Job Discussion Forums

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:22 pm Post subject:

Actually there aren't any locomotives to hijack where I am at this time of night (the last train left at 11:16, and it's now about 11:30 here in Japan). I was making up all that stuff about going out to trainspot (not that I'm not a trainspotter! Wonderful hobby, the perfect complement to complements!) just so I wouldn't end up dancing at the Grammar Groove with anybody too hideous n' bilious. But I would like to hijack something with you at some point, D, and hope we can plan something big, and plan it better, soon! Razz

Deconstructor · Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 775 Location: Montreal

If you've read my posts, you know that I'm game.

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 2:34 pm Post subject:

(A worrying silence, then a paranoia, descends on the thread as the would-be hijackers start sending all manner of silly private messages to each other)

Deconstructor · Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 775 Location: Montreal

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:12 pm Post subject:

Indeed. However, the question then is, which do I say:

You say you are going to hijack a train...
You said you are going to hijack a train...
You said you were going to hijack a train...

Lordy lordy, what's a student to make of all this?!

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 3:17 pm Post subject:

"At the end of the day", reported speech is really just about referring to what somebody said. I need to do a lot more than worry about the exact tenses I'm using in the reporting if I want to make clear what it is exactly that I believe you meant by saying what you did. Explaining "myself" with the addition of something after any one of the above "stems" would seem the most effective way to me of resolving this "dilemma". Idea

Deconstructor · Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 775 Location: Montreal

dyak · Joined: 25 Jun 2003 Posts: 630

Well, if you two are going to hijack a train, don't for god's sake leave a 'How to Drive a Train' manual and a copy of your favourite religious text in an abandoned car! Countries have been known to start wars based on evidence like that!

Wink

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 5:09 pm Post subject:

You may have noticed that my examples are a trio, just like SJ's.

In SJ's case, the missing example was: He says he was starving. Are we to assume by its exclusion that it is meant to be so very different from He said he was starving? The only important thing is that the report reflect what the person said (and who just says 'I WAS starving'? > 'I was starving until the relief workers came'); the choice of tense in the reporting verb seems irrelevant (the variation is more a native speaker thing), and any supposed choice in conveying "remoteness" in terms other than "tense" in the reported statement is also nothing that a student should be concerned (burdened?) with.*

The missing example in my case was: You say you were going to hijack a train.... I was being a bit silly...all four examples are directed BACK at Deconstructor and are therefore prompts to continue with the planning/planned actions, rather than reports to a third party of what D said. Twisted Evil

Or is this fourth example actually an odd one out after all? Confused

*If what was said used a present form, then it is logical and also obvious too that the reported statement mirror it (as past mirrored past, above): I want to sell my car > He said he wants to sell his car.

I used only 'said' there to 'simplify things for the student', BTW, regardless of whether he just said it on the 'phone ('says') or said it a day or a week ago (more advanced students should maybe be studying 'He was saying...' if anything, rather than fretting over 'says' versus 'said' - at least the progressive signals tentativeness, hedging, and therefore has some sensible function to play, a new form for a new function, not another form for the same function).

This then puts the student in the sensible position of just echoing what was said:

London is nice > He said London is nice.
London was nice > He said London was nice.

A student does not need to worry about 'London was a nice city' being 'interesting' or absolutely true in any way until such a time as it somehow gets totally destroyed, in which case, the student's knowledge of the world, that thing known as context, will save the teacher needing to explain anything not already painfully obvious.

Why is it that teachers need to explain so much when it really isn't necessary?

Deconstructor · Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 775 Location: Montreal

Deconstructor · Joined: 30 Dec 2003 Posts: 775 Location: Montreal

Reported speech: One reports someone else's speech because one thinks it is important to be repeated or one is not original enough to report one's one speech.

Besides, most of the time we misreport others' speeches. This is why we're always at war.

She is beautiful.

He told me that you are butt ugly.

Laughing

fluffyhamster · Posted: Sun Mar 20, 2005 5:50 pm Post subject:

D, you are like the magical sitar that can only speak the truth!

fluffyhamster · Posted: Mon Mar 21, 2005 8:02 pm Post subject: