IF I WERE or IF I WAS Conditional Sentences English Grammar

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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 comes from Flavia

hi Flavia Flavia says hi Alicia can you

explain why you use if I were you

instead of was yeah so the pattern if I

were you is an example of what’s called

the subjunctive mood so the subjunctive

mood is something that we use to talk

about unreal situations so things that

are not true so we use if I were you to

talk about the Unreal situation the

Unreal present situation which refers to

like the fact that I am NOT you like

that’s not a true situation so we use

this subjunctive pattern if I were you

to talk about that if I was however

would begin a simple past statement so

something in the past but maybe the

speaker is not so certain about that

past thing so for example if I was wrong

I’m sorry or if I was noisy last night I

apologize so that means the speaker has

some uncertainty about the past like if

I was noisy last night I don’t know if I

was but maybe I was if I was I apologize

so those are past situations that could

be possible they’re not necessarily like

unreal but we want to maybe express like

an apology or we want to express some

kind of uncertainty about something that

might have affected someone in the past

so maybe I was noisy last night or maybe

I was wrong for example I don’t know but

if I was then I apologize or I’m sorry

so we use this if I was for these simple

past tense statements so actually you

will commonly hear native speakers using

if I was you but it’s not like that’s

going to cause any commune

ocation problems actually so yes the

technically correct pattern to use if I

were you but there are so many people

that say if I was if I was that it’s not

like a communication problem

so technically yes it’s incorrect to say

if I was but you’re not gonna have any

problems if you use that pattern instead

so that’s the basic difference if I were

you

refers to an unreal present situation if

I was something refers to uncertainty

about a past situation or a past event

so I hope that this helps you thanks

very much for the question okay let’s

move on to your next question next

question comes from Carol hi Carol Carol

says Alesha I’m stumped by trying to

distinguish the difference in meaning

between evaluate and assess could you

help me yeah great question and actually

native speakers have trouble with the

difference between these words too so

let’s talk first about the word evaluate

so a great way to remember the

difference between the words evaluate

and assess is to consider that inside

the word evaluate is the word value so

when we evaluate something we are

assigning or we are giving some value to

that thing or to that person this can

mean like the price of something this

can mean the significance of something

this can mean like the condition of

something so some examples we evaluated

this camera and gave it an 8 out of 10

score our company’s software was

evaluated by a tech website and given a

low rating so in each of these example

sentences a certain like level of value

is assigned or is given to something or

to someone so when we evaluate we’re

doing it in order to give value or it’s

like to assign or to find the value of

something so it could be a score it

could be a price so let’s compare this

to the word assess the pronunciation is

assess assess so the word assessed then

has the same feel of evaluate but the

purpose of assess is to understand

something better so we don’t

something in order to assign a value to

that thing we’re assessing something in

order to understand it better so like we

try to understand deeper like

information or like to learn more about

the details of something we assess

something so like you might assess a

situation that means you look deep into

the details to better understand the

situation some more examples we need to

assess the security of the company’s

data he assessed his housing options

before making a decision so this is the

difference between evaluate and assess

if you’re ever not sure just to remember

that the word value is inside evaluate

to help you remember that evaluate is

used to assign value to something so I

hope that this helps you thanks very

much for the question okay let’s move on

to your next question next question

comes from yes sir hi Yasir Yasir says

what is the meaning of the expression

word I’ve seen it in some movies and I

can’t figure out what it means yeah word

is like a strong laid back expression of

agreement among close friends you can

also use it to like ask really or is

that true if you use kind of like a

question intonation so like word so you

might also hear it used in a situation

where someone does something that like

you really admire or that you kind of

respect or you think is impressive and

you like you might hear someone say like

word in response to that so that kind of

shows support or that you were impressed

or you admire that thing I feel like in

a lot of cases it’s just used as a

simple expression of agreement or

understanding for example we’re gonna

watch the game tonight word personally I

don’t use this word that much because it

is kind of like a cool word and I’m not

really like a cool like hip-hop street

culture kind of person but if you want

to use it I would recommend using it

among very close friends and in very

casual situations so I hope that this

helps you understand it thanks very much

for the question all right let’s move on

to your next question next question

comes from bray antalya hi bran

Breann says hi Alicia can you please

explain to me the meanings and uses of

the word happen specifically in these

cases do you happen to my sister happens

to be a lawyer

etc I’m confused yeah this is a nice

question okay to begin with I want to

introduce a few very common patterns

that we see with the word happen

let’s take a look do you happen to have

would you happen to know if it just so

happens that my sister happens to be

okay

so kind of the theme with this use of

the word happen is chance or by chance

of something so let’s take a look at the

first two patterns here these first two

are question patterns so the first one

was do you happen to have and the second

one was would you happen to know if so

another way to say these is is there any

chance you have or is there any chance

you know so you’re asking very politely

like is there a possibility is there a

chance of this thing so we use this form

of happen to make very formal or like

very soft requests so this is really

useful when you’re like speaking to a

stranger so if you can imagine like

you’re a tourist and you need some help

in a city that you are unfamiliar with

you could say to a nearby person like

excuse me do you happen to know where I

could buy a coffee around here or excuse

me would you happen to have the time so

that’s like you’re making a very like

soft request

that’s like saying is there any chance

or is it possible at all that you have

this information or you could do this

for me so it’s a very soft request form

so let’s take a look at the other two

sentence patterns that I introduced here

these are some statement patterns so

again these do mean by chance but for

these kinds of statements the context is

actually really important the situation

is important so for example it just so

happens that I got two free tickets to

that concert you were

talking about last week so it just so

happens means like by chance or like

something happened like that was very

coincidental it just so happens that

this situation fits nicely with

something else in my life right now so

it just so happens I got these free

tickets and this relates to having this

discussion with you about a concert last

week so those two things kind of fit

nicely together it’s a nice little

coincidence so it just so happens that

is used to do that so the other example

pattern that you introduced my sister

happens to be a lawyer is probably

something you would see in a situation

where a person is looking for a lawyer

and the person who says that sentence is

introducing that like oh no I need a

lawyer do you have any recommendations

and person B might say oh my sister

happens to be a lawyer

so that’s like saying by chance my

sister is a lawyer like coincidentally

like it matches your situation nicely

that’s kind of the feeling of happens to

in this case happens to be a lawyer so

yes you could say like oh my sister is a

lawyer that’s fine as well but it

doesn’t have that same nuance of

coincidence so kind of think of happens

to or like happens to be as meaning by

chance in these statement situations and

when you’re using it as a question it

creates like this formal very gentle

like is it possible to type request so I

hope that that helps you understand

using the word happen or happens in

cases like these thanks very much for

the question okay let’s move on to your

next question next question comes from

cloudy hi cloudy cloudy says what’s the

difference between these words admire a

door and idolize Thanks okay let’s

compare let’s make some example

sentences first I admire Beyonce

I adore Beyonce I idolized Beyonce okay

so first let’s look at I admire Beyonce

so we use admire for people usually

people that we

respect so maybe we respect that

person’s work or we want to be more like

that person or we think they’ve done

like great things they’re very talented

so if I say I admire Beyonce it means

like I respect her I respect her work so

we use admire to mean like something or

someone that we respect the second

sentence I adore Beyonce uses the word

adore which means you love something so

when we say I adore something we can use

it to talk about like people usually

people in our lives sometimes we use it

to talk about like our favorite

activities as well like I adore arts and

crafts perhaps but when we use it to

talk about people it’s usually for

people that we have a close relationship

to so like a Beyonce superfan might say

like I adore Beyonce I just love her so

that means that they feel like a close

connection to that person or like they

really really enjoy it in this case the

celebrities work so to adore something

can be used in that way also within

families like parents could say they

adore their children so to adore means

to love something and have a very close

connection or you feel like you have a

close connection with someone then the

final example sentence was I idolized

Beyonce I idolized so to idolize that

verb has the word Idol inside so Idol

actually has it like a religious kind of

connection so an idol was something like

to be worshipped so like a god or a

goddess figure sort of thing so to

idolize something means to kind of have

that thing as like above you so you have

like this image in this case like

Beyonce I idolized Beyonce that means

she’s like above everything like we

really appreciate her like we think

she’s just amazing and she’s like above

everybody else so to idolize someone is

like has almost like this image of

worshiping someone so maybe like a super

super super Beyonce fan could say like I

idolized Beyonce I want to be like her

like I want to do everything a fan can

so maybe that’s idolized in this case so

probably the most common words here are

admire and adore idolize is not used

nearly as much as these two but that’s

the difference between those words so I

hope that that helps you understand

thanks very much for the question

all right that’s everything that I have

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