Idioms are a very important part of the English language: you are told that if you want to go far (succeed) you should pull your socks up (make a serious effort to improve your behaviour, the quality of your work, etc.) and use your grey matter (brain).1 Learning and translating idioms have always been very difficult for foreign language learners. The present paper explores some of the reasons why English idiomatic expressions are difficult to learn and translate. It is not the aim of this paper to attempt a comprehensive survey of the vast amount of material that has appeared on idioms in Adams and Kuder (1984), Alexander (1984), Dixon (1983), Kirkpatrick (2001), Langlotz (2006), McCarthy and O'Dell (2002), and Wray (2002), among others. The paper concentrates on idioms as a learning-translation problem; it makes no claim to be comprehensive or academically rigorous. Leech (1989) defines an idiom as follows: “An idiom is a group of two or more words which we have to treat as a unit in learning a language. We cannot arrive at the meaning of the idiom just by adding together the meanings of the words inside it. E.g.John and Mary usedto be hardup (='They had very little money'.)”(P.186) To be more exact, an idiom is a sequence of words which is semantically and syntactically restricted, so that they function as a single unit. From a semantic point of view, the meanings of the individual words cannot be summed to produce the meanings of the idiomatic expression as a whole. Thus, fly off the handle, which means lose one's temper, cannot be understood in terms of the meanings of fly, off, or handle. The idiom phrase hot air, which means empty or boastful talk, is neither hot nor air; with hot air we are dealing with a set phrase where the meaning cannot be suggested on the basis of the two constituent words. The idiomatic meaning of spill the beans in So who spilt the beans (=told the secret) about her affair with David? has nothing to do with beans or with spilling in its literal sense. The foreign-language learner is left trying to figure out where and how the beans were spilt. From a syntactic viewpoint, the constituent parts of an idiom often do not permit the usual variability they display in other contexts. The point to be emphasized here is this: most idioms do not lend themselves easily to manipulation by speakers and writers; they are invariable and must be learned as wholes, but concord ofnumber, person and gender in the idiom phrase is still necessary, i.e. the verbs must be put into the correct form, and pronouns must agree with their antecedents: I don't give a hoot for her opinion! 2 • She doesn't give a hoot for my opinion! etc.)║He won, but only by the skin of his teeth2• She won, but only by the skin of her teeth• Iwon, but only by the skin ofmy teeth,I had to run for the train, and caught it by the skin of myteeth, etc.║He kept pullingmy arm, throwing me off my balance 2 • She kept pulling his arm, throwing him off his balance • We kept pullingher arm, throwingher offher balance, etc.2 The present paper is divided into five parts, as follows: Part I: An Overview; PART II: Learner’s Difficulties with Idioms; PART III: Some Pedagogical recommendations and Suggestions about Idioms; Part IV: Activities to Practice Idiomatic Expressions; Part V: Summary and Conclusion.
Anaerobic digestion is a technology widely used for treatment of organic waste for biogas production as a source for clean energy. In this study, poultry house wastes (PHW) material was examined as a source for biogas production. The effects of inoculum addition, pretreatment of the substrate, and temperature on the biogas production were taken into full consideration. Results revealed that the effect of inoculum addition was more significant than the alkaline pretreatment of raw waste materials. The biogas recovery from inoculated waste materials exceeds its production from wastes without inoculation by approximately 70% at mesophilic conditions. Whereby, the increase of biogas recovery from pretreated wastes was by 20% higher than its
... Show More
This study aims to evaluate drinking water quality at the Al Wahda plant (WTP) in Baghdad city. A conventional water treatment plant with an average flow rate of 72.82 MLD. Water samples were taken from the influent and effluent of the treatment plant and analyzed for some physicochemical and biological parameters during the period from June to November 2020. The results of the evaluation indicate that treated water has almost the same characteristics as raw water; in other terms, the plant units do not remove pollutants as efficiently as intended. Based on this, the station appears to be nothing more than a series of water passage units. However, apart from Total dissolved solids, the mean values of all parameters in th
... Show More
(1)
AbstractObjectives: The work environment has an impact on the performance of nurses, as well as to determine the relationship between the work environment and the performance of nurses.Research methodology: A descriptive analytical study was designed for the impact of the work environment on the performance of nurses' jobs in the hospitals of the city of Nasiriyah. The study began in the period from May 15, 2022 to 1 November, 2022. The non-probability (purposive) sample consisted of (410) nurses working in the city center hospitals. Nasiriyah, they were chosen based on the study criteria, and after obtaining approval from them. The data was collected using the questionnaire, which consi
... Show More
(4)
In this work, some mechanical properties of the polymer coating were improved by preparing a hybrid system containing Graphene (GR) of different weight percentages (0.25, 0.5, 1, and 2wt%) with 5wt% carbon fibres (CF) and added to a polymer coating by using casting method. The properties were improved as GR was added with further improvement on adding 5wt% of CF. The impact strength of acrylic polymer with GR increases with increasing weight ratio of GR; maximum value was obtained when the polymer coating was incorporated with 1wt% GR and 5wt% CF. The impact strength of acrylic polymer with GR and GR/CF composites incorporated with GR at 1wt% and CF at 5wt%. Hardness increase with increasing weight ratio of Gr and a significant imp
... Show More
(3)
The insect is diagnosed and named by the National Center of Biotechnology Information (NCBI), USA as the Mint leaf Beetle Chrysolina herbacea alnadawi (Duftschmid, 1825), (Coleoptera: Chrysomelidae). The diagnosis was performed depending on the DNA analysis by 73% similarity with Chrysolina herbacea (Duftschmid, 1825) sequence, In the present study. It is recorded as a new insect pest on mint plant Mentha puleguim (L,1753) (Lamiaceae). DNA analysis confirmend that it is recorded for the first time in Iraq and the Arab world as well as the Middle East. Those insects were observed initially during August 2017 in residential gardens of Al-Bonooq district in Baghdad / Iraq.
(3)
Background: This clinical trial aims to evaluate the color changes of direct resin composite veneer (DCV) restorations based on spectrophotometric analysis of 4 different types of resin composites between the baseline immediately after polishing and after one year of follow-up. Materials and methods: 28 patients were assessed for eligibility for participation, aged between 18 and 38 years old, who indicated for DCV restorations in anterior maxillary teeth were considered for participation in this study. In total, 25 patients who met the inclusion criteria were selected (6 males and 19 females, mean age: 20.9 at the time of restoration placement), and 3 patients were excluded. Partic
... Show More
(4)
(3)
Klebsiella pneumoniae is a severe opportunistic strain of enteric bacteria that is a major cause of urinary tract infection and pneumonia. This study was conducted in Baghdad City during September 2020-November 2020 on 50 clinical samples of urine, vaginal, sputum, wound swabs, ear swabs, and burn swabs. strains were identified using the VITEK-2 compact system and tested in K. pneumoniae terms of susceptibility to various antimicrobial drugs by Kirby-Bauer test. The isolates were more predominant in the females (56%) compared to males (44%). The antibiotic resistance rate of varied among different isolated clinical sample sources. K. pneumoniae K. pneumoniae isolated from different clinical specimens differed with respect
... Show MoreMany condensed polymers [A1-A7] were prepared via reaction of (Ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid = EDTA), with different prepared imide-diamines by modification [ modification of amino acids and antibiotics (B1- B7)] Imide-diamines were prepared by chlorination of L-amino acids such as [ L-Histidine, L-Alanine, L-Valine, L-Glycine and L-Aspargine ] or selected antibiotics such as [Cephallixine monohydrate and Amoxilline ] with thionyl chloride at 0°C, then reacted with ammonia to obtain imidediamines [B1-B7] . The physical properties of all prepared condensed polymers [A1-A7], new prepared diamines [B1-B7] were studied and characterized by FT -IR spectroscope to certify the structural formulas. The thermal analysis (TGA, DTA) were studied, a
... Show More
(20)
(15)
The varied thermal conductivity (insulation) of silica aerogel with heating for different pH has been investigated, it has been depended on ambient pressure drying method in the preparing silica aerogel samples, also six different pH of samples (1, 2, 3, 7, 8 and 9) were treated under five degree of heating with (50,100,150,200 and 250) ᴼC. This technique is important to test the carry-outs hydrophobic silica to temperature without high-quality material changes in the basic characteristics. The hot-wire technique is used in this work to examine the thermal conductivity, Fourier Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (FTIR) depended to characterize the bonds and their artificial by heating. Resu
... Show More
(15)
(9)