Use of Personal Pronouns in informal speech 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 okay
let’s get to your first question this
week first question this week comes from
brinto hi brinto brinto says can you
please tell me the difference between
change exchange and interchange sure
let’s talk about it let’s start by
talking about change we can use change
in probably the most situations out of
these three words when we want to alter
something so we want to make a different
kind of something or we want to use a
different type of something we can use
change to describe that so if you want
to make a
maybe slight alteration
which is a noun that you can use to
describe a change as well if you want to
do something in a document for example
you want to write a new sentence in a
document or you want to remove a
sentence in a document you would
describe that as a change as a noun or
if you want to use a verb in this case
you could say i changed the document
that means you altered it or you made it
different in some way the key with
change is that you are making something
different in some way or you’re adding
something new you’re removing something
that wasn’t there some common
expressions you might hear change used
in are for example like to change the
baby which means to change the diaper on
the baby to put a new diaper on a baby
or as we talked about earlier to make a
change in a document can also be
described as changing a document so
adding or removing something to make
something different that’s what we use
change to talk about let’s move along to
exchange to exchange means to usually
have two things that you want to swap so
we use this a lot when we are shopping
for example if you go to a store and you
buy a shirt that’s small but you needed
a shirt that’s a medium and you realize
it after you got home you might come
back to the store and ask to exchange
the shirts for a different size that
means you have two things that are the
same or very very similar and you want
to swap them so we use exchange to talk
about this like i exchanged my shirts at
the store yesterday to use another
example you could talk about maybe
exchanging money at a currency exchange
stand so when you want to transfer money
from for example us dollars to euros you
would ask for a currency exchange or in
other words to swap money in this way so
when you use exchange you are switching
you can think of switching or swapping
one thing for another thing okay finally
let’s go to interchange interchange i
use the word interchangeably or you can
use them interchangeably a lot on this
channel that means that you can replace
something with something else like it’s
okay to use that thing or this thing in
this place so to use something
interchangeably means that you can use
one or two or maybe three or more things
in exactly the same way or in exactly
the same position so this is different
from exchange which refers to some kind
of transaction usually
interchange doesn’t have this feeling
it’s like saying you can use anything in
this place or you can use anything in
this way
exchange doesn’t have this feeling about
it it just kind of refers to switching
or swapping to things that are similar
or roughly equal so i hope that this
helps you understand the differences
between change exchange and interchange
thanks very much for the question okay
let’s move on to your next question next
question comes from nihan hello nihan
nihan says hi alicia i’ve got a question
is there an adjective in english
meaning that you won’t talk to anyone
because you’re soaking but it’s
temporary because another person did
something wrong to you and it’s not that
you often sulk as a personal quality
yeah this is an interesting question we
might not use an adjective in this case
if i had to choose an adjective
specifically i might describe this
feeling as gloomy like you feel gloomy
because someone else did something to
you or something happened and your mood
is low you might say i’m gloomy or you
might say i’m feeling dejected or maybe
if it’s really serious despondent like
you don’t want to talk to somebody and
it’s very very serious what we might say
instead of using a specific adjective in
this case if you are actively not
talking to someone because you’re upset
with that one we might instead say we’re
giving someone the silent treatment
which means you are not talking to
someone because they did something wrong
or because there’s some kind of problem
so we often say that that’s a kind of
punishment like not talking to someone
is a kind of punishment so we might use
that kind of expression in this case
like oh i’m giving him the silent
treatment he made a huge mistake and i
don’t want to talk to him right now so
we could use something like that to
express that kind of feeling you feel
upset you don’t want to talk to someone
you are giving them the silent treatment
i hope that this helps you i hope this
kind of communicates the idea that you
were expressing in your question thanks
for an interesting topic okay let’s move
on to our next question next question
comes from gerardo vega hello gerardo
gerardo says hello alicia i’d like to
know what’s the difference between stare
and look at thank you very much sure
okay let’s cover look at first we use
look at to refer to moving our eyes to
something so we focus our attention on
something when we use look at like look
at the camera means use your eyes to
focus on the camera so we use our eyes
in a direction when we look at something
look at that look at him look at her
right but stare to stare at something
means yes to use your eyes to focus on
that but it means you don’t move your
focus so for example if you see
something interesting or maybe you see
like an attractive person or you see
something you really want to eat
whatever it might be for you if you look
at something for a very long time and
you don’t look at anything else you can
describe that as staring at something so
for example a pretty girl crossed the
street and he stared at her for 10
seconds straight so that means someone
focused their attention on another
person 100 focus their attention on
another person for 10 seconds straight
so stare means a long period of focused
attention to look at does not have this
feel we just use our eyes to focus and
to take in images so this is the
difference between look at and stare i
hope that this helps you thanks for the
question okay let’s move on to our next
question next question comes from achoo
i hope i said that right achchu says
white house staffer has tested positive
for covid19 on cnn and white house staff
has tested positive for covid19 on bbc
in our country we use staff commonly but
staffer is new to me is this an american
lingo what’s the difference between them
great question yeah so staff generally
is used to talk about a group of people
right the people who work at a company
or an organization we’re talking about
everybody there all of the employees all
of the members we say that’s the
company’s staff those are the people
that work there or they belong to the
organization so we understand staff as a
group of people right however you may in
some cases see the word staffer staffer
we tend to see this more i feel in like
government organizations or maybe more
official organizations staffer refers to
one person only one person only so in
this case as with the news reports a
staffer got a disease in this case
we want to use staffer here to refer to
one person only in this news report so
this might be a decision it might be a
decision that’s determined by the
reporting agency different reporting
agencies might follow different rules
for if they choose to use staff or maybe
employee or staffer but this is what it
means staffer refers to just one person
staff refers to a group of people
generally so i hope that this helps you
understand the difference thanks for an
interesting question okay let’s move on
to your next question next question
comes from
onerolan wonderland i hope i said your
name right owner allan says hi alicia
and team thanks for your great work it’s
amazing awesome thank you
sometimes i receive short messages from
native speakers without a personal
pronoun like got it
as far as i know this is okay in spanish
or russian languages but can i do this
in short sentences in non-formal verbal
speech only or should i avoid it hmm
good question so when you get messages
like these like got it or understood
those kinds of things it’s totally
normal it’s totally natural to use those
kinds of expressions in quick messages
typically with your friends with your
coworkers your colleagues if you’re
close to somebody it’s generally
understood that it’s okay to drop that
you don’t have to say i got it or i
understood it’s fine to just say
understood or got it
if however you don’t have such a close
relationship with someone if you are
talking to a client for the first time
or you’re exchanging emails with a
teacher for the first time or you’re
making a new connection it’s better to
write full sentences i would recommend
that you don’t use these kind of casual
expressions until you know someone and
you’ve developed a little bit of a
relationship with them but then
absolutely it’s completely fine to use
these short messages just to show you’ve
received something or you saw something
or you understood some information so
yeah got it or understood or even just
great something like that those are
perfectly fine to use and they’re very
effective ways to communicate as well so
i hope that this helps you thanks very
much for the question
all right that is everything for this
week thank you very much as always for
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