⏳ "Contemporary" 指的是甚麼時間？

I stumbled upon this article in The Atlantic (a culture magazine) recently. It discusses the possibility of the “end” of reading as a human activity in the age of social media and A.I.

This inspired me to write today’s email on the word “contemporary” and its different meanings and grammatical roles.

Let’s look at this sentence from the article first:

But contemporary historians tend to dismiss the importance of these dramatic incidents in favor of a more mundane cause of death: negligence.

不過，當代歷史學家往往淡化這些戲劇性事件的重要性，認為圖書館消亡的更主要、也更平凡的原因，是人們的疏忽。

The sentence brings up the point that, while historians in the past attributed the disappearance of the ancient Library of Alexandria to dramatic events like war, “contemporary” historians think the collections there could just have been neglected by people.

I want to discuss the word “contemporary” because it comes up quite often in English, especially in writing about history (which we can call “historiography”).

The word has two grammatical versions -- one is an adjective, and the other is a noun.

As an adjective, “contemporary” has two distinct, non-overlapping meanings. The first is “from the time in context,” and the second is “from our current time.”

For example:

Contemporary accounts of the battle described it as unusually violent.

當時的記載把那場戰役描述為異常激烈。

In this sentence, the adjective “contemporary accounts” means “accounts from the time of these battles.” “Contemporary” is pointing at the time mentioned in context.

However:

Contemporary historians tend to dismiss the importance of these dramatic incidents in favor of a more mundane cause of death: negligence.

當代歷史學家往往淡化這些戲劇性事件的重要性，認為圖書館消亡的更主要、也更平凡的原因，是人們的疏忽。

In our sentence from the article, “contemporary historians” means “historians now” and not “historians from the time of the Library’s disappearance.” We know this from the context of the sentence because it is arguing that historians now have a different take from their predecessors.

It has always struck me as interesting that this same word can express these two distinct meanings about time.

Remember that, in our “Boost Your Vocabulary” course, I keep stressing the importance of making etymological, semantic, and thematic connections between vocabulary words.

In this case, etymologically, the word “contemporary” has Latinate roots, with the prefix “con-” meaning “with” or “together,” and the word root “temp-” meaning “time.” If you have this background knowledge about this Latinate prefix and word root, you can learn and/or remember the word “contemporary” and its meanings much more readily--because it has to do “with time” in a particular “context.”

Namely, the “context” for the time that is referred to can come from the sentence itself, or it can be “our context now, as we read this sentence.”

It is interesting to note that we would use different words to translate “contemporary” in Chinese depending on which of the two possible temporal meanings it is expressing (當時 vs. 當代/現代).

“Contemporary” also has a noun version, which is also a very common word. As a noun, though, it only has one meaning, which is “a person from the same time period as someone else.” For example:

Haydn was a contemporary of Mozart.

海頓與莫札特是同時代的人。

Shakespeare and Cervantes were contemporaries.

莎士比亞和塞萬提斯是同一時代的人。

Next time you see this word, try to work out which grammatical version it is, and, if it is adjective, determine whether it is referring to “the time in context” or “our time.”

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最近，我偶然看到文化雜誌《The Atlantic》的一篇文章。文章探討的是：在社交媒體與人工智能的時代，「閱讀」這種人類活動，會否有可能在未來不再存在。

這啟發我在今天的電郵中談談 “contemporary” 這個字，以及它不同的意思和文法角色。

我們先看看文章中的這句話：

But contemporary historians tend to dismiss the importance of these dramatic incidents in favor of a more mundane cause of death: negligence.

不過，當代歷史學家往往淡化這些戲劇性事件的重要性，認為圖書館消亡的更主要、也更平凡的原因，是人們的疏忽。

這句說的是，過去的歷史學家將古代亞歷山大圖書館的消失歸因於戰爭等戲劇性事件，但現代歷史學家則認為，館內的藏書可能只是因為人們的疏忽而逐漸消失。

我想談談 “contemporary” 這個字，因為經常會出現，尤其在有關歷史的寫作中（歷史書寫在英文的學術名稱是 “historiography”）。

這個字有兩個文法版本——一個是形容詞，另一個是名詞。

作為形容詞時，“contemporary” 有兩個不同、互不重疊的意思。第一個是「來自語境所指的那個時代」，第二個是「來自我們目前身處的時代 / 現代」。

例如：

Contemporary accounts of the battle described it as unusually violent.

當時的記載把那場戰役描述為異常激烈。

在這句中，“contemporary accounts” 中的形容詞 “contemporary”，是指「來自這場戰役發生的時代的（記載）」。“Contemporary” 指向的是語境中提到的戰役的那個時代。

然而：

Contemporary historians tend to dismiss the importance of these dramatic incidents in favor of a more mundane cause of death: negligence.

當代歷史學家往往淡化這些戲劇性事件的重要性，認為圖書館消亡的更主要、也更平凡的原因，是人們的疏忽。

在文章的這句中，“contemporary historians” 的意思則是「現今的歷史學家」，而不是「亞歷山大圖書館消失時的歷史學家」。我們可以從句子的語境知道這一點，因為它所說的是：現今的歷史學家與前人有不同的看法。

我一直覺得很有趣：同一個字，竟然可以表達這兩個截然不同的時間意思。

大家記得，在我們的 “Boost Your Vocabulary” 課程中，我一直強調，在不同的單字之間建立字源、語義和主題上的連繫，是非常重要的。

就這個例子而言，從字源上看，“contemporary” 有拉丁詞源：前綴 “con-” 的意思是「與」或「一起」，而字根 “temp-” 的意思則是「時間」。如果你有這些關於拉丁文前綴和字根的背景知識，就可以更容易學懂或記住 “contemporary” 這個字及其意思——因為它所表達的，正是在某個特定語境中「與時間」相關的概念。

也就是說，所指的時間可以是句子本身內容中的時間，也可以是「我們現在閱讀這句話時所身處的時間」。

值得留意的是，視乎 “contemporary” 所表達的是兩個時間意思中的哪一個，我們在中文會用不同方式來翻譯它（例如「當時」vs.「當代／現代」）。

“Contemporary” 也有一個名詞版本，同樣非常常見。不過，作為名詞時，它只有一個意思，就是「（與另一個人）同一時代的人」。例如：

Haydn was a contemporary of Mozart.

海頓與莫札特是同時代的人。

Shakespeare and Cervantes were contemporaries.

莎士比亞和塞萬提斯是同一時代的人。

下次看到這個字時，可以嘗試判斷它是哪一個文法版本；如果它是形容詞，就再判斷它所指的是「語境中的那個時代」，還是「我們身處的時代」。

"Fussy" vs. "fuzzy"... vs. "cosy"/"cozy" 🤔😭 更多英文串字 ↔ 發音對應惱人的例子

In recent weeks, I introduced a few new words (like “caveat” and “nonchalant”) with pronunciations that you probably cannot “guess” correctly based on the already inconsistent correspondence between English spelling and the actual phonemes it represents.

Today, I want to introduce and contrast two pairs of examples to show another interesting (and also bewildering) point about the English writing system and how maddening its sound correspondences can sometimes be.

We can use this opportunity to first learn these words as well, if you don’t already know them. These happen to be more “everyday” English words rather than “academic” words or words you might encounter in a work context, so my guess is that they might be new to you—or perhaps you have seen them before but don’t know exactly what they mean.

The words are “fussy,” “fuzzy,” “cosy,” and “cozy.”

Let’s first look at “fussy” vs. “fuzzy.”

“Fussy” (/ˈfʌsi/ 🔈) means being very “picky” about what you like and dislike or, when it is used to describe small children, being easily upset and difficult to soothe.

For example:

My daughter is a very fussy eater.

我的女兒非常挑食。

The baby has been very fussy since getting the shot.

寶寶打針後一直很扭計。

“Fuzzy” (/ˈfʌzi/ 🔈), on the other hand, means “covered in very fine, soft hair” (this type of fine hair is called “fuzz”). It also has the figurative meaning of being “unclear” and “difficult to make out properly.”

For example:

The peach has fuzzy skin.

桃子的表皮上有一層細毛。

This is a fuzzy memory for me.

我對這件事的記憶很模糊。

So, “fussy” and “fuzzy” are two different English words with two distinct pronunciations that are differentiated by native speakers—because the starting consonants of their second syllables are respectively the unvoiced fricative /s/ and the voiced fricative produced in the same place, /z/. (I won’t repeat here what “voiced” and “unvoiced” pairs of consonants like /s/ and /z/ are. This is explained in detail in our “The Sounds of English” course.)

We can see that these two words are spelled respectively with the letters “s” and “z”—so it seems that the spelling system is pretty transparent and consistent in this instance!

😅 Now, let’s move on to the other two words I mentioned: “cosy” and “cozy.”

You might have seen either version of this word, or both versions. I say “versions” because these are actually the same word.

“Cosy/cozy” (/ˈkoʊzi/ 🔈) means “warm” and “comfortable,” and it is very often used to describe the feeling that being at home gives you.

For example:

We spent a cosy/cozy evening at home.

我們在家度過了一個溫暖舒適的晚上。

“Cosy” and “cozy” are two spelling variants of the same word with the same pronunciation. This word is pronounced with the voiced fricative /z/ at the start of its second syllable. The variant “cosy” is the conventional British spelling of the word, whereas the variant “cozy” is the conventional American spelling.

Now, do you see the maddening part about this?

If we had stayed with the example of “fussy” and “fuzzy” and hadn’t looked at any other words, we might reasonably conclude that, in English, when the pronunciation involves the consonant /s/, it is spelled with the letter “s”; whereas, when the pronunciation involves the consonant /z/, it is spelled with the letter “z.”

But this straightforward and consistent correspondence simply does not exist in English spelling, especially when we introduce the spelling variation between the two major varieties of native English in the world: American and British English.

In this example, for instance, in the “British” spelling of the word “cosy,” the phoneme /z/ in pronunciation is represented by the letter “s”—whereas in the word “fuzzy,” it is represented by the letter “z.”

One reason why the letter “s” representing /z/ in “cosy” does not create more confusion in real life is that this word happens not to exist in a “minimal pair”—meaning that there is no other word with the /s/ sound in the second syllable that is distinguished from “cosy/cozy” solely by the difference between /s/ and /z/. (But this does not make is less confusing for foreign language learners…)

As you can see just from what I have written above, the opaque English spelling system is confusing on many different levels—and even explaining one simple point about it can be quite difficult as it requires us to tease apart and integrate many different layers of knowledge about vocabulary, phonology, and regional variations.

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最近幾個星期，我介紹了幾個大家單憑串字方式不會正確「猜到」讀音的新字（例如 caveat 和 nonchalant）。因為即使你對英文串字跟讀音之間這套本身已經非常不一致的對應系統有一定認識，也會根據自己所知的對應規律，對這幾個字的讀音作出錯誤推斷。

今天，我想介紹和比較兩組例子，讓大家看到英文書寫系統另一個有趣（但也令人困惑）的地方，以及它的讀音和串字對應有時可以有多令人抓狂。

如果大家本身不認識這幾個字，我們也可以趁這個機會先學習它們。這些剛好都是英文中比較「日常」的字，而不是「學術」字，亦不是大家可能會在工作場合中遇到的字，所以我猜它們對大家來說可能是新字——又或者你以前見過，但不完全知道它們是甚麼意思。

這幾個字就是 fussy、fuzzy、cosy 和 cozy。

我們先看看 fussy 和 fuzzy。

Fussy（/ˈfʌsi/ 🔈）的意思是對自己喜歡和不喜歡的東西非常「挑剔」；用來形容年幼小朋友時，也可以表示他們很容易「扭計」，而且很難安撫。例如：

My daughter is a very fussy eater.

我的女兒非常挑食。

The baby has been very fussy since getting the shot.

寶寶打針後一直很扭計。

另一方面，fuzzy（/ˈfʌzi/ 🔈）是「表面被非常幼細柔軟的毛覆蓋」（這種細毛英文就是 fuzz）抽象地，它也有「模糊不清」和「難以清楚辨認」的意思，可以用作形容記憶等。例如：

The peach has fuzzy skin.

桃子的表皮上有一層細毛。

This is a fuzzy memory for me.

我對這件事的記憶很模糊。

所以，fussy 和 fuzzy 是兩個不同的英文字，也有兩個母語人士會清楚區分的不同讀音——因為它們第二個音節開首的子音，分別是「清（沒有聲帶預振）」的摩擦音 /s/，以及在同一位置發出的「濁（有聲帶預振的）」摩擦音 /z/。（我不會在這裏再次解釋 /s/ 和 /z/ 這類「清」和「濁」的子音對是甚麼。我們的《The Sounds of English》課程有詳細解釋。）

我們可以看到，這兩個字在書寫中，分別有字母 s 和 z ——所以在這對例子中，英文的串字系統看起來相當透明和一致！

😅 但我們再看看剛才提到的另外兩個字：cosy 和 cozy。

你可能見過這個字的其中一個版本，也可能兩個版本都見過。我說「版本」，是因為它們其實是同一個字。

Cosy/cozy（/ˈkoʊzi/ 🔈）是「溫暖」和「舒適」，經常用來形容家帶給我們的感覺。例如：

We spent a cosy/cozy evening at home.

我們在家度過了一個溫暖舒適的晚上。

Cosy 和 cozy 是同一個字的兩個串法版本，讀音完全相同。這個字第二個音節開首的子音，是濁摩擦音 /z/。Cosy 是這個字在英國串字習慣中的串法，而 cozy 則是美國串字習慣中的串法。

現在，大家看到令人抓狂的地方了嗎？

如果我們只看 fussy 和 fuzzy 的例子，沒有再看看其他字，就可能會合理地得出一個結論：在英文中，子音是 /s/ 時，便會用字母 s 寫；而子音是 /z/ 時，便會用字母 z 寫。

但英文串字系統根本沒有這種直接而一致的對應關係——尤其當我們再加入英國和美國這世界上兩種主要英語母語種類對某些字的不同串法習慣時。

例如，在 cosy 這個字的「英式」串法中，讀音裏的音素 /z/ 是由字母 s 代表的——但在 fuzzy 這個字中，/z/ 卻是由字母 z 代表。

在現實中，「英式」串法的 cosy 裏的字母 s 代表 /z/ 音之所以不會造成更多混淆，主要原因，是這個字剛好不是一對「minimal pair」中的一個——換句話說，英文並沒有兩個意思不同的字，純粹以第二個音節中的 /s/ 和 /z/ 作為讀音上的區別。

因此，即使「英式」串法 cosy 以字母 s 代表 /z/，在實際使用時也不會令母語人士混淆兩個不同的字。（但對外語學習者來說，這串法還是會令人混亂……）

從這兩個組例子，大家可以看到，英文不透明的串字「系統」，在很多不同層面上都非常「不系統」——就連解釋以上看似簡單的重點也可以相當困難，因為我們需要逐一拆解並應用跟英文詞彙、語音系統和地區差異有關的多層知識。

✍🏻 "On Morrison"：介詞 on 的介詞組其中一個表達的意思

I recently started reading the book “On Morrison” by Harvard English professor Namwali Serpell, which is a work of literary criticism about the entire oeuvre of the seminal American novelist Toni Morrison. The book came to my attention because it has appeared on many “best of 2026” book lists so far this year.

This book inspired me to write an email about one of the meanings expressed by the preposition “on”—because, in addition to the book’s title, the title of its preface is also a prepositional phrase with “on”: “On Difficulty.” Every subsequent chapter is also essentially a long essay “on” a particular work in the writer’s oeuvre.

If you have taken our foundational grammar course “Core Concepts of English,” you would know that prepositional phrases are modifier phrases that start with a preposition—like “on”—and are completed by nouns or noun phrases—like “Morrison,” “difficulty,” or “the bus.”

You might also remember that, as modifier phrases, prepositional phrases can express meanings in essentially three different ways:

First, phrases with a particular preposition have a range of relational meanings that they can express by themselves with their noun phrases. For example, one of the relational meanings that the preposition “on” expresses with the noun phrase after it is “spatially on top of something.” In “the book is on the table,” the prepositional phrase “on the table” expresses the meaning of “spatially on top of the table” by itself.

Second, prepositional phrases can express fixed meanings as fixed expressions by themselves. For example, the expression “on duty”—meaning “working at that time”—is a fixed expression with the preposition “on.” There is no need to think about the relational meaning between “on” and the noun “duty” here—this is simply a fixed prepositional phrase with a fixed meaning.

Third, certain verbs, in order to express specific meanings, have the structural characteristic of requiring a prepositional phrase with a specific preposition. For example, when the verb “depend” needs to express the “recipient” of this “dependence,” it has to be completed by a specific prepositional phrase with “on,” such as “on you”: “We are depending on you.”

Now, let’s go back to the prepositional phrase that forms the title of the book, “On Morrison.”

Can you tell which “category” of meaning this prepositional phrase is expressing here?

It is the first type outlined above. Namely, one of the relational meanings that the preposition “on” can express with the noun phrase after it is the figurative meaning of “about that noun phrase” or “pertaining to that noun phrase.”

In other words, the prepositional phrase “On Morrison,” as a book title by itself, tells the reader that “this book is going to elucidate the works of the writer Toni Morrison.” Similarly, the title of the preface, “On Difficulty,” expresses by itself the meaning that “this chapter is going to explain the concept of ‘difficulty’ in Morrison’s works.”

As such, “On Morrison” is a very apt title for this book of literary criticism.

If we were to put this prepositional phrase back into a full clause or sentence as a modifier, we could say, for example:

Namwali Serpell wrote a book of literary criticism on Toni Morrison’s works.

Can you form another sentence with a prepositional phrase containing “on” that expresses this same meaning?

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最近，我開始閱讀哈佛英文系教授 Namwali Serpell 所寫的《On Morrison》。這是一本評論美國重要小說家 Toni Morrison 全部作品的文學評論著作。我會留意到這本書，是因為它至今已經登上了不少「2026 年度最佳書籍」名單。

這本書令我想到，可以寫一封電郵，介紹介詞 on 所表達的其中一個意思——因為除了書名之外，這本書序言的標題 “On Difficulty” 也是一個包含 on 的介詞組。之後的每一章，也基本上都是一篇「on」這位作家某一部作品的長篇文章。

如果你修讀過我們的基礎文法課程《Core Concepts of English》，應該會知道介詞組是以介詞——例如 on——開首，並由名詞或名詞組——例如 Morrison、difficulty 或 the bus——完成的修飾語詞組。

大家可能也記得，作為修飾語詞組，介詞組基本上可以透過三種不同方式表達意思：

第一，某個介詞，本身可以跟它後面的名詞組表達不同的「關係性」意思。例如，介詞 on 跟其後的名詞組所表達的其中一個關係性意思，就是「在某件事物上面」的空間意思。在 “the book is on the table” 這句中，介詞組 “on the table” 自己就表達了「在桌子上面」的關係性意思。

第二，很多介詞組本身是固定用語，會表達固定的意思。例如，on duty 這個固定用語——意思是「當值中」——就是一個包含介詞 on 的介詞組。在這裏，我們不需要思考 on 跟名詞 duty 之間的關係性意思——它只是一個具有固定意思的固定介詞組用語。

第三，某些動詞在表達特定意思時，在結構上必須由包含某個特定介詞的介詞組完成。例如，當動詞 depend 需要表達「依賴」的「對象」時，就必須由包含 on 的特定介詞組完成，例如 “We are depending on you” 中的 “on you”。

那現在可以回到構成這本書書名的介詞組 “On Morrison”。

你能不能分析出，這個介詞組在這裏表達的是哪一個「類別」的意思呢？

它表達的是上面所說的第一類意思。具體來說，介詞 on 跟其後的名詞組可以表達的其中一個關係性意思，就是「關於這個名詞組」或「跟這個名詞組有關」的抽象意思。

換句話說，介詞組 “On Morrison” 本身作為書名，就很清晰地告訴讀者「這本書是『關於 Morrison』的，會解釋她的作品」。同樣，序言的標題 “On Difficulty” 本身表達的意思，就是「這一章是關於『difficulty』的，會解釋 Morrison 作品中『difficulty』這個概念」。

因此，《On Morrison》是一個非常貼切的文學評論書名。

如果我們把這個介詞組放回一個完整子句或句子中作為修飾語，可以例如：

Namwali Serpell wrote a book of literary criticism on Toni Morrison’s works.

Namwali Serpell 寫了一本關於 Toni Morrison 作品的文學評論著作。

你能不能使用一個包含 on、並表達跟這裡同一個意思的介詞組，組成另一個句子呢？

另一種製造新字的過程：If There's No "Forever" ♾️

Earlier this week, I introduced the productive English noun suffix “-gate,” which creates new, instantly understandable nouns that mean a “scandal,” “controversy,” or “drama” involving the word it is added to (like “Oreo-gate”).

This example shows us one natural mechanism by which new words are created in a synthetic language like English. (Linguists call a language whose words change forms to express different meanings and grammatical information a “synthetic” language—here is an old blog article I wrote about this years ago.) Namely, productive prefixes and suffixes can be added to other words to create new words whose meanings and grammatical roles are instantly understood by native speakers.

I want to add to that discussion today by showing you an example of another mechanism by which new words can be created: existing words can take on a different grammatical role to express a new, related meaning.

Again, I thought of this example organically, haha. All my inspiration for these emails comes from my daily life—because language is everywhere, and we can learn from anything if we step back and understand it in a clear, scientific, and systematic way.

The example that occurred to me is the word “forever.”

It came up because, recently, a friend of mine from Harvard who is now an independent filmmaker and film producer in Hollywood began producing a short film titled “If There’s No Forever.” She asked my husband Tyler and me (as well as other real-life couples) to film a short promotional video about “when we knew it was ‘forever’” for use on the film’s website.

Now, as you probably know, the word “forever” is a single-word adverb that means “for all time, without an end,” as in:

We will love each other forever.

However, in the title of this film, “forever” is a different version of the word that has taken on the grammatical role of a noun, meaning something like “a love that lasts forever.”

This noun version of “forever” has also become quite common in English and is readily understood by native speakers. It is a very good example that shows us how new words can be created when “old” words take on new grammatical roles and meanings.

Again, languages are constantly evolving!

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今個星期較早前，我介紹了英文中具生產性的名詞字尾 -gate。這個字尾會組成一些新的、母語人士一看就明白的名詞，意思是涉及它所加入的字的「醜聞」、「爭議」或「小是非」（例如 Oreo-gate）。

這個例子讓我們看到，像英文這類「綜合語」，可以透過其中一種自然的機制組成新字。（語言學家會把字會改變字形，以表達不同意思和文法資訊的語言稱為「綜合語」——這是我多年前寫過的一篇舊 blog 文章。）具體來說，具生產性的字頭和字尾可以加在其他字上，組成意思和文法角色都可以立即被母語人士理解的新字。

今天，我想延續這個討論，跟大家分享另一種組成新字的過程：現有的字可以被給予一個新的文法角色，表達一個新的相關意思。

同樣，這個例子也是我自然而然想到的，哈哈。我寫這些電郵的所有靈感都來自日常生活，因為語言無處不在，而只要我們退後一步，以清楚、科學和有系統的方式去理解語言，就可以從任何例子中學習。

我想到的例子是 forever 這個字。

最近，我一位在 Harvard 認識、現在於荷里活擔任獨立電影製作人和監製的朋友，開始製作一套名為 If There’s No Forever 的短片。她邀請我和丈夫 Tyler（以及其他現實生活中的伴侶），拍攝一段關於「我們甚麼時候知道對方就是『forever』」的短宣傳影片，放在電影的網站上。

大家大概都知道，forever 是一個單字副詞，意思是「永遠、沒有盡頭」，例如：

We will love each other forever.

我們會永遠愛對方。

不過，在這套電影的名稱中，forever 是這個字的另一個版本，被給予了名詞的文法角色，意思大概是「一份永遠持續的愛」。

這個 forever 的名詞版本，現在也已經成為英文中頗常見的字，而母語人士也可以直接理解它的意思。這是一個很好的例子，讓我們看到當「舊」字開始擔當新的文法角色、表達新的意思時，就會變成語言中的新字。

語言是不斷演變的！

“Oreo-gate” 事件🍪🫣 (從這事件學習英文具生產性名詞字尾 -gate)

If you are a mom of young children like me and follow some “mom-fluencer accounts” on social media, you have probably heard about a recent incident called “Oreo-gate.” 😅

This incident—or “-gate” (more on this grammatical point further down)—started as some minor “drama” between the pre-school moms in a chat group and went viral on the internet, sparking heated parental debates around topics like food and nutrition, as well as parents’ rights to make independent choices for their own children.

Anyway, basically, the “drama” was this: in a pre-school mom chat group in the U.S., one mom asked the other moms not to put Oreos in their children’s lunch boxes because her daughter is not allowed to have any sweets, and she didn’t want her daughter to become jealous of her friends’ lunches and ask for the same snacks at home. 😅

Predictably, the other moms in the group—including the one who had put Oreos in her daughter’s lunch box—reacted negatively to this demand. The entire back-and-forth in the chat group (it was drawn out because that mom pressed the matter further and stood her ground) sparked many different opinions on both sides of the debate across the internet.

(There’s some indication that the entire thing might have been concocted as promotional material for an A.I. company, but, anyway, the controversy it sparked was real.)

I obviously won’t go into the debate itself—because, if I have learnt anything since becoming a mom, it is that everything around pregnancy, childbirth, and parenting is highly incendiary, with every stakeholder (and even non-stakeholder) having a different personal opinion, haha. 😅

What I want to do instead is use this viral incident as a jumping-off point to talk about the productive noun suffix “-gate” in current English, which comes up a lot in the news. This suffix neatly shows us what linguists mean by “productive” grammatical elements in a language, as well as how languages constantly evolve and change in response to different external factors in the societies in which they are spoken.

The suffix “-gate” is a noun suffix that adds the meaning of “scandal or controversy” to the word it is added to. So, for example, “Oreo-gate” is a noun formed with this suffix that means “a controversy involving Oreos.”

Linguists call a suffix like “-gate” in current English a “productive” suffix because native speakers can freely add it to words to form new words like “Oreo-gate,” which are then readily understood by other native speakers.

For example, other “gates” in recent memory include “Slapgate,” which refers to Hollywood actor Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars, and “Cakegate,” which refers to a dispute in England over a bakery’s refusal to provide a free birthday cake and cupcakes for an actress in exchange for publicity. 😂

Because of this productive suffix, terms like “Slapgate,” “Cakegate,” and now “Oreo-gate” are instantly understood by native speakers to mean scandals involving a “slap,” a “cake,” and “Oreos.” 😂

Why did “-gate” become a productive noun suffix with this specific meaning?

It came about because of the infamous “Watergate” scandal, a major political scandal in the United States in the 1970s involving people connected to President Richard Nixon’s re-election campaign breaking into the offices of their political opponents to steal information and plant listening devices. “Watergate” was the name of the building complex where the break-in took place.

Later, because English suffixes define the grammatical roles of words, native speakers “grammaticalized” the “gate” part of “Watergate,” turning it into a productive suffix—even though it was originally just part of the name of a building and not a suffix at all. Once it had been “grammaticalized” as a noun suffix, “-gate” could be added to other words to form new nouns meaning “scandals” or “controversies.”

This is an interesting and prevalent example of how new productive elements are constantly added to the grammar and vocabulary of a living language—and also of how these new elements still fit into the same overall grammatical framework.

Next time you read English news and encounter a new “-gate,” you will know that you are getting yourself into some drama 👀

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如果你跟我一樣，是家中有年幼子女的媽媽，又會在社交媒體上追蹤一些「mom-fluencers」(mom 加 influencers 兩個字的合體，即媽媽網紅），你大概會聽過最近一宗叫做「Oreo-gate」的事件。😅

這宗事件——或者說，這宗「-gate」（下面會再詳細解釋這個文法重點）——原本只是美國一個學前班媽媽 What’sApp group 中的一場小事非，後來卻在網上瘋傳，更引發了家長之間的激烈辯論，討論的包括食物和營養，以及父母是否有權為自己的子女獨立作出選擇等議題。

簡單來說，這場事非是這樣的：在美國一個學前班媽媽 group 中，一位媽媽要求其他媽媽不要把 Oreo 放進子女的午餐盒，因為她不讓女兒吃任何甜食，而她不希望女兒看到朋友的午餐後感到妒忌，回家要求吃同樣的零食。😅

可以預料，group 中的其他媽媽——包括那位把 Oreo 放進女兒午餐盒的媽媽——都覺得這個要求有點霸道。這場你來我往的爭論（因為提出要求的媽媽繼續追究下去，堅持自己的立場），在網上引發了來自正反雙方的各種不同意見。

（有一些跡象顯示，整件事可能是為一家 A.I. 公司刻意編造的宣傳材料。不過是不是也好，它引發的爭議是真實的。）

我當然不會在這裏討論這場辯論本身——因為我成為媽媽後才知道了，所有跟懷孕、生產和育兒有關的事情都非常容易引發激烈爭議，每一個持份者（甚至不是持份者的人）都有自己不同的個人意見，哈哈。😅

我反而想以這宗在網上瘋傳的事件作為切入點，介紹現今英文中具生產性的名詞字尾 -gate。這個字尾在新聞中經常出現，也很清楚地讓我們看到，語言學家所說一種語言中具「生產性」的文法元素是甚麼，以及語言怎樣不斷因應使用這些語言的社會中的各種外在因素演變和加入新元素。

字尾 -gate 是一個名詞字尾，會為它所加入的字加上「醜聞或爭議」的意思。因此，例如 Oreo-gate 就是一個以這個字尾組成的名詞，意思是「一場涉及 Oreo 的爭議」。

語言學家會把現今英文中的 -gate 這類字尾稱為「具生產性」的字尾，因為母語使用者會自由地把它加在其他字後面，組成 Oreo-gate 之類的新字，而其他母語人士會直接理解這些新字的意思。

例如，近年其他以 -gate 組成的字包括 Slapgate，指荷里活演員 Will Smith 在奧斯卡頒獎禮上掌摑 Chris Rock 的事件；還有 Cakegate，指英國一家餅店拒絕免費為一位女演員提供生日蛋糕，以換取宣傳而引發的爭議。😂

正因為有這個具生產性的字尾，母語使用者看到 Slapgate、Cakegate，以及現在的 Oreo-gate 等名稱，就可以立即理解它們分別是涉及「一巴掌」、「蛋糕」和「Oreo」的醜聞或事非爭議。😂

為甚麼 -gate 會變成一個具有這個特定意思、具生產性的名詞字尾呢？

這是源自著名的「Watergate（水門事件）」醜聞。這是 1970 年代美國的一宗重大政治醜聞，涉及跟總統 Richard Nixon 競選連任團隊有關的人，闖入其政治對手的辦公室，企圖竊取資料和安裝竊聽器。Watergate 原本是發生這宗闖入事件的大廈名稱。

後來，由於英文字尾會界定那字的文法角色，母語人士便把 Watergate 中的 gate 部分「文法化」，變成了一個具生產性的字尾，但原本這只是建築物名稱的一部分，根本不是字尾。被「文法化」成了名詞字尾後，-gate 便變得可以加在其他字後面，組成意思是「醜聞」或「爭議」的新名詞。

這是一個有趣而且常見的例子，讓我們看到一種活生生的語言怎樣不斷把新的具生產性元素加入其文法和詞彙之中——以及這些新元素怎樣仍然被那語言原本的整體文法框架所規範。

下次你閱讀英文新聞，遇到一個新的「-gate」時，就會知道是關於事非的了。👀

"Nonchalant" 和 "Charlotte" 🇫🇷：另一個英文書寫方式「不透明」的例子

In an email last week, I introduced the word “caveat” (a noun meaning “a warning or limiting condition”) to you and used it as an example to show that the English spelling/writing system is famously “opaque”—as in, there is no totally consistent correspondence between the letters and letter strings used to spell words in writing and the actual English phonemes (individual consonant and vowel sounds) they represent.

The “opacity” of the English spelling system is explained in much more detail in our “The Sounds of English” course, but I just want to share another real-life example today because a personal friend asked me about it recently.

Namely, my friend asked me to record the pronunciation of the word “nonchalant” for him.

“Nonchalant” is a common English adjective that means “indifferent” or “appearing calm and not particularly interested in something.” Here is a simple example sentence:

She gave a nonchalant shrug after I told her the news.

我告訴她這個消息後，她若無其事地聳了聳肩。

But the meaning and grammatical characteristics of the word are not the point today. Instead, I want to use it as another example to show that English spelling is famously opaque.

As I explained in the email about “caveat” last week, one of the primary reasons why the spelling of English words corresponds so inconsistently to English phonemes is that English has a lot of loanwords from other (usually historically related) languages that also use Roman letters in their writing systems.

These loanwords range from words that were borrowed into English long ago and have become integrated into common English vocabulary to words that are still totally “foreign” but are used as they are to express meaning in English.

Either way, loanwords often still retain their “original” spellings from their languages of origin and so do not fit into the English spelling-to-phoneme correspondence system (which is not totally consistent to start with), even when their pronunciations have gained English phonological characteristics.

For example, the word “nonchalant” (commonly /nɑnʃəˈlɑnt/ in the General American pronunciation or /ˈnɒn.ʃəl.ənt/ in the General British pronunciation) is a French loanword, and the letter string “ch” in it—which corresponds to the phoneme /tʃ/ (like in “church”) in a lot of English words otherwise—actually represents the phoneme /ʃ/ (like in “ship”) instead.

This is because, in the French spelling system, the letter string “ch” represents the sound /ʃ/.

As such, if you were not aware of the French etymological origins of the English word “nonchalant” and did not look up its pronunciation with IPA, you would probably wrongly assume that the “ch” represents /tʃ/ (like in “church”) and mispronounce the word.

This, again, shows us that, if you want to be 100% certain how a new English word is pronounced, you ought to have a basic understanding of English phonemes and their corresponding one-to-one IPA symbols and then look up each word’s IPA transcription.

Incidentally, my English name “Charlotte” is also French in origin—and the “ch” letter string in it, like in “nonchalant,” represents the consonant /ʃ/ (“ship”) instead of /tʃ/ (“church”).

When you encounter French loanwords in English with the letter string “ch” in the future, remember to keep this in mind—or just look up the word to be 100% certain.

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在上星期的一封電郵中，我跟大家介紹了 caveat 這個字（一個意思是「附帶限制條件」的名詞），並用了這個字作例子，說明英文的 spelling／書寫系統是出了名地 opaque（不透明）的——也就是說，我們用來拼寫英文字的字母及字母串，跟它們實際代表的英文 phonemes（音素，即英文個別的子音和母音）之間，並沒有真正完全一致的對應關係。

我們的《The Sounds of English》課程有更詳細解釋英文 spelling 系統的「不透明」，但今天我想再分享一個生活中的例子，因為最近剛好有一位朋友問到我。

這位朋友請我錄下 nonchalant 這個英文字的讀音給他聽。

Nonchalant 是一個常見的英文形容詞，意思是「漠不關心的」，或「表現得平靜、像對某件事沒有特別感興趣的」。以下是一個簡單例句：

She gave a nonchalant shrug after I told her the news.

我告訴她這個消息後，她若無其事地聳了聳肩。

不過，這個字的意思和文法特徵並不是今天的重點。我想用它作為另一個例子，說明英文的 spelling 是出了名地不透明的。

正如我在上星期關於 caveat 的電郵中解釋，英文字的拼寫跟英文音素之間的對應關係這麼不一致，其中一個主要原因，就是英文有很多從其他（多數是有親戚關係的）語言借入的字，而這些語言同樣使用羅馬字母作為書寫系統。

這些借字，有些在很久以前就已經進入英文，已演變成為常見英文詞彙的一部分；有些則仍然是完完全全的「外語詞彙」，但我們會直接用它們原本的樣子，在英文中表達意思。

無論是哪一種情況，借字往往仍然保留了它們在來源語言中的「原本」拼寫方式，所以即使它們的讀音已經演變成具有英文語音特徵，拼寫仍然不符合英文的拼寫與音素對應系統（而這套系統本身就已經不是完全一致的）。

例如，nonchalant 這個字（一般美國口音發音是 /nɑnʃəˈlɑnt/，一般英國口音發音則為 /ˈnɒn.ʃəl.ənt/）是一個法文借字。當中的字母串 ch，在很多其他英文字中代表的是音素 /tʃ/（就像 church 中一樣），但在這個字中，代表的卻是音素 /ʃ/（就像 ship 中一樣）。

這是因為，在法文的書寫系統中，字母串 ch 代表的是 /ʃ/ 這個音。

因此，如果你不知道 nonchalant 這個英文字的法文字源，也沒有透過 IPA 查清楚它的讀音，就很可能會錯誤地以為當中的 ch 代表 /tʃ/（就像 church 中一樣），因而把這個字讀錯。

這再次說明，如果你想百分之百確定一個新的英文字應該怎樣讀，就應該對英文音素，以及跟它們一對一對應的 IPA 符號有基本認識，然後查清楚每個字的 IPA 標音。

順帶一提，我的英文名 Charlotte 也是來自法文的——而當中的字母串 ch，也跟 nonchalant 一樣，代表的是子音 /ʃ/（ship），而不是 /tʃ/（church）。

以後遇到有 ch 這個字母串的英文法文借字時，記得留意這一點——或者直接查清楚這個字的讀音，就可以百分之百確定。

Daily practice 日常練習 📖

The point of building a systematic and comprehensive framework of English grammar is that you can put everything you read and encounter in it to analyze and organize. On the one hand, you can reinforce your existing grammatical knowledge; on the other, you can learn (an infinite amount of) new things about words, expressions, and even cultural elements.

Here is a random sentence lifted from a recent news article from the British newspaper The Guardian:

Meta denies wrongdoing, and the amount it plans to pay will be spread over a decade.

Meta 否認有任何不當行為，而它計劃支付的款項將會分十年支付。

What grammatical knowledge can we reinforce with this simple sentence?

If you have taken “Core Concepts of English” before, you would be able to identify that this relatively simple sentence is first made up of two parts “linked” by the conjunction “and.”

“And” is a so-called coordinating conjunction because its role is to “add” another clause to a clause that is already a standalone sentence in its own right. The extra clause after “and” is structurally equal to — or on the same structural “level” as — the previous clause.

So, the parts linked by “and” here are:

[ Meta denies wrongdoing, ] and [ the amount it plans to pay will be spread over a decade. ]

The clause before “and” and the clause after “and” are on the same structural level.

But the clause after “and” actually contains another embedded clause inside it:

…and [ the amount [ (that) it plans to pay ] will be spread over a decade. ]

What kind of embedded clause is [ (that) it plans to pay ]?

It is a relative clause — the type of embedded clause that acts as an adjective to a noun phrase in its outer clause. Here, the relative clause [ (that) it plans to pay ] is modifying the noun phrase the amount as its adjective, expressing the meaning of 它打算支付的（款項).

The relative pronoun “that,” which represents the amount inside the relative clause, has been omitted — as it can be — because it is not playing the role of the subject inside the relative clause. The subject is “it.”

So, the whole sentence can be broken down in our analysis like this:

[ Meta denies wrongdoing, ] and [ the amount [ it plans to pay ] will be spread over a decade. ]

What other things can we learn from this simple sentence?

We can look at the vocabulary and expressions in it and tease out their specific meanings and structural characteristics in context. This is an important step in self-learning if we want to consistently build our productive knowledge of English.

For example, we can learn that the verb “deny,” when expressing this meaning, takes a direct object — as in “deny wrongdoing.”

We can also reinforce or add to our understanding of noun markers in English noun phrases — namely, that an abstract singular noun like “wrongdoing” often appears without a noun marker such as an article when it refers to an abstract entity or concept. Here, it is “deny wrongdoing” — not “deny a wrongdoing” or “deny the wrongdoing.”

What else can we learn or reinforce?

For example, we can look at the finite verb form “will be spread” in the outer clause of the part linked by “and.”

You can always test your knowledge of finite verb forms against real-life examples. What tense and aspect does this form have? Then, going one step further, you can think about the meaning that this particular finite verb form is expressing in this specific context, so that you can eventually express the same kind of meaning with this form in your own sentences.

“Will be spread” is in the future tense. It is in the simple aspect, but it has passive voice — that is why we have the auxiliary “be” and the past participle form of “spread,” which happens also to be “spread.” (If you didn’t know that the past participle form of “spread” is “spread” before, you can learn it here also.)

Here, the meaning expressed by this form is quite straightforward: the subject, “the amount it plans to pay,” will receive this core action in the future.

This is just a simple everyday example of how, once you have a grammatical framework in place, you can use virtually everything you encounter in English as an opportunity to reinforce what you already know and keep adding new knowledge to the same system.

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建立一套有系統而完整的英文整體文法框架的目的，是讓你可以把自己讀到、接觸到的所有英文，都放進這套框架之中分析和整理。一方面，你可以鞏固自己原有的文法知識；另一方面，你亦可以不斷學到（幾乎無限多的）新知識，包括詞彙、表達方式，甚至文化元素。

以下是一句我隨手從英國報章 The Guardian 最近一篇新聞文章中抽出來的句子：

Meta denies wrongdoing, and the amount it plans to pay will be spread over a decade.

Meta 否認有任何不當行為，而它計劃支付的款項將會分十年支付。

我們可以透過這句簡單的句子，鞏固哪些文法知識呢？

如果你以前修讀過 Core Concepts of English，你應該可以辨認到，這句相對簡單的句子，首先由兩個透過連接詞 and「連接」起來的部分組成。

And 是一個所謂的對等連接詞，因為它的作用，是在一個本身在結構和意思上都已經可以獨立成句的子句之後，再「加上」另一個子句。And 後面的額外子句，在結構上和前面的子句是對等的——亦即處於相同的結構層次。

所以，這裡由 and 連接的兩個部分是：

[ Meta denies wrongdoing, ] and [ the amount it plans to pay will be spread over a decade. ]

And 前面的子句和 and 後面的子句，處於同一個結構層次。

不過，and 後面的子句，其實本身又包含了另一個嵌入其中的嵌入子句：

…and [ the amount [ (that) it plans to pay ] will be spread over a decade. ]

那麼，[ (that) it plans to pay ] 是哪一種嵌入子句呢？

它是一個關係子句 relative clause——亦即一種在外層子句中，充當某個名詞組的形容詞的嵌入子句。

在這裡，關係子句 [ (that) it plans to pay ] 正在修飾名詞組 the amount，充當它的形容詞，表達的是「它打算支付的（款項）」這個意思。

關係代名詞 that 在這關係子句中是代替被修飾的 the amount 的，但它被省略了，因為 that 在這個關係子句內並不是充當主語角色。這個關係子句內的主語是 it。

所以，整句句子在分析時應這樣拆開：

[ Meta denies wrongdoing, ] and [ the amount [ it plans to pay ] will be spread over a decade. ]

那麼，我們還可以從這句簡單的句子中學到甚麼？

我們可以看看句子中的詞彙和表達方式，並在具體語境中進一步分析它們的特定意思和結構特徵。

如果我們希望持續建立自己對英文的生產性知識，而不只是看懂句子，這是自主學習中非常重要的一步。

例如，我們可以學到，動詞 deny 在表達這個意思時，會直接帶一個直接賓語，例如：

deny wrongdoing

我們亦可以藉此鞏固，或者補充自己對英文名詞組中名詞標記的理解。

例如，像 wrongdoing 這種抽象、文法上不可數並已單數字形出現的名詞，在表達它的抽象實體或概念時，往往不需要加上任何名詞標記，例如 article。

所以在這裡表達的意思中，是：deny wrongdoing

而不是：deny a wrongdoing （單數不可數名詞基本上不會被「a」標記）

或者：deny the wrongdoing

我們還可以學習或鞏固甚麼呢？

例如，我們可以看看由 and 連接的後面那個部分，其外層子句中的限定動詞字形：

will be spread

你其實可以隨時利用真實生活中遇到的例子，測試自己對限定動詞字形的理解。

這個字形有甚麼時態和體貌？再進一步，你還可以思考：這個限定動詞字形，在這個具體語境之中究竟表達甚麼意思？這樣，你日後就可以用同一個字形，在自己的句子中表達相同的意思。

Will be spread 顯示的是未來式時態，和簡單式體貌，但同時亦是被動語態——所以這裡會出現輔助動詞 be，以及 spread 的 past participle 字形。而剛好，spread 的 past participle 字形亦是 spread。（如果你以前不知道 spread 的 past participle 字形也是 spread，那麼你亦可以順便在這裡學到這一點。）

在這裡，這個字形所表達的意思相當直接：

主語 the amount it plans to pay，會在說話時的「未來」承受這個核心動作。

這只是一個很日常、很簡單的例子，用來說明：一旦你已經建立起一套文法框架，你其實可以把自己接觸到的幾乎每一句英文，都變成鞏固既有知識、並持續把新知識加入同一個系統之中的學習機會。

你看書時，會 "DNF" 嗎? 📚😂

I have written emails about my reading habits before and shared with you books that I found rewarding to read. Today, I want to share this funny Instagram post from The New York Times Book Review that I stumbled upon yesterday. (There is a grammatical point below too.)

The post is about how, on the book review website Goodreads, where ordinary readers share their thoughts on and review books they have read, there is now a new “shelf” called “Did Not Finish (DNF)”—a space where readers can share the books that they started reading and then put down (and maybe explain why).

According to the post, the addition of this new “DNF shelf” to the review site has apparently sparked lively discussions again between the “camp” of readers who are comfortable with “DNF-ing” books that they start and the “camp” of readers who are not comfortable doing so.

The “DNF camp” uses arguments like “life is too short for bad books!” as justification for putting down books that do not engage them from the start, while the “anti-DNF camp” says things like we should always “give books a chance to redeem themselves by the end.” 😂

I find this “spat” between the two “camps” amusing because I have always been firmly, squarely, 100% in the “anti-DNF” camp. 😂 It has been a personal habit for as long as I can remember: I do not ever stop reading books that I start. It is a matter of principle for me, hahaha. 😂

This “principle” has, on occasion, brought frustration, especially when I start books that are really long but whose tone or style I find grating from the first page. 😂 But, still, I am “proud” to say that I have never “DNF-ed” a book in my life.

There is also a point of interest about the term “DNF” from a grammatical perspective.

“DNF” is an “acronym,” which means that it is a term made up of the first letters of its component words—“did not finish.” What is grammatically interesting about this acronym is that it is actually a finite verb form and would normally be the core finite verb of a clause, for example in “I did not finish this book.”

However, since this acronym has become a slang term, it has undergone a grammatical transformation and taken on the role of a new verb in its own right rather than a finite verb form—with “DNF” as the infinitive form. Because “DNF” now functions as a new verb by itself, we can form sentences with it by changing its form, like in the first sentence in the post:

There are plenty of reasons to DNF.

…in which the verb “DNF” is in the infinitive phrase “to DNF.”

Or:

I am not okay with DNF-ing a book.

…in which the verb “DNF” is in its gerund noun form, “DNF-ing.”

Or:

I have never “DNF-ed” a book in my life.

…in which “DNF” is the main verb in past participle form in the finite verb “have DNFed.”

This is a fun example that shows us how new terms and words become integrated into the grammatical architecture and framework of a living and evolving language.

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我之前寫過一些關於自己閱讀習慣的電郵，也跟大家分享過一些我覺得讀完很有得着的書。今天，我想分享昨天偶然看到的《紐約時報書評》一個很好笑的 Instagram post。（下面也有一個文法重點。）

這個 post 說的是，在 Goodreads 這個書評網站上，現在新加了一個叫做「Did Not Finish（DNF）」的「書架」。Goodreads 是一個讓普通讀者分享自己對讀過的書的看法和書評的網站，而這個新的「書架」，就是讓讀者分享自己開始讀了、後來卻放下沒有讀完的（即「did not finish」的）書的空間，他們也可以順便解釋原因。

根據這個 post，網站新增了這個「DNF 書架」之後，似乎再次引發了兩個讀者「陣營」之間的熱烈討論：一邊是覺得開始了一本書之後，中途「DNF」是完全沒有問題的讀者；另一邊則是不太能接受這樣做的讀者。

「DNF 陣營」會用「人生太短，沒有時間讀爛書！」之類的論點，去把放下一本由一開始就無法吸引自己的書合理化；而「反 DNF 陣營」則會說，我們應該「給一本書機會，因為它在完之前都可能會變得好看」。😂

我覺得這兩個「陣營」之間的「爭執」很好笑，因為我一直都非常堅定、明確、100% 屬於「反 DNF 陣營」。😂 這是我從有記憶以來一直都有的個人習慣：我開始了的書，就絕對不會中途停止閱讀。對我來說，這是一個原則問題，哈哈哈。😂

這個「原則」偶爾也會令我很煩，尤其是當我開始了一本很長的書，但由第一頁開始就已經覺得它的語氣或風格很煩厭時。😂 不過，我仍然可以很「自豪」地說：我這輩子從來沒有「DNF」過任何一本書。

從語言學和文法角度來看，DNF 這個 term 也有一個很有趣的地方。

DNF 是一個所謂得 acronym，也就是由組成它的幾個單字的第一個字母組成的縮寫——did not finish。這個 acronym 在文法上有趣的地方，是 did not finish 本身其實是一個限定動詞字形，正常情況下會是子句中的核心限定動詞，大家應該能看出，例如：

I did not finish this book.

我沒有讀完這本書。

不過，這個 acronym 成為一個「新字」之後，就經歷了文法角色上的轉變：它不再只是一個限定動詞字形，而是變成了一個本身獨立存在的「新動詞」，以 DNF 作為基本動詞字形。

因為 DNF 現在本身是一個新的動詞，所以我們可以改變它的字形，用它組成不同的句子。就像這個 post 中的第一句：

There are plenty of reasons to DNF.

有很多理由可以令我們把開始了的書放下，不再讀完。

這句中的動詞 DNF，出現在基本動詞組 to DNF 之中。

又例如：

I am not okay with DNF-ing a book.

我不能接受開始了一本書之後，中途放下不再讀完。

這句中的動詞 DNF，是以是動名詞字形 DNF-ing 出現。

又例如：

I have never DNF-ed a book in my life.

我這輩子從來沒有開始了一本書之後，中途放下不再讀完。

這句中的 DNF 是主要動詞，在限定動詞 have DNFed 中以過去分詞字形 DNF-ed 出現。

這是一個很有趣的例子，讓我們看到新的 terms 和字怎樣融入一個不斷演變的語言本身的文法框架之中。例如，它會變得可以加入英文文法中不同的常規動詞字尾，如「-ing」和「-ed」。

☝🏻 "Caveat": Ms. Charlotte Academy 每日一字 ⭐️

I have written many emails introducing vocabulary words from The New York Times’ “Word of the Day” articles for English learners.

Today, I happened to think of a word to share with you myself—“caveat,” a noun meaning a “warning” or “condition” attached to something being stated. It is often used when the terms and conditions of something, such as an agreement or policy, are being laid out. For example:

The agreement is subject to one caveat: either party may terminate it with 30 days’ notice.

這項協議附帶一項限制條件：任何一方均可提前三十日通知終止協議。

The offer comes with one important caveat, which is that it is only available to existing customers.

這項優惠附帶一個重要條件：只適用於現有客戶。

This word came up as an example when I was explaining to a student enrolled in our vocabulary course that the English spelling system is famously opaque—that is, there is no truly consistent correspondence between the letters and letter strings we use to spell English words and the actual phonemes (individual consonant and vowel sounds) they represent.

There are many historical reasons for this. One major reason is that English has borrowed many words from other related languages that also use Roman letters in their writing systems, while retaining the ways in which those loanwords were originally written.

As such, even after these loanwords have evolved in English to become full-fledged English words with English phonological characteristics, their spellings still reflect their “original” written forms, which captured their pronunciation in their languages of origin.

“Caveat” is a Latinate loanword that has now evolved into a common English word. It is pronounced /ˈkæ vi ɑt/ (three syllables, with these vowel phonemes). As you can see, its spelling still reflects the word’s Latinate etymological origins.

If you simply looked at this English word without already knowing how it is pronounced, you would naturally draw the wrong conclusions about its pronunciation based on certain English “spelling conventions” you know.

In particular, you would probably assume that it is a two-syllable word, with “-veat” representing one syllable, likely with the vowel /i/ (as in “heat” and “beat”). “-veat” in this word actually represents two syllables: /vi ɑt/.

This is why it is important to have a conscious understanding that English spelling is opaque. Even though there are certain spelling conventions that allow us to “predict” how a previously unknown word is pronounced, the “system”—to the extent that there is one—is actually highly inconsistent, especially when we get to “higher level” words that have different etymological origins.

You should always look up how a new English word is pronounced to be certain. Otherwise, you might find yourself in some embarrassing situations—imagine trying to use the word “caveat” in a professional context and pronouncing it with the wrong vowels!

This is where knowledge of English phonemes and the IPA’s one-to-one system of representation comes in handy!

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我之前寫過不少電郵，介紹《紐約時報》為英語學習者而設的「每日一字」（Word of the Day）文章中的詞彙。

今天，我自己剛好想到一個字想跟大家分享——caveat。這是一個名詞，意思是「警告」或「附帶條件」。當我們列出協議或政策的內容時，就經常會用到這個字，去預先提醒對方條件是甚麼。例如：

The agreement is subject to one caveat: either party may terminate it with 30 days’ notice.

這項協議附帶一項限制條件：任何一方均可提前三十日通知終止協議。

The offer comes with one important caveat, which is that it is only available to existing customers.

這項優惠附帶一個重要條件：只適用於現有客戶。

我剛向一位正在修讀我們詞彙課程的學生解釋，英文的 spelling 系統是出了名地 opaque （不透明）的，用了這個字作例子。

所謂「不透明」，就是我們用來拼寫英文詞語的字母及字母串，跟它們實際代表的 phonemes（音素，即英文個別的子音和母音）之間，並沒有真正完全一致的對應關係。

造成這個現象的歷史原因有很多。其中一個主要原因，就是英文在演變中從其他有「親戚關係」的語言借了大量詞語。這些語言同樣使用羅馬字母作為書寫系統，而英文在借入這些詞語時，往往保留了它們原本的拼寫方式。

因此，即使這些外來字進入英文之後，至今已經演變成具有英文語音特徵、完完全全的英文字，它們的拼寫仍然會反映其「原本」的書寫形式——也就是原先用來記錄它們在來源語言中讀音的形式。

Caveat 是拉丁文借字，如今已經演變成一個常見的英文字。它讀作 /ˈkæ vi ɑt/，共有三個音節，當中包含這幾個母音音素。大家可以看到，它的拼寫仍然反映了這個字的拉丁文字源。

如果你事前不知道這個英文字的讀音，只看它的拼寫，便很自然會根據你所認識的某些英文「拼寫規律」，對它的讀音作出錯誤推斷。

例如，你很可能會以為它是一個兩個音節的字，並把 -veat 這部分視為一個音節，當中的母音很可能是 /i/，就像 heat 和 beat 中一樣。但事實上，這字中的 -veat 代表的是兩個音節：/vi ɑt/。

這正正說明了為甚麼我們必須清楚意識到，英文的拼寫系統並不透明。雖然英文的確有某些拼寫「規律」，讓我們可以「預測」一個從未見過的字應該怎樣讀，但這套「系統」其實非常不一致，尤其是當我們接觸到有很多不同字源的「高階」詞彙時。

因此，每當你學到一個新的英文字，都應該主動查清楚它的讀音，以確保自己讀得正確。否則，你可能會遇到一些尷尬的情況——試想像一下，你在工作場合中嘗試使用 caveat 這個字，卻用了錯誤的母音去讀它！

這正是認識英文音素，以及國際音標（IPA）這套一對一標音系統有用的地方。

跟大家分享一個 New Yorker 漫畫 📧

Something more light-hearted today!

Once we become familiar with the overall grammatical structure of a foreign language and have enough receptive vocabulary, we can start engaging with more real-life cultural content mediated through that language.

For many people — including me — being able to “consume” and engage with the culture(s) of a foreign language is one of the primary goals of learning it in the first place. Once you “unlock” this ability, the experience is immensely rewarding.

The cultural content we expose ourselves to in a foreign language can be both “high-brow” and “low-brow”. The point is that everything mediated through the language teaches us something about the language itself — by reinforcing our grammatical knowledge and exposing us to new vocabulary, expressions, etc. — as well as something about that culture (or cultures).

Anyway, that is a lot of preamble for what I actually wanted to share today. I was trying to think of something to send you and happened to notice this cartoon that has been stuck on my computer monitor for a long time.

This cartoon is from The New Yorker, a serious English-language magazine known for high-quality writing on everything from global politics to art and culture — and even fiction.

The New Yorker is also famous for its humorous and satirical cartoons. It is almost a running joke in English-language popular culture that sometimes its cartoons are so “intelligent” that they are difficult to understand, haha.

For what it’s worth, I have always enjoyed reading the magazine and find most of its cartoons very funny. In fact, both my husband and I have a habit of saving the ones we particularly like or find illuminating and sticking them up in our shared office or on the fridge, haha.

This one on my monitor caught my eye again today, so I wanted to share it with you.

Do you understand what the “joke” is?

A woman is on a date with a man, and the waiter presents her with a “new email” on his tray and says:

“For your appetizer, a work e-mail you accidentally glanced at and now need to respond to before enjoying the rest of your evening.”

I don’t know whether you have had this experience, but in this age of work, we are constantly “on duty” because we all have phones. When something comes up during our “off” hours, it can be very difficult to ignore it, so we end up dealing with the issue immediately, in real time.

This has certainly ruined many of my meals before, haha, so the cartoon really resonates with me with its dry humor. I hope this makes you chuckle too!

My broader point is that, as you become more and more proficient in English, you will be able to engage with all sorts of English-language cultural content like this. That aspect of foreign-language learning is itself immensely intellectually rewarding — quite apart from the more practical benefits of proficiency.

What is one example of English-language cultural content that you are now able to access that you couldn’t before?

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今天來一點輕鬆的！

當我們對一個外語的整體文法結構已經有一定掌握，也累積了足夠的「接收性詞彙」（receptive vocabulary）之後，就可以開始接觸更多真正存在於日常生活中的文化內容。

對很多人來說——包括我自己——能夠透過外語去理解和參與那個語言背後的文化，本來就是學習外語其中一個最重要的目的。

而當你終於「解鎖」了這個能力之後，那種體驗其實非常有滿足感。

我們透過外語接觸的文化內容，可以很「高雅」，也可以很「低俗」；重點是，只要內容是透過那外語傳遞的，我們其實都會同時學到兩樣東西：

一方面，它會不斷鞏固我們對語言和文法的理解，也讓我們接觸新的詞彙、表達方式等等；

另一方面，它也會讓我們更了解那個語言背後的文化。

前言好像有點長，其實我今天只是在想，有甚麼比較輕鬆的東西可以跟大家分享，然後剛好看到這張已經貼在我電腦螢幕上很久的漫畫。

這張漫畫來自 The New Yorker 雜誌（《紐約客》）。

The New Yorker 是一本很有份量的英語雜誌，內容由國際政治、藝術、文化，以至文學創作都有，而且一向以高質素的文字著稱。

不過，The New Yorker 另一樣非常出名的東西，就是它的幽默和諷刺漫畫。

甚至在英語流行文化裏，有一個笑話就是，有些 New Yorker 漫畫好像「高深」到普通人看完會不知道笑點到底在哪裏，哈哈。

不過，我自己一直都很喜歡看這本雜誌，而且大部分漫畫我都覺得很好笑。

事實上，我和我先生都有一個習慣：如果看到一張我們特別喜歡、或者覺得特別一針見血的漫畫，就會把它剪下來，貼在我們共用的書房，或者貼在雪櫃上，哈哈。

今天我剛好又看到螢幕旁邊這一張，所以想跟大家分享一下。

你看得明白它的「笑點」嗎？

圖中有一男一女正在約會。侍應把一封「新電郵」放在托盤上，遞到女生面前，然後說：

“For your appetizer, a work e-mail you accidentally glanced at and now need to respond to before enjoying the rest of your evening.”

意思大概是：

「你的前菜是：一封你不小心看了一眼、然後現在不得不先回覆，才能繼續享受今晚剩餘時間的工作電郵。」（就是有很長的 relative clause 去形容那個 work email 是你現在看到了，所以不能裝作沒看到的）

不知道你有沒有試過這種情況。在現在這個工作年代，因為人人都有手機，我們某程度上其實是長期處於「on duty」的狀態。

即使已經是下班時間，只要突然看到一封工作訊息或者電郵，就很難真的假裝沒有看到。結果往往就是：本來應該屬於自己的私人時間，又馬上開始即時處理工作。這也真的毀掉過我很多頓飯，哈哈。

所以我覺得這張漫畫的「dry humor」特別有共鳴。希望你看到也會笑一下！

我今天真正想說的是，當你的英文程度愈來愈高，你慢慢就會發現，自己能夠直接接觸和理解愈來愈多像這樣的「真實」英語文化內容。

而我一直覺得，這本身就是學習外語其中一個非常有趣的地方——它很多時是比英文能力提升之後帶來的那些實際用途更有滿足感的。

你有沒有一些英語文化內容，是你現在已經可以接觸和享受的，但以前英文程度還不夠的時候做不到的？

🎧 英文發音中的「vowel clipping」現象是甚麼？

為甚麼 hit 和 hid 的母音長度不一樣？教大家一個實用發音技巧

⏳ Ms. Charlotte Academy 八周年的訂閱者專屬優惠現正進行中（至 2026 年 9 月 1 日）。《The Sounds of English》課程以及課程組合均適用。

如果你曾經修讀《The Sounds of English》，你會知道，廣東話和英文在最基本的音素層面，已經有很多很大的分別。

其中一個是，英文有很多一對對的清和濁子音（voiced and unvoiced consonant pairs）。例如 /t/ 和 /d/、/f/ 和 /v/：每一對的兩個音，發音位置和方式相同，唯一分別在於濁子音（voiced consonant )發音時，聲帶會預先在聲音還未發出時振動，而清音則沒有這預振。

廣東話卻沒有這一種相同的清濁對立子音對。廣東話也有在同一位置發的子音對，但是每對之間的分別是在「噴氣」（如「他」字的字音）和「不噴氣」（如「打」字的字音），而不是清和濁之分（有沒有聲帶預振）。

所以，廣東話母語人士很自然會較難區分英文的 /t/ 和 /d/ 等音，尤其當它們出現在單字最後。

順帶一提，很多香港人會以為「打」的開首就是英文的 /d/ 音，實際上並不是。「打」的開首是不噴氣的清音（IPA 其實是 /t/，相對「他」字的帶噴氣的 /tʰ/），而不是濁音 /d/；只是因為英文 /d/ 同樣不噴氣，所以很容易令人混淆。這個分別在《The Sounds of English》中會有完整解釋。

今天只想在這裡分享一下，區分英文一對對濁子音（如 /d/）和清子音（如 /t/ ）在字尾出現時的一個實用小技巧：vowel clipping。

「Vowel clipping」是指，當一個母音後面接着 /t/ 這類清子音結尾時，母音會明顯被「斬短」；如果後面接着 /d/ 這類濁子音結尾，母音則會保留較完整的長度。所以就算未能完全從「聲帶預振」分辨 /d/ 和 /t/，也可以以前面母音長度去幫助區分。

例如：

hit /hɪt/ → 母音較短（被最尾清的子音斬短）

hid /hɪd/ → 母音較長（結尾的濁的子音）

所以，要令單字最後的 /t/ 和 /d/ 聽起來真正不同，並不只是注意最後一個子音本身；前面的母音長度也是非常重要的線索。

🎧 聽聽下面的錄音，留意 hit 和 hid 的母音長度有甚麼分別，然後試試區分之後的兩組例子：

如果你想更完整地理解這些廣東話和英文聲音系統之間的分別，並有意識地逐步改善自己的英文發音，請把握今次八周年優惠修讀《The Sounds of English》。

75 折優惠至 8 月 31 日晚上 11:59。

⚙️ 有了完整框架，AI 會變成無懈可擊的語言學習工具

AI is an extraordinarily powerful tool for foreign-language learning—but only when it is used in the right way.

It can generate almost unlimited examples, conversations, passages, exercises and explanations. It can produce material at exactly the level you request, change the subject matter, rewrite something in a different register, or answer a specific question within seconds.

What AI does not automatically give you, however, is a coherent system for understanding and organizing everything it produces.

Most of the language-teaching material that already exists in the world or on the internet is organised around local topics and functions: a rule about tense here, an explanation of passive voice there, a list of expressions for a particular situation somewhere else. AI can gather, combine and restate this material extremely efficiently -- but, without a clearly defined framework, it may simply multiply the number of explanations and examples you receive while leaving the underlying knowledge just as fragmented and disjointed as before.

That is why I believe the combination of a complete analytical framework and AI is so powerful.

I have recently been using AI myself to reactivate languages that I once knew well but no longer encounter every day, including Swedish and Italian. I do not need AI to invent an entire method of learning these languages for me. I already have a full grammatical and lexical framework in place, because this is how I have always approached foreign languages through my linguistic training (and this is how I have tried for a decade to teach students to learn foreign languages!)

What AI can now do is provide an almost limitless supply of input that allows me to reactivate, reinforce and expand my knowledge that is already organized within that framework.

For example, I recently asked AI to give me some Swedish news to read, and it gave me an article about an upcoming music festival in Gothenburg. Here is one paragraph from it:

Under festivaldagarna väntas många människor röra sig i centrala Göteborg. Besökare rekommenderas därför att planera sina resor i förväg och räkna med mer trafik än vanligt. För många göteborgare är festivalen ett tydligt tecken på att sommaren ännu inte riktigt är över.

Every sentence—and almost every word—in this short paragraph becomes useful input.

Take “festivaldagarna,” meaning “the days of the festival.” The word immediately reactivates part of my existing framework for Swedish noun forms. The singular noun is “dag,” meaning “day.” Its plural form is “dagar.” When that plural noun is marked by a definite article (English “the”)—“the days”—the ending “-na” is added, giving us “dagarna.” Combined with “festival,” it becomes “festivaldagarna.”

The phrase “under festivaldagarna” also reinforces that Swedish uses the preposition “under” to express “during” in this context. Because I already understand what prepositions and prepositional phrases are, and how they function within Swedish sentences, this is not an isolated phrase for me to memorize. It fits into the larger Swedish grammatical framework that I already have in my brain.

I want to show you one more example in the final sentence:

…att sommaren ännu inte riktigt är över

(...that the summer is still not really over)

This is a “that”-embedded clause in Swedish. Swedish is closely related to English, so many of the grammatical categories that exist in English have direct equivalents in Swedish.

In this embedded clause, the subject is “sommaren”—“the summer”—and the finite verb is “är”—“is.” But the finite verb does not come immediately after the subject. It comes after the words “ännu” (“still”), “inte” (“not”) and “riktigt” (“really”), all of which are core clause adverbs.

This clause therefore reinforces an important feature of Swedish clause structure: in embedded clauses, the finite verb comes after core clause adverbs instead of following the subject directly.

And what if I had forgotten this particular feature of Swedish?

Then this example sentence could teach it to me again—not merely because AI told me: “This word goes here,” but because I already possess the framework needed to analyze what I am seeing. I can identify the embedded clause, the subject, the finite verb and the core clause adverbs. I can see exactly where each element appears, compare the structure with the system I already know, and restore the missing piece of knowledge.

This is the kind of language learning I have always wanted students to experience--even before generative AI existed.

Once you have an analytical framework for understanding grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation, every piece of accurate input can help you fill in more of the puzzle and expand the picture.

A sentence can reinforce a structure you already know. A new expression can attach itself to an existing network of lexical relationships. A pronunciation example can strengthen your understanding of phonemes, syllable structure, stress, rhythm or liaison. New knowledge no longer has to remain isolated: it has somewhere to go.

Over time, the framework only becomes richer and more detailed. Knowledge that begins as receptive understanding can gradually become productive knowledge that you can express yourself with with increasing ease.

AI supercharges this process because it can provide input in almost any form, at almost any level, and on almost any subject. It can generate another passage, offer contrasting examples, create a conversation, test a particular structure, or show the same idea expressed in several different ways.

But the framework has to come first.

Without one, AI may simply do the work for you. It can write your email, correct your sentence or produce the answer you need—but you may understand no more afterwards than you did before. Even when it explains a mistake, the explanation may remain another local fact: “this is wrong; write this instead.” You receive the immediate answer without seeing where that answer belongs in the larger architecture of the language.

This is one of the reasons I feel genuinely excited about the possibilities that AI has opened up for serious language learners like you.

For years, I have tried to give students a framework that allows them to understand language as a system rather than as an endless collection of disconnected rules, corrections and expressions. AI does not make this framework obsolete. On the contrary, it makes it more powerful than ever, because we can now generate almost unlimited material with which to activate, test, reinforce and expand it.

So, the next time you use AI for English learning, try not to ask only: “Can you write this for me?” or “Is this sentence correct?”

Ask it to give you a passage containing a structure you want to practise. Ask it to produce contrasting examples. Ask it to show you the same idea expressed through several different grammatical choices. Ask it to create input that you can analyze using the framework you already have from my courses.

The real power is not that AI can produce language for you.

It is that, once you have the right framework in place, AI can give you an almost limitless supply of language from which you can reinforce what you know and continue learning.

That is something that really excites the “language nerd” in me endlessly. 🤓

💡 Subjunctive 語氣在現今英文中不再是一致的文法範疇

A student enrolled in my foundational grammar course “Core Concepts of English” recently asked me a question about the English subjunctive grammatical mood.

If you have taken “Core Concepts of English,” you would know that finite verbs with subjunctive verb forms express “imaginary” meanings.

We obviously can’t go into the forms and meanings here because that is a big topic. I just want to make a very relevant general point in this email about the subjunctive in current English -- which is that this grammatical mood is no longer a consistent grammatical category now.

In the language produced by native speakers now (across all varieties of English), subjunctive finite verb forms do not consistently appear and do not have consistent meanings when they do appear. As in, in current English, imaginary meanings are primarily expressed through context with or without subjunctive forms (or with a mixture of subjunctive forms and normal indicative forms). This, again, just has to do with language change and is not “bad.”

The student asked about this lyric from a children’s song her daughter was learning to sing:

“If I visit the moon, I will dance on a moonbeam… and I’ll wish I was home again”

「如果我到月亮上，我會踏着月光跳舞……然後，我會希望自己再次回到家。」

Specifically, she asked which -- if any -- of the finite verbs in clauses of the quoted lyric are in subjunctive form, and, if they are not in subjunctive form, whether the clauses still correctly express these clearly imaginary actions.

It is very hard for me to answer questions about the subjunctive precisely because it is no longer a consistent grammatical category in current English, so we can find all sorts of real-life examples -- all of perfectly natural English -- with mixed uses of the subjunctive.

Regarding this line of lyric, the first thing we need to establish is that this is a perfectly natural line in current English, and the “imaginary” scenario is conveyed very clearly to the listener with no ambiguity.

Actually, none of the finite verbs are in subjunctive mood.

The finite verbs “visit,” “will dance,” and “will wish” are clearly not in subjunctive mood -- they are normal indicative verb forms in present tense and future tense.

Even though these finite verbs are “normal” and not in subjunctive form, they are perfectly capable of conveying “imaginary” actions just through the context and the conjunction “if” alone. To a native speaker, this all sounds very natural.

The subjunctive version of this sentence would be:

“If I visited the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam…”

…with the (simple aspect) subjunctive form “visited” and the corresponding “would dance” with the modal verb “would,” whose main function is to express a subjunctive meaning.

The way to understand this is that imaginary scenarios can be expressed with or without (or with a mixture of) subjunctive forms now (as evinced by the song lyric, which expresses an imaginary scenario without the subjunctive at all), but the tone conveyed by the speaker/writer can be different depending on what forms are used.

For example, in this specific case, using normal indicative forms to express “visiting the moon” fits the tone of a child very well -- it is almost like the child is imagining doing this in real life; expressing this with the subjunctive forms “visited” and “would dance” makes the imagined scenario a bit more “distant” in tone and more “deliberately expressed as imaginary.”

What about the form “was” in the last clause?

I am also always asked about this -- and this is another thing that is always hard to explain because it takes several logical steps.

First, we have to understand that the subjunctive form of the verb “be” is “were” -- there is only one form for all persons, so it would be “if he were,” “if she were,” etc. There is no “was.”

“However,” because every other verb’s subjunctive form is actually completely identical to the normal, indicative past tense form -- “visited,” “did,” “won” etc. -- AND because the subjunctive is no longer a consistent category in English now, native speakers tend to also use the form “was” instead of the actual subjunctive form “were” when the subject normally takes “was” in past tense -- like saying “if I was” instead of the “proper” version “if I were.”

So, no, originally, “was” is not a subjunctive form at all -- but because the subjunctive is no longer consistent in current English, native speakers have co-opted it when the subject is “I,” “he,” “she” etc. to express what the subjunctive “were” expresses.

As in, “was” is meant by native speakers now as subjunctive even though it is not actually a subjunctive form (the subjunctive form of “be” is only “were”).

Again, there is nothing “bad” about this. This is just language change. The subjunctive form of “be” is historically just “were” -- so it would be “if I were the Queen” -- but, when native speakers now say “if I was the Queen,” it is accepted, and the meaning is 100% clear.

Of course, if you want to be careful in situations in which readers/listeners might “judge” you for using the “wrong” subjunctive form, you should be careful; but that is a matter of the social side of language and not about actual changing grammar.

Finally, I want to point out that native speakers often express imaginary scenarios with a mixture of finite forms now, and there is often no discernible difference in meaning.

For example:

If I visited the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam.

If I visit the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam.

「如果我去了月球，我會踏着月光跳舞。」

The top sentence has the subjunctive form “visited” in the first clause, followed by “would dance” in the next one. The bottom sentence has no subjunctive form in the first clause -- just the normal present tense “visit” -- followed by “would dance” also.

These two sentences have no functional difference in meaning to native speakers now, and both are completely accepted -- even though the “proper” subjunctive one is the top one.

It is the same thing with different aspects when subjunctive forms are involved. For example:

If I had done that, I would not have won.

If I did that, I would not have won.

「如果我當時那樣做了，我就不會贏了。」

The top sentence has the subjunctive form in perfect aspect “had done” in the first clause, and “would not have won” -- which is also in perfect aspect -- in the second clause. The bottom sentence has the subjunctive from in simple aspect “did” in the first clause -- which originally only expresses “open” imaginary actions and not “completed” imaginary actions -- followed by the perfect aspect “would not have won.”

These two sentences also have no functional difference in meaning to native speakers now, and both are completely accepted -- even though the “proper” one is the top one.

The overall point is that, in current English, the subjunctive is not a consistent grammatical category, and native speakers use a variety of subjunctive and non-subjunctive forms to express imaginary meanings, with many ways of expressing these meanings being functionally identical.

My conclusion to the student is that she doesn’t need to be too caught up in subjunctive forms, what they mean, and when they should be used to express imaginary scenarios in light of this inconsistency now. She can a bit more careful in certain “formal” situations, but, all in all, the more important thing is to understand how imaginary scenarios are actually expressed in English now, which is, with a mixture of subjunctive and non-subjunctive forms.

---

今天的 email 是一段較長的文法討論！

最近，一位修讀過我的基礎文法課程《英文概論課程》的學生，問了我一個關於英文假設語氣 (subjunctive) 的問題。

如果你修讀過《英文概論課程》，你會知道，帶有 subjunctive 字形的限定動詞會表達想象意思。

我們當然不可能在這裏詳細講解這些字形和意思，因為這是一個很大的課題。我在這裏只想提出一個與此非常相關、關於現今英文中 subjunctive 的整體重點——就是這種文法語氣在今天已經不再是一個一致的文法類別。

在現今母語者所產生的語言中（無論是哪一種母語英文種類），subjunctive 的限定動詞字形多數不會一致地出現；即使出現，所表達的意思也不一致。換句話說，在現今英文裏，「想象」意思主要是透過語境表達的：可以有 subjunctive 字形，也可以沒有，亦可以混合使用 subjunctive 字形和一般陳述語氣（indicative）字形。這只是反映語言文法演變，並不是「不好」的英文。

這位學生問到她女兒正在學唱的一首兒歌裏的一句歌詞：

“If I visit the moon, I will dance on a moonbeam… and I’ll wish I was home again.”

「如果我到月亮上，我會踏着月光跳舞……然後，我會希望自己再次回到家。」

她具體想問的是：這句歌詞各個子句裏的限定動詞，究竟有沒有任何一個用了 subjunctive 字形？如果沒有，這些子句是否仍然能夠正確表達這些顯然是想象的動作？

我一向都覺得很難回答有關 subjunctive 的問題，正正是因為 subjunctive 在現今英文裏已經不再是一個一致的文法類別。因此，我們在真實語言中可以找到各式各樣的例子——全部都是完全自然的英文——當中會混合使用不同的 subjunctive 和非 subjunctive 字形來表達想象意思。

關於這句歌詞，我們首先需要確立的是：這是一句完全自然的現今英文，而當中的「想象」情境亦非常清楚地傳達給聽者，沒有任何含糊之處。

其實，當中的限定動詞沒有一個用了 subjunctive 字形。

限定動詞 “visit”、 “will dance” 和 “will wish” 顯然都不是 subjunctive 字形——它們只是一般陳述語氣的 present tense 和 future tense 字形。

雖然這些限定動詞都是「一般」字形，並不是 subjunctive 字形，但它們單靠語境和連接詞 “if”，已經完全能夠表達「想象」動作。對母語者來說，整句聽起來非常自然。

這句句子的 subjunctive 版本會是：

“If I visited the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam…”

當中包括 subjunctive 字形 “visited”，以及相應的 “would dance”，即有情態動詞 “would” 的限定動詞組，而 “would” 的主要功能正是配合表達 subjunctive 意思。

我們可以這樣理解：在現今英文裏，想象情境可以有 subjunctive 字形，也可以沒有，亦可以混合使用不同字形。正如這句歌詞所顯示，它完全沒有使用 subjunctive 字形，但仍然清楚表達了一個想象情境。不過，說話者或作者使用不同字形時，所傳達的語調可以有所不同。

例如，在這個具體例子裏，用一般陳述語氣字形表達「到月亮上」，非常符合小朋友的語調——感覺就像這個小朋友正在想象自己真的會到月亮上做這件事。相反，如果用 subjunctive 字形 “visited” 和 “would dance”，這個想象情境在語調上便會稍為「遙遠」一些，也更像是說話者刻意把它表達為一個想象情境。

那麼，最後一個子句裏的 “was” 又是甚麼情況呢？

我也經常被問到這個問題，而這亦是另一個很難解釋清楚的地方，因為當中涉及幾個邏輯步驟。

首先，我們需要明白，動詞 “be” 的 subjunctive 字形是 “were”——所有人稱都只有這一個字形，所以會是 “if he were”、 “if she were” 等等。Subjunctive 裏並沒有 “was” 這個字形。

「不過」，由於其他所有動詞的 subjunctive 字形，實際上都和一般陳述語氣的 past tense 字形完全一樣——例如 “visited”、 “did”、 “won” 等等——再加上 subjunctive 在現今英文裏已經不再是一個一致的類別，因此，當主語在一般 past tense 中本來會配搭 “was” 時，母語者也往往會用 “was” 代替真正的 subjunctive 字形 “were”。例如，他們會說 “if I was”，而不是原來 subjunctive 字形的 “if I were”。

所以，從原本的文法字形來說，“was” 根本不是 subjunctive 字形；但由於現今英文的 subjunctive 出現已經不再一致，母語者現在會借用 “was”，在主語是 “I” 或任何單數主語的情況下，表達原本由 subjunctive 字形 “were” 所表達的意思。

也就是說，母語者現在會把 “was” 當作 subjunctive 來使用，雖然它本身實際上並不是 subjunctive 字形——因為 “be” 的 subjunctive 字形本是 “were”。

同樣，這並沒有任何「不好」，這只是語言演變。從歷史字形來說，“be” 的 subjunctive 只有 “were”，所以會是 “if I were the Queen”；但當母語者現在說 “if I was the Queen” 時，這現在是同樣獲得接受的，而意思亦百分之百清楚。

當然，如果你身處某些讀者或聽者可能會因為你使用了「錯誤」subjunctive 字形而批評你的場合，那麼你便應該小心一點；但這屬於語言的社會層面，而不是實際文法本身的問題。

最後，我想指出，母語者現在經常會混合使用不同的限定動詞字形來表達想象情境，而不同說法之間往往沒有任何可辨別的意思差異。

例如：

If I visited the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam.

If I visit the moon, I would dance on a moonbeam.

「如果我去了月球，我會踏着月光跳舞。」

第一句的第一個子句使用了 subjunctive 字形 “visited”，下一個子句則使用 “would dance”。第二句的第一個子句沒有使用 subjunctive 字形，只是使用一般現在時態的 “visit”，下一個子句同樣使用 “would dance”。

對現今母語者來說，這兩句在功能和意思上沒有分別，而且兩句都完全可以接受——儘管從「標準」subjunctive 句子來說，第一句才是較「規整」的版本。

當 subjunctive 涉及不同體貌（aspect，即表達動作發生狀態的字形）時，情況也是一樣。例如：

If I had done that, I would not have won.

If I did that, I would not have won.

「如果我當時那樣做了，我就不會贏了。」

第一句的第一個子句使用了完成式（perfect）體貌的 subjunctive 字形 “had done”，第二個子句則使用 “would not have won”，同樣是完成式體貌。

第二句的第一個子句使用了簡單式（simple）體貌的 subjunctive 字形 “did”——這個字形原本只表達「開放空泛」的想象動作，而不是「在想象中已完成」的動作——但下一個子句卻使用完成式體貌的 “would not have won”。

對現今母語者來說，這兩句在功能和意思上同樣沒有分別，而且兩句都完全可以接受——儘管從「標準」subjunctive 來說，第一句才是較「正確」的版本。

整體重點是：在現今英文裏，subjunctive 已經不再是一個一致的文法類別。母語者會使用各種 subjunctive 和非 subjunctive 字形來表達想象意思，而不同的字形表達方式在功能上很多時候是完全相同的。

所以，我給這位學生的結論是：既然現今英文的 subjunctive 本身已經如此不一致，她不需要過分執着於某個字形究竟是不是 subjunctive、它表達甚麼意思，以及在甚麼情況下應該使用哪一種字形來表達想象情境。

在某些較「正式」、或者別人可能會對你的語言字形作出判斷的場合，她當然可以稍為小心一點；但總括而言，更重要的是理解現今英文實際上如何表達想象情境——也就是混合使用 subjunctive 和非 subjunctive 字形。

（🎥 短片）「Altruistic」對廣東話母語人士的自然發音陷阱 🚨

上星期，我們看了「altruistic」這個單字（一個形容詞，意思是「願意幫助別人、令別人受益，即使這樣做不會直接令自己得益」）。

今天，我們就將對這個單字的討論再延伸一點，看一下廣東話母語人士在發這個字的時候，自然會遇到的一些發音陷阱，就像我們之前看「perceptive」和「fallible」這兩個字時那樣。

今次，主要的陷阱和第一個音節有關，因為這個音節涉及英文母音音素 /æ/。正如我之前指出過，廣東話的母音系統入面沒有這個音。

在這個字入面，這個 /æ/ 不是單獨出現，而是後面有子音 /l/，為這個母音帶來「修飾」效果。廣東話母語人士很自然會傾向將整個 /æl/——也就是母音加上這個帶有「修飾」效果的結尾子音的單位——錯誤換成廣東話入面的一個雙母音。

大家要有意識避免這個自然錯誤！

Last week, we looked at the word “altruistic” (an adjective meaning ““willing to help or benefit other people, even when doing so does not directly benefit oneself”).

Today, let’s extend our discussion of this word a bit further and look at some of the pronunciation traps that native Cantonese speakers would naturally face when trying to pronounce it, just like we did previously with the words “perceptive” and “fallible.”

This time, the main trap has to do with the first syllable, which involves the English vowel phoneme /æ/, which, as I previously pointed out, Cantonese does not have in its vowel inventory.

In this word, this /æ/ is not just standing alone but has the consonant /l/ after it to “color” its vowel quality. Cantonese speakers would naturally tend to replace the whole /æl/ -- vowel and “coloring” consonant unit -- wrongly with a diphthong vowel from Cantonese.

Try to avoid this natural mistake!

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🎖️ 每日一字: "altruistic"

Let’s look at another Word of the Day from the New York Times Learning Network today!

The word this time is “altruistic,” an adjective which means “unselfish” or “willing to help or benefit other people, even when doing so does not directly benefit oneself.”

The example sentence from the article is this:

“I can think of no other edifice constructed by man as altruistic as a lighthouse,” George Bernard Shaw once wrote. “They were built only to serve.”

「我想不到任何其他由人類建造的建築物，像燈塔一樣利他，」George Bernard Shaw 曾經寫道。「它們被建造出來，只是為了服務他人。」

This use of “altruistic” is of course a more literary one as the author is attributing this “selfless” and “serving” quality to a lighthouse, an inanimate object, and its function in guiding ships home.

More often, we would use this adjective to describe humans and their selfless behaviors or actions. For example:

Her decision to donate the money anonymously was truly altruistic.

她匿名捐出那筆錢的決定，是真正利他的。

In this context, the sentence emphasizes that it is the “anonymous” part that is “altruistic” -- because if the donation were not “anonymous,” the motive for the person to do so could still be “self-serving” in that she just wants to be given credit as a generous donor.

As I stress in our “Boost Your Vocabulary” course, we should always try to make all sorts of meaningful connections between words -- whether etymological, semantic, or even thematic -- in order to learn and expand our vocabulary as effectively as systematically as possible.

Etymologically, we can connect “altruistic” to the noun “altruism,” which has the same word root and means an act or the quality of “caring about other people’s good selflessly.” The suffix “-ism” is of course a common noun suffix for abstract nouns like concepts, theories, or philosophies.

Semantic connections that come easily to mind are “selfish” and “self-serving” -- which are antonyms to “altruistic” meaning “putting oneself first” -- and “selfless,” which is a sort of synonym, but it emphasizes “sacrifice” more strongly. The noun “egoism” -- which also ends in “-ism” is a noun that means “the quality of being selfish,” like “selfishness.”

In the next email, we will look briefly at the pronunciation traps of this four-syllable word!

Starting from a single word in this way and building connections in terms of word form, etymology, meaning, and context is precisely the vocabulary-learning habit that “Boost Your Vocabulary” is designed to help you build.

All our courses will have price adjustments soon. If you want to expand your English vocabulary in a more systematic way, you can learn more about Boost Your Vocabulary at the link below.

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今天我們再一起看一篇 New York Times Learning Network 的 Word of the Day！

這次的單字是「altruistic」，是一個形容詞，意思是「無私的」，或者「願意幫助別人、令別人受益，即使這樣做不會直接令自己得益」。

文章入面的例句是：

“I can think of no other edifice constructed by man as altruistic as a lighthouse,” George Bernard Shaw once wrote. “They were built only to serve.”

「我想不到任何其他由人類建造的建築物，像燈塔一樣利他，」George Bernard Shaw 曾經寫道。「它們被建造出來，只是為了服務他人。」

這裡「altruistic」的用法當然是比較文學性的，因為作者將這種「無私」和「服務他人」的特質，歸於燈塔這種無生命的物件，以及它引導船隻回家的功能。

更多時候，我們會用這個形容詞去形容人，以及人的無私行為或行動。例如：

Her decision to donate the money anonymously was truly altruistic.

她匿名捐出那筆錢的決定，是真正利他的。

在這個語境入面，句子強調的是「匿名」這一點是「altruistic」的——因為如果這筆捐款不是匿名的話，這個人的動機仍然可能是「自私」的，也就是她只是想得到慷慨捐款者的名聲。

正如我在《Boost Your Vocabulary》課程入面強調，我們應該經常嘗試在單字之間建立各種有意義的連繫——不論是字源上的、意思上的，甚至是主題上的連繫——這樣才可以盡可能有效和有系統地學習和擴展自己的詞彙量。

從字源上，我們可以將形容詞「altruistic」連繫到有相同字根的名詞「altruism」，意思是「無私地關心他人福祉」的行為或者特質。字尾「-ism」當然是一個常見的名詞字尾，很多關於概念、理論或哲學等的抽象名詞都有這個名詞字尾。

比較容易想到的意思連繫包括形容詞「selfish」和「self-serving」——它們是「altruistic」的反義詞，意思是「將自己放在第一位」——以及同義詞「selfless」，但「selfless」更強調「自我犧牲」。名詞「egoism」也是「-ism」的名詞，意思是「自私的特質」，就像「selfishness」。

下一封 email，我們會簡單看一下這個四音節單字的發音陷阱！

像這樣從一個單字出發，建立字形、字源、意思、相反詞、相關詞和語境上的連繫，正是《Boost Your Vocabulary》想幫大家建立的詞彙學習習慣。

我們所有課程不久之後都會有價格調整；想用更有系統的方法擴展自己的英文詞彙量，可以到下面了解更多：

一個小小的個人近況 👶🏻

I just wanted to share a little personal update. 👶🏻

I’m expecting my third daughter very soon, so, over the next month or two, my regular subscriber emails may become a bit more sporadic as I prepare for her arrival and adjust to life with a newborn again.

I will keep writing and sending learning content to you whenever I can even in this period — just probably not on as fixed or predictable a schedule as usual.

Thank you so much for your understanding and for continuing to read along. ☺️

我想和大家分享一個小小的個人近況。👶🏻

我很快就會迎來第三個女兒，所以接下來一兩個月，我平時寄給大家的 subscriber emails 可能會稍為不定期一點，因為我也要準備她的出生，並重新適應有初生寶寶的生活。

不過，即使在這段時間，我仍然會在能力範圍內繼續寫 email、寄學習內容給大家；只是可能不會像平時一樣有那麼固定或可以預期的時間表。

多謝大家的理解，也多謝你繼續讀我的 email。☺️

🏡 "Home"：「家」（名詞）或「在家 / 向家」（副詞）

A student who recently finished our foundational course “Core Concepts of English” and received our $700 rebate asked about the grammatical role of the the word “home” in this sentence from one of the course assignments:

Every Chinese New Year, hundreds of millions of Chinese people travel home to their families.

每年農曆新年期間，數以億計的中國人都會回鄉與家人團聚。

She asked why the answer key marked the word “home” as an adverb modifier and not a noun (as in, a direct object of the verb “travel”) in this sentence.

Indeed, the word “home” is an adverb in this sentence modifying the entire core action of this clause -- “hundreds of millions of Chinese people travel” (with the subject “hundreds of millions of Chinese people” and the finite verb “travel”). It describes that the core action of “travel” is “toward the direction of home.”

The word “home” has two grammatical “versions” -- one a noun meaning the physical location of “home” and/or the idea of “home,” and the other an adverb.

The adverb version of “home” has two separate but related locational and directional meanings -- it can mean “at home/inside the home” or “toward home,” depending on context.

For example:

This is my home.

這是我的家。

In this sentence, “home” is a noun. It is in the noun phrase “my home.” It is expressing the meaning of “the place of home.”

But, for example:

I am home now, but I will go out later.

我現在在家，但稍後會出去。

In this sentence, “home” is an adverb meaning “in the home.”

And, for example:

They will go home soon.

他們很快會回家。

In this sentence, “home” is an adverb meaning “toward home.” In the fixed expression “go home,” the word “home” is an adverb modifier of the verb “go” and not its direct object.

The thing to understand is that many -- or, actually, probably the majority -- of English words have more than one “version.”

The different “versions” might be completely different grammatical roles, or they might have the same grammatical role but express completely different or similar but slightly different meanings, with each meaning having a different grammatical characteristic regarding elements like objects and specific modifiers.

That is why it is very important to have a grammatical framework in place so that you can analyze each word you don’t know within the structural and meaning context of the sentence you find it in.

Only then would you be able to learn to use the word productively in your own sentences accurately both in structure and meaning.

If you want to build a systematic grammatical framework as a basis for all your English learning, learn more about our foundational course “Core Concepts of English” now. The pricing will be adjusted soon.

最近有一位完成了我們基礎課程《Core Concepts of English》，並獲得我們 $700 回贈的同學，問了我一個很好的問題。

她問的是課程其中一個練習入面這句句子的答案：

Every Chinese New Year, hundreds of millions of Chinese people travel home to their families.

每年農曆新年期間，數以億計的中國人都會回鄉與家人團聚。

她想知道，為甚麼答案將句子入面的「home」分析成副詞修飾語，而不是名詞（即動詞「travel」的直接賓語）。

的確，在這個句子入面，「home」是一個副詞，修飾這個子句的整個核心動作——「hundreds of millions of Chinese people travel」（當中主語是「hundreds of millions of Chinese people」，限定動詞是「travel」）。它描述的是，「travel」這個核心動作是「向著家的方向」進行的。

「Home」這個字有兩個文法上的「版本」：一個是名詞，表示「家」這個實際地方，或者「家」這個概念；另一個是副詞。

副詞版本的「home」本身又有兩個相關的位置／方向意思：視乎語境，它可以表示「在家」，也可以表示「回家／向家的方向」。

例如：

This is my home.

這是我的家。

在這個句子入面，「home」是名詞。它在名詞組「my home」入面，表達的是「家這個地方」的意思。

又例如：

I am home now, but I will go out later.

我現在在家，但稍後會出去。

在這個句子入面，「home」是副詞，意思是「在家」。

再例如：

They will go home soon.

他們很快會回家。

在這個句子入面，「home」也是副詞，意思是「向家的方向」。在固定表達「go home（回家）」入面，「home」是修飾動詞「go」的方向的副詞修飾語，而不是它的名詞直接賓語。

大家要理解的是，很多英文單字——甚至可以說，大部分英文單字——都不只得一個「版本」。

不同「版本」可能有完全不同的文法角色；也可能有相同的文法角色，但表達完全不同的意思，或者相似但有細微分別的意思。而每一個意思，亦會有自己在文法上的特徵，例如會不會接賓語、會和甚麼特定修飾語一起出現等。

這也是為甚麼，學英文時有一套文法框架是很重要的。

這正正就是《Core Concepts of English》想幫大家建立的能力：不是只記住一個字的中文意思，而是學會將它放回句子結構入面，判斷它在當下語境中的文法角色和意思。

《Core Concepts of English》不久之後會有價格調整；想有系統地重新建立自己對英文句子的根本理解，請到下面連結了解更多。

💯 星期一小挑戰 💡

建立英文文法整體結構框架的重點，是要將這套框架應用到你在真實生活中遇到的每一句英文入面，令你可以不斷、自然地鞏固自己的文法知識，同時也盡可能有系統地學習新的（和一定要「記」的東西）——例如單字和表達方式。

你能不能將在《Core Concepts of English》學過的框架，應用到以下句子入面，回答以下問題？

There’s no easy answer, but we assembled a panel of four experts who are closely following the impact of A.I. on work to try to help shed light on this question.

這並沒有一個簡單答案，但我們集合了四位密切關注人工智能對工作影響的專家，組成一個 panel，希望嘗試幫助大家更清楚理解這個問題。

(Original article)

1. How many clauses are there in this sentence?
   這個句子由多少個子句組成？

2. What is the grammatical role of “who are closely following the impact of A.I. on work”?
   「Who are closely following the impact of A.I. on work」這部分的文法角色和功能是甚麼？

3. What can we learn about the expression “shed light” from this example?
   從這個例子中，我們可以學到關於「shed light」這個表達方式的甚麼特徵？

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Answers 答案：

1. 3 clauses
   [ There’s no easy answer, ] but [ we assembled a panel of four experts [ who are closely following the impact of A.I. on work ] to try to help shed light on this question. ]
   

2. “Who are closely following the impact of A.I. on work” is a relative clause describing the noun phrase “four experts” (「正在 closely following the impact of A.I. on work」的四位專家）
   

3. The expression “shed light” (verb + direct object) is further completed/modified by a specific prepositional phrase with “on” — like “on this question” — to complete its meaning of “clarifying/adding insight to what”
   「Shed light」這個表達方式（動詞 + 它的直接賓語）會再由一個以「on」開始的特定介詞組完成／修飾——例如「on this question」——去完整表達「為甚麼事情提供更深入理解」的意思。

20/7/2026 星期一小挑戰 -- 答案 💯

Sentence:

“Schmigadoon!,” a musical comedy that lovingly spoofs the genre by imagining a bickering couple trapped in a fantastical village whose residents keep bursting into song, won the coveted Tony Award for best new musical on Sunday night.

《Schmigadoon!》是一部音樂喜劇，故事講述一對正在吵架的情侶被困在一條奇幻村莊裡，而村民不斷突然唱起歌來。這部作品以充滿愛意的方式戲仿音樂劇這個類型，並在星期日晚上贏得備受矚目的東尼獎最佳新音樂劇獎。

Answer:

The part “a musical comedy that lovingly spoofs the genre by imagining a bickering couple trapped in a fantastical village whose residents keep bursting into song” is a long “hidden” non-restrictive relative clause that allows the writer to pack more adjectival description into the noun “Schmigadoon.”

Originally, the relative clause is:

“Schmigadoon!,” which is a musical comedy…..,

However, the writer omits the “which is” -- which he can do because the relative pronoun “which” (standing for “Schmigadoon") is the subject of the relative clause, and finite verb is “is” -- to make this long relative clause appear less lengthy and less “repetitive.”

Within this relative clause layer, there are actually two further internal relative clauses -- “that lovingly spoofs the genre by imagining a bickering couple trapped in a fantastical village whose residents keep bursting into song” (modifying “a musical comedy”) and “whose residents keep bursting into song” (modifying “a fantastical village”) -- so it is stylistically a good idea for the writer to omit the “which is” on the outermost layer to make the internal layers less cumbersome.

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答案：

「A musical comedy that lovingly spoofs the genre by imagining a bickering couple trapped in a fantastical village whose residents keep bursting into song」這個部分，是一個很長的「隱藏」非必須關係子句，讓作者可以將更多形容詞性描述加進名詞「Schmigadoon」入面去形容它。

原本，這個關係子句是：

“Schmigadoon!,” which is a musical comedy…..,

不過，作者省略了「which is」——這是可以的，因為關係代名詞「which」（代表「Schmigadoon」的關係代名詞）是這個關係子句中的主語，而限定動詞是「is」——令這個很長的關係子句看起來沒有那麼冗長，也沒有那麼「重複」。

在這一層關係子句入面，其實還有另外兩個內層關係子句——「that lovingly spoofs the genre by imagining a bickering couple trapped in a fantastical village whose residents keep bursting into song」（修飾「a musical comedy」）和「whose residents keep bursting into song」（修飾「a fantastical village」）——所以，在風格上，作者省略最外層的「which is」是一個很好的選擇，可以令入面的多層結構顯得沒有那麼笨重。

👶🏻 主題性 Word of the Day: "confinement"

As I mentioned in an earlier email, I recently gave birth to my third child — my third daughter! — so I just want to write a light-hearted email today from my “confinement”!

I thought we could look at the noun “confinement” as a “thematic” Word of the Day today, haha — as this is the English word that is generally used to refer to the period of time in which a mother stays at home to recover from childbirth and take care of the newborn baby.

I say that this word is “generally used” because, as you probably know, different cultures have different customs regarding “confinement,” and Westerners generally do not observe confinement as strictly as Chinese people — even though, evolutionarily and anthropologically, most cultures have some general custom of women staying home and resting after childbirth.

What I mean is that “confinement” is not really a term that is culturally “native” to English now, even though, apparently, English-language texts from the 18th century onwards did refer to this period with this word.

Right now, however, it seems that the word is more frequently used by Asian people to refer to this postpartum period when speaking in English.

Anyway, if we look at the word itself, “confinement” has the word root “confine” and the noun suffix “-ment.” “Confine,” as you probably know, is a Latinate word — via French — that means “keep within borders or limits.” Together with “-ment,” “confinement” is a noun that means “keeping someone within borders or limits.”

This is also why this word has always struck me as a little semantically “harsh” when referring to the postpartum recovery period — because the original connotation of the noun is that the mother is “kept within the house against her will,” haha.

But it is also true that words eventually take on more specific meanings without their original connotations when they are used to refer to something specific over time. In this case, the word “confinement,” to the people who do use it to refer to this postpartum period, is quite neutral and does not strongly suggest coercion, haha.

What are some thematic connections we can make with this word? Remember that making all sorts of connections — whether etymological, semantic, or even thematic — is key to learning and expanding our vocabulary effectively and systematically.

For one, we can call “陪月” “confinement nannies” — that is generally the term used when we discuss this profession in English discourse, although, again, hiring a confinement nanny is more of a Chinese custom, so it is an expression that is not really culturally “native” to English.

The Latinate adjective “postpartum” is also thematically related — it means “after birth.” “Post-” is a Latinate prefix that means “after” — you probably know this or have learnt it from our “Boost Your Vocabulary” course. We use this adjective to describe the period after birth for the mother. We can find it in common expressions like “postpartum period” and “postpartum depression,” etc.

Another thematically related expression that springs to mind is “maternity leave.”

“Maternity,” with the noun suffix “-ity” that you should know, is another word with a Latinate root. It is a noun that means the “quality or condition of being a mother.” As such, “maternity leave” means the “leave” you take “because of motherhood.”

I will engage more again after my maternity leave!

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正如我在之前一封 email 裡提過，我最近生了第三個孩子——我的第三個女兒！——所以今天就想在我的「confinement （坐月時期）」裡，寫一封比較輕鬆的 email 給大家！

我想我們今天可以將名詞「confinement」當成一個主題性的 Word of the Day 來看一下，哈哈——因為這個英文字一般是用來指媽媽生完孩子之後，留在家中恢復身體和照顧初生嬰兒的那段時間。

我說這個字是「一般」會這樣用，是因為大家應該也知道，不同文化對於「confinement」有不同的習俗，而西方人一般不會像華人那樣嚴格地坐月——雖然，從人類學角度來看，大部分文化其實都有某種讓女性在生產後留在家中休息的習俗。

我的意思是，雖然英文有些文本似乎從 18 世紀開始已經有用這個字來指「坐月」時間，但在現在的英文文化裡，「confinement」其實不算是一個在文化上很「native」或自然的字。

現在比較常是亞洲人在用英文講到產後「坐月」這段時間時，會用「confinement」這個字。

無論如何，如果我們看這個字本身，「confinement」有字根「confine」和名詞字尾「-ment」。

「Confine」大家應該也知道，是一個拉丁文字源的動詞——經由法文借到英文——意思是「將某人或某物限制在某個範圍或界線之內」。加上「-ment」之後，「confinement」就是一個名詞，意思是「將某人限制在某個範圍或界線之內」。

這也是為甚麼我一直覺得，用這個字來指「坐月」這段產後恢復期，在意思上有一點「harsh」——因為這個名詞原本給人的感覺，是媽媽好像「被迫留在屋企，不能出去」那樣，哈哈。

不過，當然，單字經過長時間被用來指某個特定事物之後，也會慢慢發展出更加具體的意思，而不一定保留原本的意思。在這個情況下，對於會用「confinement」來指產坐月時間的人來說，這個字其實是相當中性的，並不會強烈暗示被強迫或者被限制，哈哈。

我們可以和這個字建立甚麼主題性的連繫呢？記得，要有效和有系統地學習及擴展詞彙量，關鍵就是要在單字之間建立各種連繫——不論是字源上的、意思上的，甚至是主題上的連繫。

例如，我們可以將「陪月」稱為「confinement nanny」——當我們在英文語境中討論這個職業時，一般會用這名詞組來表達。當然，請陪月本身也比較是華人文化中的習俗，所以這個 expression 也不是一個在英文文化中本來就存在的表達。

另一個主題上相關的字，是有拉丁文字源的形容詞「post-partum」——意思是「產後」。「Post-」是一個拉丁文字源的前綴，意思是「之後」——大家應該知道這一點，或者在我們的《Boost Your Vocabulary》課程裡學過。

我們會用這個形容詞去描述媽媽生產之後的時期，例如常見的名詞組表達方式「post-partum period（產後時期）」和「post-partum depression（產後抑鬱）

」等等。

另一個我馬上想到的主題相關表達方式，是「maternity leave」。

「Maternity」這個字有大家應該知道的名詞字尾「-ity」，也是一個有拉丁文字根的字。它是一個名詞，意思是「作為母親的狀態或特質」。所以，「maternity leave」就是因為「成為媽媽」而放的假期，也就是產假。

I will engage more with everyone again after my confinement! 👶🏻