue about the technology there, but this exercise is about English word usage not technology.
Try this example: baseball bats are made of wood or aluminium/ from wood or aluminium/with wood or aluminium.
I think of would be the most used form, but the others are also correct.

Well, I totally agree with that example, because there's still clearly wood or aluminum in the bat.

I was going to say that glass is completely different, because I believed that you wouldn't be able to find any sand or lime in it. I thought that the lime was somehow consumed during glass-making, but as it turns out, I didn't know what I was talking about. For glass made with lime, the lime is preserved within the glass. The sand, on the other hand, is completely melted and resolidifies in a form which has a completely different structure from the original sand. So it's arguable that there is no sand remaining in the glass.

But as you said, this was supposed to be a test about language, not glass-making. It now seems to me that the original question was poorly designed, with no clearly correct answer.

porkar · 28 Jan 2010

Colin Howell said:
.. It now seems to me that the original question was poorly designed, with no clearly correct answer.

Maybe the person who set the question should have said that more than one answer is correct, as in this case.

Yukiko chan · 29 Jan 2010

porkar said:
Maybe the person who set the question should have said that more than one answer is correct, as in this case.

Or none, as in question 6.

Red5 · 29 Jan 2010

could some one answer this :

" Parents are often upset when their children praise the homes of their friends and regard it as a slur on their
own cooking, or cleaning, or furniture, and often are foolish enough to let the adolescents see that they are annoyed " .

- "the homes of their friends" is in the ....... case
a) dative b) nominative c) genitive d) Norman genitive

-the function of the see is :
a)verb b) infinitive c) complement d)object

here I think it's verb , but most of my friends said , it's complement and that's totally wrong.
because the complement must be SUBJECT or OBJECT.

porkar · 29 Jan 2010

Zoon van Ijs said:
Or none, as in question 6.

:? more information please.

Yukiko chan · 29 Jan 2010

porkar said:
:? more information please.

I was speaking of the last question iceman proposed, which had 4 possible (suggested) answers, but none of them is totally adequate, as I had explained in an earlier post (though not being a professional linguist, my answer may be subject to criticism).

iceman said:
and here extra question.
6. I ........ a decision not to see him as long as I live.
a) decide b) do c) take d)make
I put it c)take but my friends told me it's d) make ...

porkar · 29 Jan 2010

Zoon van Ijs said:
I was speaking of the last question iceman proposed, which had 4 possible (suggested) answers, but none of them is totally adequate, as I had explained in an earlier post (though not being a professional linguist, my answer may be subject to criticism).

d is correct; "I make a decision not to ......."

Yukiko chan · 29 Jan 2010

porkar said:
d is correct; "I make a decision not to ......."

I disagree. I think "to make" is the right verb, but present simple cannot work here for reasons I've stated above.
From wikipedia:

present simple, which is used to describe both habits and or routines (I eat breakfast every morning at 6:30. I go to work every day), and general facts or the truth (The earth revolves around the sun);
English speakers use the present simple for thoughts and feelings. (Ex. I think so, I like it.)

There's only one situation that I've just thought of where the above sentence would work:
"I make a decision not to see him as long as I live every time he gets me angry, but when I calm down I forgive him"
In which case it would be denoting habit; but the original sentence, as it is, only admits the simple past, present perfect and past perfect.

porkar · 29 Jan 2010

Zoon van Ijs said:
..(though not being a professional linguist, my answer may be subject to criticism).

I also notice by your address bar and your name, that it appears English is not your first language.
You can see by my flag, that English is my first language.

'I make' is the first person, present tense of the verb 'to make'. If the person is speaking in the present tense, that sentence is correct. It can also be used as you said, 'denoting habit' e.g. "Every day I make a decision to........"
Believe me, if you say this to any English speaking person it makes sense.
Wikipedia can not always be relied upon because, as stated on Wikipedia's page:-
"This article does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (June 2007)"

Red5 · 29 Jan 2010

as Porkar said that the native speakers know more than us which the English is my second language.
maybe it's different from place to place to say I made and I make according to accent and dialogue.
but if you may Pokar or Zoon van Ijs to answer my last participation about this,

" Parents are often upset when their children praise the homes of their friends and regard it as a slur on their
own cooking, or cleaning, or furniture, and often are foolish enough to let the adolescents see that they are annoyed " .

- "the homes of their friends" is in the ....... case
a) dative b) nominative c) genitive d) Norman genitive

-the function of the see is :
a)verb b) infinitive c) complement d)object

here I think it's verb , but most of my friends said , it's complement and that's totally wrong.
because the complement must be SUBJECT or OBJECT.

Pokar it's noticeable that your English is your mother language but Zoon van Ijs is educated enough .

PS: yesterday my exam The History of Literature and Thought , it's really very very hard subject . I think it'll go down

Yukiko chan · 29 Jan 2010

porkar said:
I also notice by your address bar and your name, that it appears English is not your first language.
You can see by my flag, that English is my first language.

'I make' is the first person, present tense of the verb 'to make'. If the person is speaking in the present tense, that sentence is correct. It can also be used as you said, 'denoting habit' e.g. "Every day I make a decision to........"
Believe me, if you say this to any English speaking person it makes sense.
Wikipedia can not always be relied upon because, as stated on Wikipedia's page:-
"This article does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (June 2007)"

Well, I never stated that my answer was perfect.

Yup, I'm not a native speaker, but I've studied English for a long time, and all Americans and Canadians I've met have told me that I had a native level in English in all aspects (but I'm well aware that I still need to make more progress to sound purely native). Besides, languages, as we know, tend to progress more quickly than academic officialization, thus even when an expression is widely accepted and used by natives, it may not be accepted in an academic context.

I didn't notice that the wiki article wasn't referenced, sorry. But in fact, it matches what I had studied years ago, and I was simply trying to give an external source to the same information.

I'd be glad if you could cite a reliable link explaining a similar example to the above one, or at least giving another possible use of simple present other than the ones I've stated, that would account for our example. Sorry, I tend to be a language purist most of the time!

Cheers, Greg.

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