Whats the difference in English between BEFORE and UNTIL

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hi everybody welcome back to ask alicia

the weekly series where you ask me

questions and i answer them maybe

okay let’s get to your first question

this week first question this week comes

from andrea oliviera hello andrea andrea

says hi alicia could you help me with

the differences between before and until

in these phrases first

don’t say you hate it until or before

you try a bite of it

you’re not going anywhere until or

before you put your things away

enjoy your meal until or before it gets

cold thank you very much

okay nice question yeah mostly the

differences between until and before in

these example sentences are about nuance

you could use either in these sentences

i want to talk about the first two

example phrases or the first two example

sentences first i want to talk about

these two together because they have a

negative at the beginning of the

sentence in the first example sentence

we had don’t say you hate it until or

before you try a bite of it so until is

used to mark like a key moment or kind

of a deadline or a point at which

something changes before it doesn’t

really have this feeling so don’t say

you hate it until you try a bite of it

sounds more natural in this case because

it’s like saying taking a bite of this

thing this food probably is kind of the

key point or the moment for change the

moment at which the person makes a

decision so until sounds more natural

here than before

the same is true for the second example

sentence you’re not going anywhere until

or before you put your things away again

this sounds more natural with until

because we have kind of a key moment for

change yeah so the person needs to put

their things away that’s why until

sounds a little bit more natural than

before here

this is not the case however with the

final example that you included which

was enjoy your meal until or before it

gets cold the reason that until sounds

unnatural in this example is because we

don’t really have a specific point like

a key moment or a kind of deadline or a

time at which something’s going to

change we have this cold like the meal

is going to get cold situation we know

is going to happen but there’s not a key

point

also if you use until in this sentence

it sounds like enjoy your meal and

continue enjoying your meal but at the

point your meal becomes cold stop

enjoying your meal this is really

strange right so enjoy your meal before

it gets cold sounds a lot more natural

here because it’s kind of like you’re

encouraging the other person to eat

while the meal is warm and therefore

it’s most delicious so that’s the

difference between until and before in

these example sentences and you can kind

of carry that you can kind of remember

that when you need to choose in the

future so until we tend to use more with

that kind of deadline or key change

point so you can kind of remember this

when you need to make a decision between

these two in the future we tend to use

until a lot when we have some kind of

change point coming in the future we can

refer to it’s easy to spot or it’s easy

to understand that change point and we

don’t really always do that with before

so i hope that this helps you thanks for

an interesting question okay let’s get

to your next question next question

comes from andre hello andre andre says

ciao alisha what’s up hey

uh my question which is correct he don’t

or he doesn’t i’ve noticed a lot of

usage of the form he don’t in american

movies yeah nice question so depending

on the style of english used in the

movie you’re watching you might see a

grammar pattern like this so you might

see this in a few different styles of

speaking the speaker might use this kind

of speaking to sound rough or to sound

cool you might also hear it used in

certain communities or in certain

regions of the usa there are many

different reasons a speaker might use he

don’t instead of he doesn’t so it

depends a lot on the style of the movie

on the people that are in the movie or

the characters that are portrayed the

people that are actually in the movie

so there are a lot of different factors

to consider

yes we learn he doesn’t in typical

textbook english but depending on the

community or the region or the

background of the speaker it might be

common to use he don’t and other similar

grammar patterns so this is the reason

you might see he don’t in certain

american movies or in certain tv shows

even sometimes it’s because the

character wants to sound rougher or

cooler or something other times it’s

because that’s how the character

naturally speaks that’s the type of

english or the style of english they

grew up using so

over time as you watch media you’ll kind

of get to understand a little bit better

which is which so i hope that this helps

you thanks very much for the question

okay let’s move on to our next question

next question comes from jane

advincula hi jane i hope i said your

name right jane says hi alicia i’d like

to ask about how and when to use later

and earlier for example in phrases like

one year later and earlier in 1992. okay

yeah nice question so of course we can

use earlier and later to talk about

different times of the day like let’s do

that later so meaning not now but later

but these words are also very very

useful when we’re telling stories

especially about the past when we want

to talk about a point in time in the

past and we want to talk about something

that happened before that or something

that happened after that we can use

earlier and later to do that let’s look

at earlier first so for example he

finished school in 2000 we want to talk

about the year 2000 in this case a past

tense point we could say something like

one year earlier he had started looking

for a job so that means one year before

this key point in time we already

introduced so earlier kind of refers

back to the previously introduced point

in time this sounds quite natural on the

other hand if we want to talk about

something that happened after that key

point in time we would use later to do

that so for example he finished school

in 2000 one year later he got a job so

we use the same point in time 2000 but

we use later so one year later so we can

use earlier and later to refer to a

previously introduced time period this

can help us to tell stories very

naturally yes we can also say like the

year before that or the year after that

these are just different ways to express

the same idea of course you can also use

earlier and later to talk about smaller

time periods and bigger time periods

earlier i said let’s do it later for

example so you can use earlier and later

to refer to a few minutes time as i just

did in this video you can use it to talk

about a day to talk about a week a month

a year whatever when you want to talk

about something that happened before a

point in time use earlier and when you

want to talk about something that

happened after you can use later so i

hope that this helps you thanks for the

question okay let’s move on to your next

question next question comes from cuong

hi quang quang says if my mobile phone

has a low battery what should i say

which sentences are correct

my mobile phone’s battery is low

my mobile phone is running out of power

are there any ways that native speakers

say this that sound natural does this

sentence sound natural my mobile phone’s

battery is out of power

my mobile phone’s battery power is five

percent what should i ask to find out

the power percentage can i say this what

is the percentage of your phone’s

battery’s power volume capacity and so

on great questions so first your first

example sentence is perfect so my mobile

phone’s battery is low or my mobile

phone is running out of power both of

these are great the only thing is we

tend to make this expression very short

because this is a very common situation

for example mobile phone is long we

usually say in american english my phone

so here are some really natural

expressions you can use to describe your

phone’s battery situation you can say my

phone is almost dead or my phone is

about to die to express the precise

percentage of power on your phone you

can say my phone is at five percent or

you might even hear some people say i’m

at five percent or i’m about to die

sometimes people say i’m when they mean

their phone as well if you want to ask

for a charger you can say do you have a

charger or can i borrow your charger or

in a group situation does anyone have a

charger so just keep in mind make this

expression short my phone’s about to die

is very very common that’s probably the

one that i use most what do you say when

your phone’s gonna die i’m running out

of batteries i’m running out of battery

yeah i’m running out of battery or i’m

running out of power there are many

different ways to express this

running out of shoes

oh juice

running out of juice yeah juice also

means power so it depends a little bit

on the personality of the person you’re

talking to but a very straightforward

one is my phone’s about to die or my

battery is running low so there’s a big

list of expressions that you can use

thanks for a good question i hope that

that helps you okay let’s move on to our

next question next question comes from

tawfiq saeed hi talfiq i hope i said

your name right talfiq says

his sports car flew past us on the

highway what is the meaning of past in

this example please explain with some

examples thank you okay sure this past

is a preposition so past has a few

different uses in this sentence we’re

seeing it as a preposition as a

preposition here it means beyond or to

come close to something and then move

beyond that so some other examples of

this use of past are for example i

walked past your house yesterday or my

dog ran past me into the street so in

all of these situations it’s like

something moves close to something else

and then continues beyond that thing so

in your example the car flew past us

means the car was on a course

came very close to us and then continued

on the course beyond us the same thing

with my first example i walked past your

house yesterday that means i walked like

on a course

near your house and then i continued

beyond it and in the final example with

the dog it sounds like the dog ran very

close to me and then continued beyond me

so when we use past as a preposition

like this this is what it means i hope

that this helps you thanks for the

question all right that is everything

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