Mr. Bob's Posts

I am new here and hope to make a difference for some learners when I have the spare time. This seems to be a great site and there are many people with different backgrounds all with an interest in English.I love learning and teaching too. Other cultures are very interesting and I have studied many of them and traveled widely. Undergraduate classes were very interesting and I focused on Anthropology, Biology, and English literature. I even was allowed to teach biology labs as an undergraduate because I had taken so many of the higher courses.There were lots of opportunities for learning, so I worked many places doing Archaeology and Ethnobotany as well as applied anthropology and biology fieldwork. During Graduate training more opportunities came for teaching, academic advising, and research. My children were born during this time. After the Masters Degree I took courses for both Biology and Anthropology Ph.D. degrees while teaching and parenting. I finished all the courses but did not complete those degrees.More teaching opportunities were available and I concentrated on teaching and academic advising of college students. I taught a course at three different institutions geared toward the business student and their need to understand different cultures. We focused on many cultures and their differences from the culture these Americans had experienced. the Arab world, various Asian cultures (including Japan), the Eskimo, the Bushmen cultures of the Kalahari Desert, the Tklingit, and many others were covered.The saddest time was when I had to leave the teaching to follow my wife and children for her new job opportunity. After moving I did some adjunct teaching but had to move into the business world to provide steady insurance coverage and income, as well as provide for my growing children and their education. I have worked within the petrochemical support, and process equipment manufacturing industry for over 13 years.Within this industry I specialize in working with the customers and engineers who studied english as a foreign or second language. Others may have trouble understanding them sometimes, but my work in other cultures as well as academic English background (also TESL / TEFL certified) makes it easy to communicate for me. I help them come up with the proper English technical word when necessary and we confirm our oral conversations by email.English is crucial for most international business and I enjoy playing my small part in helping L2 speakers. I am especially interested in digital learning solutions for the English language and ways it can help international business people. I teach English to immigrants who need some help and I enjoy helping them.I plan to start some groups here that will help people understand the cultures of English speaking countries, and also others to help people in industry with specialized English and international terminology. Please be patient if it takes a while for me to answer because I have a full time paid job and volunteer work as well.This was one of my first blogs and That is How I joined MyEC.

All of us who have studied languages discover words and phrases with more than one meaning. These may have different meanings for native speakers in a single place or have a meaning in one place that is different from the meaning in another. These differences can be difficult and sometimes embarrassing for learners of the new language.

I am a native English speaker and have been surprised in my own language when visiting other English speaking countries. Many years ago my wife used a phrasal verb common in the United States to express to a waitress In South Africa that she did not need any additional food. That moment the restaurant became so quiet you could have heard a pin drop as if someone had said a terrible word in the presence of the families eating their meals.

I will not mention the phrase because it did have a very rude translation into the South African English. I have had similar things happen around the world and always try to learn from my mistakes. I found that from one Spanish speaking country to another in Central America the same noun we learned in Spanish class can have an unintended interpretation. This was an example of "slang" where a common word is given another meaning.

I recently took an English level exam on the site http://www.examenglish.com/ . The exam was to help determine someone's level of speaking. Since I am a fluent English speaker I knew the correct usage, but I did notice a number of incorrect choices that would be difficult for a non-native speaker.

Examples of differences I have seen with the automobile and tools
American - front compartment door above engine = hood
England and many others this = bonnet
American - rear compartment for storage on car = trunk
England and others this = boot
Tool for tightening bolts and nuts in USA = wrench (there are many types of wrench)
the same tool in South Africa, Botswana, and England is usually = spanner
Those are just a few examples of regional differences.

Have you found some words in English that have different meanings and may have confused you or someone you were speaking to? If you can tell of an embarrassing situation of word usage you experienced then please comment here. It may be useful to teachers and students alike. Perhaps you can help others avoid your mistake and if you check back again you may learn some examples to avoid.

Please try to avoid swear words and words you would not want your mother or grandmother hear you say. Those "more sensitive words" may be dealt with later as I get used to this site and come up with a polite way to warn of innocent sounding words which must be very carefully used. If your experience involves more than one country then it will help to tell the country where you were misunderstood.

Thanks for your comments,

Bob

Mr. Bob's Posts (62)

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