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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