Dating 101: Translating What Men Say Into What Men Mean
Sick of overanalyzing every word that guys say? So are we, which is why we went straight to the source to find out what his guy-speak really means.
By dating editor Dustin Goot for Glamour
Photo: iStockphoto.com/© Silvia Jansen
Updated: Jun 16, 2009
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He says: "I'll call you."
He means: "I may call you."
This line isn't the slam dunk most women make it out to be. Besides being genuinely interested, there are a slew of reasons why a guy might ask for a number (he needs an ego boost... he wants a quick way to end the conversation... he bet his buddy he could score more digits, etc). The thing to remember here is that if he's into you, he will find a way to call. And, no, emailing, Facebooking or Twittering at him in the meantime isn't going to help your case. Give the guy a chance to pursue you -- if he doesn't, he's not the one for you anyway.
More Dating Articles from Glamour:
Five Secrets All Guys Keep From You
Seven Things a Guy's Bedroom Says About Him
He says: "I like your shirt/necklace/shoes/hair."
He means: "You look good."
He may have an ulterior motive when he compliments you, but that doesn't make the praise any less sincere. The fact is, men are generally terrible at false flattery. Instead of accusing us of feeding you a line (we know we are!), feel good about the fact that we've noticed something about you that's attractive and memorable. Just don't ask us to remember the brand of those cute shoes.
He says: "I've been busy lately."
He means (if you've dated less than six months): "I've lost interest in you."
He means (if you've dated longer than that): "I like you, but I need to focus on other things."
Usually, this is the classic guy blow-off, but there are exceptions. "Don't forget the big picture," cautions Steve Santagati, who offers dating advice at badboysfinishfirst.com. If you've dated for a few months and your guy is usually there for you, don't hit the panic button over his recent short bouts of inattention. "Just because we get distracted by our jobs doesn't mean we don't care anymore," says Santagati.
He says: "I need some space."
He means: "This relationship is moving too fast."
Nobody's thrilled to hear this one, but "I need space" isn't always the kiss of death. Often men get excited about a new relationship and then struggle to turn down the temperature when they're suddenly seeing you six nights a week. First, confirm that he still wants to date. (Any answer besides yes means you should take your toothbrush and get out of there, stat.) Once that's confirmed, revert to early courtship behavior; make him schedule thoughtful dates in order to see you (no 3 A.M. texts). If the spark returns, still insist on a couple of girls-only nights a week for the next several months -- it'll be good for both of you.
He says: "I love spending time with you."
He means: "I love you... I think."
Guys are notoriously hesitant about dropping the L-bomb outright. When your man starts talking about how he loves specific aspects of the relationship, that's probably his way of dipping his toe in those waters. You should feel good about where things stand, even if the three magic words aren't directly uttered. "Guys aren't gifted at translating their feelings fluently to females," Santagati says. "Give a brother a break."
He says: "I don't believe in marriage."
He means: "I'm not going to marry you."
This is one of those maddening statements you simply can't overanalyze. He may truly oppose the institution. He may be immature. He may not care for you deeply enough. In any case, you have a better chance of making out with Brad Pitt than waiting for him to "come around." Either enjoy his company for what it is or move on.
He says: "I want this to last forever."
He means: "I'm really happy right now."
Most things a guy says about the future should be taken with a grain of salt. "When a guy says he likes you, he means he likes you right then and there," Santagati says. That doesn't mean men are unreliable jerks. But it does mean that when it comes to relationship stability, you should look at what your guy is doing instead of focusing on what he's saying. Santagati advises, "You're better off taking an observational stance." Is he physically affectionate? Does he remember things that are important to you? Does he support you when you need it?
Minggu, 21 Juni 2009
Minggu, 07 Juni 2009
Finite Verb
A finite verb is a verb that is inflected for person and for tense according to the rules and categories of the languages in which it occurs. Finite verbs can form independent clauses, which can stand by their own as complete sentences.
The finite forms of a verb are the forms where the verb shows tense, person or singular plural. Non-finite verb forms have no person, tense or number.
I go, she goes, he went - These verb forms are finite.
To go, going, gone - These verb forms are non-finite.
In most Indo-European languages, every grammatically complete sentence or clause must contain a finite verb; sentence fragments not containing finite verbs are described as phrases or minor sentences. In Latin and some Romance languages, however, there are a few words that can be used to form sentences without verbs, such as Latin ecce, Portuguese eis, French voici and voilà, and Italian ecco, all of these translatable as here ... is or here ... are. Some interjections can play the same role. Even in English, a sentence like Thanks for your help! has an interjection where it could have a subject and a finite verb form (compare I appreciate your help!).
In English, as in most related languages, only verbs in certain moods are finite. These include:
the indicative mood (expressing a state of affairs); e.g., "The bulldozer demolished the restaurant," "The leaves were yellow and stiff."
the imperative mood (giving a command).
the subjunctive mood (expressing something that might or might not be the state of affairs, depending on some other part of the sentence).
Verb forms that are not finite include:
the infinitive
participles (e.g., "The broken window...", "The wheezing gentleman...")
gerunds and gerundives
The finite forms of a verb are the forms where the verb shows tense, person or singular plural. Non-finite verb forms have no person, tense or number.
I go, she goes, he went - These verb forms are finite.
To go, going, gone - These verb forms are non-finite.
In most Indo-European languages, every grammatically complete sentence or clause must contain a finite verb; sentence fragments not containing finite verbs are described as phrases or minor sentences. In Latin and some Romance languages, however, there are a few words that can be used to form sentences without verbs, such as Latin ecce, Portuguese eis, French voici and voilà, and Italian ecco, all of these translatable as here ... is or here ... are. Some interjections can play the same role. Even in English, a sentence like Thanks for your help! has an interjection where it could have a subject and a finite verb form (compare I appreciate your help!).
In English, as in most related languages, only verbs in certain moods are finite. These include:
the indicative mood (expressing a state of affairs); e.g., "The bulldozer demolished the restaurant," "The leaves were yellow and stiff."
the imperative mood (giving a command).
the subjunctive mood (expressing something that might or might not be the state of affairs, depending on some other part of the sentence).
Verb forms that are not finite include:
the infinitive
participles (e.g., "The broken window...", "The wheezing gentleman...")
gerunds and gerundives
Case
The accusative case (abbreviated ACC) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. The same case is used in many languages for the objects of (some or all) prepositions. It is a noun that is having something done to it, usually joined (such as in Latin) with the nominative case.
In the sentence I see the car, the noun phrase the car is the direct object of the verb "see". In English, which has mostly lost the case system, the definite article and noun – "the car" – remain in the same form regardless of the grammatical role played by the words. One can correctly use "the car" as the subject of a sentence also: "The car is parked here."
In a declined language, the morphology of the article or noun changes in some way according to the grammatical role played by the noun in a given sentence. For example, in German, one possible translation of "the car" is der Wagen. This is the form in nominative case, used for the subject of a sentence. If this article/noun pair is used as the object of a verb, it (usually) changes to the accusative case, which entails an article shift in German – Ich sehe den Wagen. In German, masculine nouns change their definite article from der to den in the accusative case.
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun indicates its grammatical function in a greater phrase or clause; such as the role of subject, of direct object, or of possessor. While most languages distinguish cases in some fashion, it is only customary to say that a language has cases when these are codified in the morphology of its nouns — that is, when nouns change their form to reflect their case. (Such a change in form is a kind of declension, hence a kind of inflection.) Cases are related to, but distinct from, thematic roles such as agent and patient; while certain cases in each language tend to correspond to certain thematic roles, cases are a syntactic notion whereas thematic roles are a semantic one.
Cases are not very prominent in modern English, except in its personal pronouns (a remnant of the more extensive case system of Old English). For other pronouns, and all nouns, adjectives, and articles, case is indicated only by word order, by prepositions, and by the clitic -'s.
Taken as a whole, English personal pronouns are typically said to have three morphological cases: the nominative case (such subjective pronouns as I, he, she, we), used for the subject of a finite verb and sometimes for the complement of a copula; the accusative/dative case (such objective pronouns as me, him, her, us), used for the direct or indirect object of a verb, for the object of a preposition, for an absolute disjunct, and sometimes for the complement of a copula; and the genitive case (such possessive pronouns as my/mine, his, her(s), our(s)), used for a grammatical possessor. That said, these pronouns often have more than three forms; the possessive typically has both a determiner form (such as my, our) and a distinct independent form (such as mine, ours). Additionally, except for the interrogative personal pronoun who, they all have a distinct reflexive or intensive form (such as myself, ourselves).
While not very prominent in English, cases feature much more saliently in many other Indo-European languages, such as Latin, Greek, German, Sanskrit, and Russian. Historically, the Indo-European languages had eight morphological cases, though modern languages typically have fewer, using prepositions and word order to convey information that had previously been conveyed using distinct noun forms. The eight historic cases are as follows, with examples:
The nominative case, which corresponds to English's subjective case, indicates the subject of a finite verb:
We went to the store.
The accusative case, which together with the dative and ablative cases (below) corresponds to English's objective case, indicates the direct object of a verb:
The clerk remembered us.
The dative case indicates the indirect object of a verb:
The clerk gave us a discount.
The ablative case indicates movement from something, and/or cause:
The victim went from us to see the doctor.
He was unhappy because of depression.
The genitive case, which corresponds to English's possessive case, indicates the possessor of another noun:
Our citizens are proud of our country.
The vocative case indicates an addressee:
You there, are you O.K.?
The locative case indicates a location:
We live in China.
The instrumental case indicates an object used in performing an action:
We wiped the floor with it.
All of the above are just rough descriptions; the precise distinctions vary from language to language, and are often quite complex. Case is arguably based fundamentally on changes to the noun to indicate the noun's role in the sentence. This is not how English works, where word order and prepositions are used to achieve this; as such it is debatable whether the above examples of English sentences can be said to be examples of 'case' in English
Case and linguistic typology
Main article: Morphosyntactic alignment
Languages are categorized into several case systems, based on their morphosyntactic alignment — how they group verb agents and patients into cases:
Nominative-accusative (or simply accusative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the nominative case, with the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb being in the accusative case.
Ergative-absolutive (or simply ergative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the absolutive case, with the agent (subject) of a transitive verb being in the ergative case.
Ergative-accusative (or tripartite): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in its own case (the intransitive case), separate from that of the agent (subject) or patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (which is in the ergative case or accusative case, respectively).
Active-stative (or simply active): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb can be in one of two cases; if the argument is an agent, as in "He ate," then it is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the agentive case), and if it's a patient, as in "He tripped," then it is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the patientive case).
Trigger: One noun in a sentence is the topic or focus. This noun is in the trigger case, and information elsewhere in the sentence (for example a verb affix in Tagalog) specifies the role of the trigger. The trigger may be identified as the agent, patient, etc. Other nouns may be inflected for case, but the inflections are overloaded; for example, in Tagalog, the subject and object of a verb are both expressed in the genitive case when they are not in the trigger case.
The following are systems that some languages use to mark case instead of, or in addition to, declension:
Positional: Nouns are not inflected for case; the position of a noun in the sentence expresses its case.
Adpositional: Nouns are accompanied by words that mark case.
Some languages have very many cases; for example, Finnish has eighteen (see Finnish language noun cases), Hungarian has eighteen and Tsez can even be analyzed as having 126 cases.
John Quijada's constructed language Ithkuil has 81 noun cases, and its descendent Ilaksh has a total of 96 noun cases.[1][2]
In Indo-European languages, each case often contains several different endings, some of which may even be derived from different roots. An ending is chosen depending on gender, number, whether the word is a noun or a modifier, and other factors.
The lemma forms of words, which is the form chosen by convention as the canonical form of a word, is usually the most unmarked or basic case, which is typically the nominative, trigger, or absolutive case, whichever a language may have.
In the sentence I see the car, the noun phrase the car is the direct object of the verb "see". In English, which has mostly lost the case system, the definite article and noun – "the car" – remain in the same form regardless of the grammatical role played by the words. One can correctly use "the car" as the subject of a sentence also: "The car is parked here."
In a declined language, the morphology of the article or noun changes in some way according to the grammatical role played by the noun in a given sentence. For example, in German, one possible translation of "the car" is der Wagen. This is the form in nominative case, used for the subject of a sentence. If this article/noun pair is used as the object of a verb, it (usually) changes to the accusative case, which entails an article shift in German – Ich sehe den Wagen. In German, masculine nouns change their definite article from der to den in the accusative case.
In grammar, the case of a noun or pronoun indicates its grammatical function in a greater phrase or clause; such as the role of subject, of direct object, or of possessor. While most languages distinguish cases in some fashion, it is only customary to say that a language has cases when these are codified in the morphology of its nouns — that is, when nouns change their form to reflect their case. (Such a change in form is a kind of declension, hence a kind of inflection.) Cases are related to, but distinct from, thematic roles such as agent and patient; while certain cases in each language tend to correspond to certain thematic roles, cases are a syntactic notion whereas thematic roles are a semantic one.
Cases are not very prominent in modern English, except in its personal pronouns (a remnant of the more extensive case system of Old English). For other pronouns, and all nouns, adjectives, and articles, case is indicated only by word order, by prepositions, and by the clitic -'s.
Taken as a whole, English personal pronouns are typically said to have three morphological cases: the nominative case (such subjective pronouns as I, he, she, we), used for the subject of a finite verb and sometimes for the complement of a copula; the accusative/dative case (such objective pronouns as me, him, her, us), used for the direct or indirect object of a verb, for the object of a preposition, for an absolute disjunct, and sometimes for the complement of a copula; and the genitive case (such possessive pronouns as my/mine, his, her(s), our(s)), used for a grammatical possessor. That said, these pronouns often have more than three forms; the possessive typically has both a determiner form (such as my, our) and a distinct independent form (such as mine, ours). Additionally, except for the interrogative personal pronoun who, they all have a distinct reflexive or intensive form (such as myself, ourselves).
While not very prominent in English, cases feature much more saliently in many other Indo-European languages, such as Latin, Greek, German, Sanskrit, and Russian. Historically, the Indo-European languages had eight morphological cases, though modern languages typically have fewer, using prepositions and word order to convey information that had previously been conveyed using distinct noun forms. The eight historic cases are as follows, with examples:
The nominative case, which corresponds to English's subjective case, indicates the subject of a finite verb:
We went to the store.
The accusative case, which together with the dative and ablative cases (below) corresponds to English's objective case, indicates the direct object of a verb:
The clerk remembered us.
The dative case indicates the indirect object of a verb:
The clerk gave us a discount.
The ablative case indicates movement from something, and/or cause:
The victim went from us to see the doctor.
He was unhappy because of depression.
The genitive case, which corresponds to English's possessive case, indicates the possessor of another noun:
Our citizens are proud of our country.
The vocative case indicates an addressee:
You there, are you O.K.?
The locative case indicates a location:
We live in China.
The instrumental case indicates an object used in performing an action:
We wiped the floor with it.
All of the above are just rough descriptions; the precise distinctions vary from language to language, and are often quite complex. Case is arguably based fundamentally on changes to the noun to indicate the noun's role in the sentence. This is not how English works, where word order and prepositions are used to achieve this; as such it is debatable whether the above examples of English sentences can be said to be examples of 'case' in English
Case and linguistic typology
Main article: Morphosyntactic alignment
Languages are categorized into several case systems, based on their morphosyntactic alignment — how they group verb agents and patients into cases:
Nominative-accusative (or simply accusative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the nominative case, with the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb being in the accusative case.
Ergative-absolutive (or simply ergative): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb; this case is then called the absolutive case, with the agent (subject) of a transitive verb being in the ergative case.
Ergative-accusative (or tripartite): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb is in its own case (the intransitive case), separate from that of the agent (subject) or patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (which is in the ergative case or accusative case, respectively).
Active-stative (or simply active): The argument (subject) of an intransitive verb can be in one of two cases; if the argument is an agent, as in "He ate," then it is in the same case as the agent (subject) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the agentive case), and if it's a patient, as in "He tripped," then it is in the same case as the patient (direct object) of a transitive verb (sometimes called the patientive case).
Trigger: One noun in a sentence is the topic or focus. This noun is in the trigger case, and information elsewhere in the sentence (for example a verb affix in Tagalog) specifies the role of the trigger. The trigger may be identified as the agent, patient, etc. Other nouns may be inflected for case, but the inflections are overloaded; for example, in Tagalog, the subject and object of a verb are both expressed in the genitive case when they are not in the trigger case.
The following are systems that some languages use to mark case instead of, or in addition to, declension:
Positional: Nouns are not inflected for case; the position of a noun in the sentence expresses its case.
Adpositional: Nouns are accompanied by words that mark case.
Some languages have very many cases; for example, Finnish has eighteen (see Finnish language noun cases), Hungarian has eighteen and Tsez can even be analyzed as having 126 cases.
John Quijada's constructed language Ithkuil has 81 noun cases, and its descendent Ilaksh has a total of 96 noun cases.[1][2]
In Indo-European languages, each case often contains several different endings, some of which may even be derived from different roots. An ending is chosen depending on gender, number, whether the word is a noun or a modifier, and other factors.
The lemma forms of words, which is the form chosen by convention as the canonical form of a word, is usually the most unmarked or basic case, which is typically the nominative, trigger, or absolutive case, whichever a language may have.
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