Which one is correct?

lolwhites · Post by **lolwhites** » Sun Jun 11, 2006 12:39 pm

Actually, there are many contexts in spoken English where a simple "yes" or "no" will suffice. It actually sounds rather incongrous when learners insist on saying "Yes, I do/can/will/might..." all the time because their teachers and textbooks back home told them to; it can be almost as incongruous as Would you like to drink a cup of tea?

lolwhites · Post by **lolwhites** » Sun Jun 11, 2006 9:52 pm

There is nothing silly about "eating lunch". In fact in many Asian languages and in my native Dutch you "eat lunch", you don't "have lunch". And that is exactly what a collocation is. It is a combination of words that commonly occur together. So in Dutch the collocation is "eat lunch" and "make photos" whereas in English it's "have lunch" and "take photos".

Fair enough, but the question concerned the whole phrase Would you like to drink a cup of tea? and not simply the chunk drink a cup of tea. I think you're right about the two-word collocations have lunch and take photos as opposed to what you say in Dutch, but even Would you like to have lunch? sounds more cumbersome to me than simply Would you like lunch?. The former is more likely to mean "Are you hungry? Shall we eat now or later?" while the second sounds more like a general offer of a meal (though context could change that, of course).

Would you like to drink a cup of tea? is bad on two counts; the wrong collocation and excess information. It's far more natural to say Would you like (a cup of) tea?, unless you are going to suggest doing something unusual with it (Would you like to give a cup of tea to your tired teacher?)

Zimmermann · Post by **Zimmermann** » Mon Jun 12, 2006 12:19 am

I was aware there were 2 issues involved here: "the wrong collocation and excess information" and I totally agree with your final analysis here, Lolwhites. (At least I am happy to call it the final analysis.)

I am new to these discussions and have another question: many of you seem to google certain expressions and count the number of hits. However, doesn't that include discussions that analyse these issues and actually state that they are incorrect English? For example, would googling "Would you like to drink a cup of tea?" show the number of times we have mentioned it in this discussion?

One more question unrelated to this topic. How do you quote from someone else posting? I can see the quote link but don't understand how to use it?

Thanks for your help.
Luke Zimmermann

JuanTwoThree · Post by **JuanTwoThree** » Mon Jun 12, 2006 6:13 am

That does seem to be the two issues sorted out.

As you imagined, "Would you like to drink a cup of tea?" now googles 8 times including at number one this discussion!

If you google frequent errors you get strange results: "I am agree" gets 69000 hits, of which a lot seem to be either from dubious sources or pointing out its incorrectness. But in other cases it seems to work as a rough and ready check on frequency of use of "correct English".