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.
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The main goal of the current research is to know -Environmental problems included in the content of the two science books (chemistry units) for intermediate stage
A list of environmental problems had been prepared and consisting of (8) main areas which are (air and atmosphere pollution, water pollution, soil pollution, energy, disturbance of biodiversity and environmental balance, waste management, food and medicinal pollution, investment of mineral wealth). Of which (60) sub-problems, at that time the researcher analyzed the two science books (two chemistry units) for the intermediate stage of the academic year (2020-2021) in light of the list that was prepared, and the validity and consisten
... Show MoreRecently, some prostate cancer patients have acquired resistance to the second -generation drugs (anzalutamide and apalutamide) prescribed for the treatment of this disease due to the emergence of the F876L mutation, which represents a challenge to modern medicine. In this study, a new series of 2-thiohydantoin derivatives were prepared through the reaction of different derivatives of maleimide (1c-4c) with isothiocyanate derivatives. The prepared compounds were diagnosed using FT-IR,1H-NMR ,13C-NMR, Mass spectra. The prepared series compounds has been studied against prostate cancer cells. The MTT assay was used to determine the activity of the prepared compounds against prostate cancer cells. The da
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The definition of "prostitute" and prostitution is a difficult one and a
question over which the legislators of many lands and nations differed. A
notable feature of prostitution is its epidemic increase at times of war,
revolution and armed commotion, on account of economic, social and
psychological factors generated by such conditions of mortal conflicts. Wars
invariably deprive young wives and lovers of their men folk, resulting in
financial , sexual and emotional frustrations . At no time is the natural
balance between the sexes more seriously disturbed than during wars, when
thousands of men are thrown into one sector of the country and hundreds of
towns and villages are left to women and children only. Lo
Objective: preparing educational units for the magnet poles strategy in learning the spiking skill in volleyball, and identifying the effect of the magnet poles strategy in learning the spiking skill in volleyball for female students.Research methodology: The experimental design with two equal experimental and control groups with tight control was also adopted in the pre- and post-tests. The boundaries of this research community are represented by fourth-grade middle school students at Basra Girls' Middle School (2024-2025), whose total number is (90) students, distributed by nature into 4 sections. Sections (A-B) were determined by lottery, so that Section (A) represents the experimental group and Section (B) represents the control
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There are numbers of automatic translation services that internet users can choose to automatically translate a certain text, and Google translate is one of these automatic services that proposes over 51 Languages. The present paper sheds light on the nature of the translation process offered by Google, and analyze the most prominent problems faced when Google translate is used. Direct translation is common with Google Translate and often results in nonsensical literal translations, particularly with long compound sentences. This is due to the fact that Google translation system uses a method based on language pair frequency that does not take into account grammatical rules which, in turn, affects the quality of the translation. The
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The Arab Muslime Paid agreat attention to the Islamic East, especially after their conquest to the Parisian lands, they went forword to continue their conquest till Transoxiara (the lands beyond the river). The research is included the Islamic efforts to conquest (Transoxiara) , They needed mouch time for more than 40 years to conquest it. To sattle their steps in it they used its leading figures to prevent the breaking of the agreement held between them as they were known for doing this before more than once. The main idea of this research is releated to study that history in the Arabic resources.
اﻟﺴﯿﺎق ﻓﻲ َأدرك ﻋﻠﻤﺎؤﻧﺎ اﻷواﺋﻞ أﺛﺮَ اﻟﺴﯿﺎق ﻗﺮﯾﻨﺔ ﻣﻦ اﻟﻘﺮاﺋﻦ اﻟﻤﺆﺛﺮة ﻓﻲ ﻣﻌﻨﻰ اﻟﺨﻄﺎب، وﻗﺪ ﻠﻤﺔ ّ وﺗﻤﺜﻞ ﻟﺪﯾﮭﻢ ﻓﻲ ﺟﺎﻧﺒﯿﻦ :اﻷول اﻟﺴﯿﺎق اﻟﻠﻐﻮي اﻟﺬي ﯾﻘﻮم ﻋﻠﻰ أﺳﺎس أن اﻟﻜ ،ﺗﻮﺟﯿﮫ اﻟﻤﻌﻨﻰ وﺗﺤﺪﯾﺪه ِﻜﻮن ﺣُﺴﻨﮭﺎ ورداءﺗﮭﺎ ﻓﻲ ﻧﻈﻤﮭﺎ، ّ ﻻ ﻗﯿﻤﺔ ﻟﮭﺎ ﻓﻲ ﺣﺎل إﻓﺮادھﺎ، وإﻧﻤﺎ ﯾ واﻟﺜﺎﻧﻲ اﻟﺴﯿﺎق اﻟﺤﺎﻟﻲ، وذﻟﻚ ُ ُ ﺑﺮﺑﻄﮭﻢ اﻟﺼﯿﺎﻏﺔ اﻟﻠﻐﻮﯾﺔ ﺑﺎ
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