A FewFew A LittleLittle How to Talk About Quantities in English

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hi everybody welcome back to ask Alicia

the weekly series where you ask me

questions and I answer them

maybe first question this week comes

from Minh sir Hyman moon says hi Alicia

could you please show me how to

pronounce these symbols so the first

symbol here in your list is this mark so

this is read as hashtag so we use this a

lot on social media like Twitter

Instagram this mark means hashtag or is

read as hashtag if however you’re

reading it in like a phone number it’s

read as the pound sign so that’s kind of

a lesser used word for this symbol in

most cases today we read this as hashtag

hashtag so this symbol is read as @ @ or

at mark so we use this a lot on again

Twitter or Instagram when we want to at

somebody or when we want to contact

somebody or tag them in something so we

call this the at mark the at mark so

this very short dash is called a - a -

so I also just use the word - so

actually there are three dashes there

are three small lines that we use when

we’re writing in English and actually

native speakers often don’t know the

differences between these so the first

one here this shortest one is called a

hyphen

so we use this one we’re connecting

words so for example like extra crispy

or free-for-all we use hyphens to

connect these small words together the

next longest dash is called an N - en an

en n - is used when we want to for

example mark like time periods so for

example like 2002 to 2007

instead of writing to in 2002 to 2007 we

may use an N - so that’s like this

medium length - actually the third kind

of dash is the longest - this is called

the M dash p.m. the e/m

• is used for breaks in speech so like

when you’re speaking and you stop in

your speech and you want to make an

extra point or you want to emphasize

something we set off that extra point

with an M - we use M dashes when we want

to make an extra point in a sentence

like to give an example and we want to

continue talking after that so I just

gave an example of that when I said like

to give an example that’s sort of like

extra information I want to add in the

sentence we can use M dashes on both

sides of that to set it off in the text

some people choose to use parentheses to

do that so that’s actually the next item

on your list parentheses so there are

those two kind of like curved lines

parentheses so the one that opens this

way this is called the open parentheses

we begin our parenthetical information

with the open parentheses mark the other

side is called the closed parentheses

mark so these are called parentheses

parentheses the thing that looks like a

• or like a - but it’s kind of low

that’s called an underscore an

underscore you might also hear it called

an underbar so underscore or underbar so

another item from your list was this

little star this tiny little star is

called an asterisk and asterisk we read

that as asterisk it’s kind of hard to

say even for native speakers um then for

questions when we’re making questions we

finished the sentence with a question

mark we call that a question mark and

then it’s not on your list but when we

have like a shocking statement or a

surprising statement we use the

exclamation mark the exclamation mark or

the exclamation point that’s what that’s

called your final item on the list was

this thing that’s called a slash a slash

you can use a front slash or a back

slash if you want to be very specific

but in most cases just using slash is

fine so I hope that that helps you

understand some very common marks that

we use in our writing so thanks very

much for this interesting question okay

let’s move along to your next question

next question comes from Sofia hi Sofia

Sofia says hi Alicia what is the

difference between farther and further

lot of and lots of for example and for

instance okay

about your last two pairs a lot of and

lots of they are the same and for

example and for instance those are also

the same for instance might sound

slightly more formal than for example

but generally speaking these are used

exactly the same way you can use them in

the same way in every situation that I

can think of okay but I do want to talk

about your first pair here farther and

further farther and further when you’re

talking about distance they can be used

the same we use them the same way when

we’re talking about distance this can be

like distance in time it can be like a

physical distance as well however

further has some uses that farther does

not so further can also mean more some

examples we need to look further into

this problem she further refined her

skills by taking a training course

further can also mean additionally when

it has this meaning it typically comes

at the beginning of a sentence or at the

beginning of a clause so for example we

plan to make a new product this month

further we plan to sell 1000 units in

the first week so that further means

additionally or more over there so

farther does not have this meaning

further does so this is one important

difference remember when you’re talking

about distance you can use either I hope

that this helps thanks very much for

your question alright let’s move along

to your next question next question

comes from nacho hi nacho nacho says hi

Alicia English speakers use crispy

crunchy and crisp when they explained

food what’s the difference okay

let’s talk about crispy and crunchy

first I want to focus on crunchy to

begin with so crunchy comes from the

word crunch so when we eat crunchy foods

in our mouth they make a crunching sound

it’s like hard to eat these things

crunchy foods are often like hard

candies so maybe like peppermint or it

could be like carrots for example could

be really crunchy

nuts can be really crunchy so when we

eat them we have to chew a lot and they

make a crunching sound in our mouth

that’s a crunchy food crispy on the

other hand is kind of like light crunchy

and crispy foods are foods that are like

often fried foods so like the outside

part of something is crispy so for

example like crispy skin on fried

chicken or let crispy potato chips or

crispy bacon so these things aren’t like

noisy foods they don’t really make a

crunching sound maybe it’s like a light

crunching sound when we eat them but

they have kind of a lighter feel about

them and they’re often yes fried foods

these are crispy things crisp then

refers to something usually like a fruit

or a vegetable that is very fresh so

something that is crisp is like

perfectly ripe so like a Crisp apple or

a crisp pear

you could also use it to talk about like

celery or again carrots so something

that’s just right is crisp we don’t

really use this word to talk about

squishy things so like berries or

oranges or grapefruits

we don’t use crisp to talk about those

crisp is usually something that’s solid

so when you bite into something that’s

crisp you might hear like a nice like

slicing sound that’s something that’s

crisp

additionally crisp is used to talk about

like the weather or to talk about smells

• it’s usually for something that’s kind

of fresh when we use crisp to talk about

the weather it usually means something

like a day that is kind of fresh the air

is very fresh and a little bit cold as

well - so this is crisp so I hope that

that helps you understand the

differences between crunchy and crispy

and crisp

go forth and use them okay thanks very

much for the question okay let’s move

along to your next question the next

question comes from Charles Higham Roos

Charu’s says hi Alicia what is the

difference between a few and few also a

little and little yeah a nice question

okay let’s look at some example

sentences to compare first the company

bought a few computers

second the company bought few computers

okay so the first sentence in this pair

sounds like a simple statement of fact

the company bought a small number of

computers that’s what it means if the

speaker is really excited when they say

this like the company bought a few

computers maybe it sounds kind of

positive in general it’s kind of a

neutral just simple statement of fact

just information the second sentence

however the company bought few computers

can have a little bit more of like a

disappointed or a negative field so yes

this sentence means the company

purchased a small amount of computers

but it kind of has the feeling that like

maybe the speaker wishes the company had

purchased more computers like the

company purchased few computers so it

sounds like there’s a little bit of

disappointment there one more example a

few people attended the meeting and few

people attended the meeting again in the

first example it kind of feels like a

simple statement of fact again depending

on speaker intonation like a few people

attended the meeting it could sound a

little more excited more positive but

generally it’s kind of neutral it’s a

simple statement the second sentence

here though few people attended the

meeting sounds kind of disappointed or a

little bit more negative so we see the

same thing with a little and little I

made a little progress on my project

today and I made little progress on my

project today this is the same kind of

idea so I made a little progress on my

project today is a simple statement of

fact and it can sound more excited it

can sound more positive depending on the

speaker’s intonation the second sentence

I made little progress on my project

today

sounds more disappointed sounds more

negative so this is a very small point I

know but it can kind of change the

feeling of your sentence when you make

the decision so if you want to sound

just kind of neutral or if you want to

have a little bit of a feeling of

positivity you could use a few or a

little if you want to use kind of a

negative or disappointed feel you can

use no article there few or little okay

so I hope that that helps you understand

thank you very much for an interesting

question all right let’s move on to your

next question next question comes from

Gautam hyegyo Tong Bao Chun says could

you tell me the difference between that

and which oh yeah okay

so this is kind of related to a more

advanced grammar point actually and not

a lot of native speakers know the

difference between these two the

difference between that and which

generally speaking for kind of

intermediate level learners is that

which is going to sound more formal most

of the time so we use that in which as

relative pronouns we can use both of

these words to talk about people and to

talk about things but in more advanced

grammar when we’re looking at relative

clauses which give us extra information

about a noun there are two types of

relative clause and depending on the

type of relative clause we choose a

different pronoun so there’s a kind of

relative clause that’s called

a restrictive or some people call it a

descriptive clause this means it’s

information about a noun that is

essential to understanding the noun like

we have to have this information in

order to understand the noun so an

example is the car that my mom bought is

really fast so here the relative clause

is that my mom bought so we have to have

this information in order to understand

the car if we don’t have this

information we might not be able to

understand which car the speaker is

talking about so for example if I want

to select compare the car that my mom

bought with the car that my dad bought

it’s very important to clearly say the

car that my mom bought is really fast

the car that my dad bought is really big

I have to have that relative clause in

order to communicate this essential

information so this is an example of

what’s called a restrictive clause or a

descriptive clause as well when you’re

using a descriptive clause you have to

use that to show it then on the other

hand when you’re using a non restrictive

clause or what’s called a non

descriptive clause for some people you

don’t have to use that instead you use

which so an example

a non-restrictive clause is something

like this phone which I bought two years

ago is really convenient so here my

relative Clause is which I bought two

years ago so if I remove that from the

sentence my sentence becomes this phone

is really convenient

so it’s grammatically correct and I

still understand which phone we’re

talking about I still understand that

from the sentence so in these cases the

information in that relative Clause is

not essential I don’t need that

information to understand them now in

these cases we use which and you’ll also

notice that these non restrictive

relative clauses are set off with commas

so we have a comma at the beginning and

a comma at the end of the clause so

these are a couple of different ways

that you can kind of spot restrictive

and non-restrictive clauses so again

this is kind of a more advanced grammar

point and something that even like lots

of native speakers don’t know but that

is the difference that is the difference

in terms of grammar and in terms of your

pronoun choice so I hope that that helps

you thanks very much for this question

ok that’s everything that I have for you

for this week thank you as always for

sending your interesting questions

remember you can send them to me at

English class 101.com slash ask - alicia

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