Entries for February 2008

6 comments Contributed by David Kent on 14 February 2008 at 20:44

Learning a foreign language is difficult. Even after conjugations and syntax have been refined, a vulgar idiom will still poison a paper. Idioms are phrases that are peculiar to a given language or locale. They are part of the natural evolution of a spoken language as an expression of the culture in which it is spoken. Unsurprisingly, those speaking a foreign language in an alien culture find their tongues tied by idioms. If beauty is only skin deep, then so is human nature; a frustrated idiom can strangle a brilliant idea. The final solution is to cleanse your paper of all imperfect idioms.


The most common way to find out how to use idioms is to hear them from native speakers (friends, movies, teachers, etc.) and then experiment with them yourself. While this method will undoubtedly work, it is not quick and lends a sense of dependency. Fortunately, it is possible to tell if an idiom is incorrect using online concordances. These concordances contain a massive database of English prose (not literature, but more mundane writings such as newspaper articles). The user is able to search this collection for any word or phrase they desire. For the most part, idioms are pre-constructed phrases that have little variation. If an idiom is constructed improperly there will be few results, but if constructed correctly there will be plenty. Of course, it is important to examine the sentences generated by each search to see how the phrase is used and its connotation. One final note before continuing, online concordances are not typical search engines; they generally use a subset of the Regular Expression query syntax. This means that you cannot simply type in the phrase like you would for Google. Each word in the phrase is joined with a +. For example, a search for “in my opinion” would be written in+my+opinion. Of course, this can also be written “in your opinion”, “in his opinion”, “in her opinion”, “in our opinion”, or “in their opinion” yet it is the same basic idiom. To have a more inclusive search we would type in+1opinion. This allows one extra word to come between “in” and “opinion”. Changing this number changes the amount of words that can separate the terms joined by the +. However, if the idiom is common enough, there will be a large number of results using simply in+my+opinion.


Now that you know how to search a concordance, go to Collin's Concordance. There are two text input bars on this page, but for this blog entry we will only use the first one. To use this site, you must let it through any pop-up blockers you have enabled. Also, the number of characters in each result can be modified using the “+” and “–“ buttons directly below “Show Concs” button. This site is only a demo, so it will only display 40 results at the most. Fortunately, this is enough for our purposes.

One of the most common mistakes I see is the confusion of an idiom's preposition. A recent paper contained the sentence “For my opinion, having plastic surgery is good”. This author may not have been sure whether to write “For my opinion” or “In my opinion”. Rather than flip a coin, let’s make an educated guess. Type in+my+opinion into the first text bar and hit enter. You will have to make sure your pop-up blocker does not prevent pop-ups from this site. Look at the pop-up window and see how many search results were obtained: 40 (the maximum). Since there are 40 results, the phrase “in my opinion” is probably used in English. You should examine each result to find out how it is used. In particular, notice how it is often used at the start of a sentence or independent clause. Now type in for+my+opinion and hit enter. This time, you probably only got one result. These few results indicate that it is probably not a commonly used idiom, even though it may be grammatically correct. In this case, the “opinion” is the indirect object of the verb “ask”. This is not the same sense the author intended. Since the author did not make “opinion” the indirect object of anything, it is more probable that “in my opinion” is the proper idiom to use.


In summary, this site can reveal whether a given phrasing is correct for a particular idiom. If there are no or very few sentences using your phrase, it is probably not an idiom as you have phrased it. It is crucial to remember to see how the phrase is used in the example sentences. The more research you put into your writing, the more effortlessly natural it will seem.

1 comments Contributed by Theodore Roman on 08 February 2008 at 15:39

This past week, I've had a chance to reflect on the writing strategies that I use most often. Often, I have a natural tendency to want to sound "scholarly". In other words, I use far too many words and far too formal diction. When I realize this is happening, though, I slow down, reread my paper, and look to write as though I were talking to a friend who didn't know the subject matter at hand. I've also encouraged many visitors to do the same. However, be warned: informal speech isn't always acceptable. Sometimes precise, high diction works best. The secret is knowing which diction is more appropriate for a specific prompt.