COULD / MIGHT
Could denotes potentiality; might suggests possibility.
e.g. Don't play with
the knife; you might accidentally hurt
yourself.
e.g. Could you close the window, please?
Accountable to / Accountable for
Accountable to means responsible to someone; accountable for means
responsible for something or having to explain.
e.g. The Manager has to
be accountable to the Board; he has to be accountable
for all his
business decisions.
Genteel / Gentle
Genteel: well-bred,
polite; imitating the lifestyle of the rich.
e.g.
Your friend is genteel.
Is he really rich?
e.g.
All along he has been living in genteel poverty.
He is not practical.
Gentle:
soft and well-behaved.
e.g.
He is a gentleman: he is especially gentle with
the ladies.
Ingenious / Ingenuous
Ingenious is
clever; ingenuous is natural, free from deceit.
e.g. I
must say that was an ingenious way to fund the project.
e.g.
The Mayor's response to the questions from the reporter was sincere and ingenuous.
All / All
of
All is used for amount,
quantity, distance, and length of time.
e.g. all the money, all the way, all day, all night,
All
of is
used when a simple pronoun follows.
e.g. all
of it, all
of you, all
of us.
All and all of may be used when it refers to
number.
e.g. All or all of the employees are satisfied with the new policy.
e.g. All or all of the children in the family have gone
to college.
Words are neither
effective nor ineffective; they just impart different meanings to the sentences
in which they are used. It is the writer's effective use of words and phrases
that makes sentences effective or ineffective.
The English
language is made up of nearly a million words and phrases. A writer, especially
one whose English is not his or her first language, may face two major problems
in writing: not knowing "enough" words; and not knowing how to choose
the "right" words.
Writing is made up
of words. Effective writing requires having a good stock of vocabulary, as well
as selecting the most suitable words and phrases to express the intended ideas.
There are many
English words and phrases that are frequently confused and misused by ESL
learners. This book provides hundreds of those words and phrases with examples.
Stephen Lau
Copyright© by Stephen
Lau
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