Question...
I read this somewhere:
"An once in a lifetime oppurtunity."
That's not right, right? It's meant to be "A once in a lifetime oppurtunity", right?
Right??!!
It's annoying the hell out of me. Someone put me out of my misery?
Friday, April 13
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
13 comments:
yea i think that's right cause "once" isn't a noun, so the "an" in front of a,e,i,o,u don't apply.
I second what anonymous literary genius said.
- One whose eyeballs want to pop out after just thinking about all the finance chapters she has to read.
And it's "opportunity". Haha! Beat that, anonymous literary genius.
hhaha it the opportunity IS spelt wrong.
Anyway what were u reading? that has once in a lifetime opportunity in it?
It's "once" but not because "once" isn't a vowel. It *is* headed by a vowel, but the vowel doesn't sound like a vowel. It has a "w" sound instead of an "oh" (as in the sounds for a-e-i-o-u).
That's why certain words which begin in consonants may require an "an" as opposed to an "a", such as an horse, or an hospital, or any word which begins with an "h", as the "h" is pronounced with a vowel noise.
"an horse, or an hospital" wtf... but anyways microsoft word says it's A Once ...
Damn I didn't know I spelt opportunity wrong. Hmm.
Um. Who the fuck is anonymous. I'm thinking Meng but I don't think she's that smart? Haha.
Words beginning with an "h" should be prefixed with an "an". Herb is pronounced "erb", hospital "opspital", horse "orse" and so on and so forth. Why? Because English is a strange language, and the ancient conventions are still followed in correct literary circles.
Why does nobody say "ospital", or "orse", then? Because contemporary society wouldn't have a clue what you're talking about.
And, it doesn't matter that "once" isn't a noun - many things which aren't nouns beginning with "o" are prefixed by an "an". Once is pronounced "wuntz". Ounce is "an ounce", because ounce is pronounced "owntz" not "wountz".
I have never seen An horse or An hospital written anywhere !! Who has besides wendy?
okay this is a different anonymous person because i didnt make the first few posts but an hospital and an horse is probably a bad example because there is a 'h' sound there ... its not 'ospital' ... u do say 'Hospital' ... but you are right but a better example is honest as in an 'honest' person ... thats truly 'onest' n the h is silent
An even better example is 'an hour'...
Hmm I think the only aspect about livejournal that's better than blogger is the 'threads' in the comments, you know who is responding to who and what not. Here its like one big jumbo convo and it's like everyone's talking at the same time.
If you read texts written pre-contemporary, the texts will use an in front of a word beginning with "h" - just like it's still an hour, an honest, as previous unknown pointed out.
English concentrates more on sounds than letters, which is why it's one of the hardest languages in the world to learn. People who speak English fluently do not always know the conventions.
Post a Comment