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.
(1)
Witch stories are part of American popular culture, and this culture is extremely influenced by a continuing reliance on its past. The modern obsession of Americans with witches, whether real or metaphorical, is related to politics especially when it came to issues of gender politics. This article exposes a modern image of the female character seen from a male author point of view. John Updike, influenced by the changes that happened to women within second wave of feminism, attempted to write The Witches of Eastwick (1984). Actually, he presented women who did have a sort of careers. His witches are professional active and dynamic. What do witches stand for in American Culture? Why did Updike choose to write
... Show MoreThe major climate changes that have affected the planet in addition to wave the big drought plaguing the study area, including the lack of water for imports Badra River fatigue because of the Iran constructing dams on this river and make use of the waters for the benefitof its territory. The subject of finding sources of water has become available with the possibility of exploiting them in an exemplary manner is one of the key things in order to be exploited somewhere.
The study area was chosen within the eastern border of the province of Wasit within the district of Badra border, an area of (1557.5 km2) almost "to study the characteristics of hydrological and identify possibilities for water harvesting them. In this study was conduct
NiO nanoparticle synthesis by chemical method and characterized by XRD with crystal size 11.72
nm and grain size 13 nm from FESEM image also NiO micro used ,two NiO as an additive to evaluate the
possibility of producing photodegradable polymers, the practical application of solid-phase photocatalytic
degradation of polyvinyl chloride (PVC- NiO composite films) was investigated. PVC has a negative impact
on the environment since its polymer degrades slowly, yet it has a wide range of industrial applications and
the amount used shows no evidence of diminishing use. Thus, a synthesis of modified PVC- NiO micro and
nano has been studied with 0, 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, and 300 (hours) as irradiation time a
(6)
(1)
Nowadays, the worldwide issue of the environment occupies the minds not only of ecological experts and politicians but also is addressed in cultural fields and literature in particular. The conceptualization of ecocriticism, whether in the ecological field or cultural studies, has come as a response to the increasing public awareness of numerous environmental crises. Most ecocritics regard John Clare (1793-1864) as a 'proto-ecological' British poet since his poetry incorporates ecological issues which were not then categorized as they are now. The study offers a precise illustration of ecocriticism coupled with a number of the most significant ecological concepts proven in selected poems by John Clare. The ecocritical reading of Clare's po
... Show Moreالنظام السياسي اليمني : دراسة في المتغيرات الداخلية
In this paper, there are two main objectives. The first objective is to study the relationship between the density property and some modules in detail, for instance; semisimple and divisible modules. The Addition complement has a good relationship with the density property of the modules as this importance is highlighted by any submodule N of M has an addition complement with Rad(M)=0. The second objective is to clarify the relationship between the density property and the essential submodules with some examples. As an example of this relationship, we studied the torsion-free module and its relationship with the essential submodules in module M.
Marriage is a holly secret in Christian religion .So it id natural that its ceremonies acquired religious form .In general the marriage is contracted by minister of religion in presence of the two parties or by a proxy or presence of parents if it is necessary . And to make the condition of publicity for the marriage ,its procedures must be made before witnesses .Also the minister of religionhave to confirm the agreement of the two parties before beginning the procedures.The marriage ceremonies are made.These procedures are religious traditions that includes praying and make blessings and putting the rings in fingers by thepriest . The marriage is a holly secret performed by the crown pray according to the church religious traditions
The present study aims at analyzing the polysemy of the English preposition in from the cognitive linguistic (CL) point of view using Evans' and Tyler's approach (2003). The perplexity faced by Iraqi second language learners (L2) due to the multi-usages of this preposition has motivated the researcher to conduct this study. Seventy-six second year university students participated in this experimental study. The data of the pre-test and post-test were analyzed by SPSS statistical editor. The results have shown the following: First, a progress of more than (0.05≤) has been detected as far as students' understanding of the multiple usages of the preposition in is concerned. Second, the results of the questionnaire have s
... Show MoreGlobally, the COVID-19 pandemic’s development has presented significant societal and economic challenges. The carriers of COVID-19 transmission have also been identified as asymptomatic infected people. Yet, most epidemic models do not consider their impact when accounting for the disease’s indirect transmission. This study suggested and investigated a mathematical model replicating the spread of coronavirus disease among asymptomatic infected people. A study was conducted on every aspect of the system’s solution. The equilibrium points and the basic reproduction number were computed. The endemic equilibrium point and the disease-free equilibrium point had both undergone local stability analyses. A geometric technique was used
... Show More
(5)
(4)