[Grammar] use of relative

Status
Not open for further replies.

licinio

Junior Member
Joined
May 8, 2006
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
My sentence I want to submit reads as follows:

The city looks very different today, that is Monday.

I'm not sure it is idiomatic so I'd like to ask you about it.
Thanks!
Andrea
 

bhaisahab

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Apr 12, 2008
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
England
Current Location
Ireland
My sentence I want to submit reads as follows:

The city looks very different today, that is Monday.

I'm not sure it is idiomatic so I'd like to ask you about it.
Thanks!
Andrea
No, it's not. It's not clear what you want to say.
 

licinio

Junior Member
Joined
May 8, 2006
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
Ok, the idea is: today being Monday, the city look different. I'll stick to this one or equivalent ones if you can suggest some. Thanks.
 

Rover_KE

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jun 20, 2010
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
England
Current Location
England
'The city looks very different today (Monday).'
 

crazYgeeK

Member
Joined
Jun 9, 2010
Member Type
Student or Learner
Native Language
Vietnamese
Home Country
Vietnam
Current Location
Vietnam
Today being Monday, the city looks different.
The city looks different, today being Monday.
Being Monday, today the city looks different.

Could you please tell me why "is" can't be used instead of "being" like this "Today is Monday, the city looks different"?
Thank you so much!
 

bhaisahab

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Apr 12, 2008
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
England
Current Location
Ireland
Could you please tell me why "is" can't be used instead of "being" like this "Today is Monday, the city looks different"?
Thank you so much!
"Today is Monday, the city looks different" This is fine.
 

Rover_KE

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jun 20, 2010
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
England
Current Location
England
'Today is Monday; the city looks different.'
 

TheParser

VIP Member
Joined
Dec 8, 2009
Member Type
Other
Native Language
English
Home Country
United States
Current Location
United States
My sentence I want to submit reads as follows:

The city looks very different today, that is Monday.

I'm not sure it is idiomatic so I'd like to ask you about it.
Thanks!
Andrea


NOT A TEACHER


(1) As all the other posters have suggested, a relative pronoun

("that") is not appropriate in your sentence.

(2) I am not sure what meaning you wish to express.

Are you saying that after every weekend, the city seems to appear

different to the eyes?

If so, then maybe something like:

The city always seems different on Mondays.


Respectfully yours,


James
 

BobK

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 29, 2006
Location
Spencers Wood, near Reading, UK
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
:up: If, for some reason :)-?) you are saying 'Cities always look different on Mondays, therefore - today being Monday - the city looks different', then you could say

'The city looks different today - a Monday'.

But if you just want to say 'The city looks different today. 'And by the way, it's Monday - that's what I mean by "today"', then a simple parenthesis will do.

b
 

licinio

Junior Member
Joined
May 8, 2006
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
:up: If, for some reason :)-?) you are saying 'Cities always look different on Mondays, therefore - today being Monday - the city looks different', then you could say

'The city looks different today - a Monday'.

But if you just want to say 'The city looks different today. 'And by the way, it's Monday - that's what I mean by "today"', then a simple parenthesis will do.

b

The meaning is the one of your first suggestion. The reason why I used a personal pronoun is that I tried to combine "Today is Monday" + "Today the city looks very different" into one sentence. Adding "a Monday" after today seems to convey exactly what I meand. Thanks.

PS by the way, this is the link to the whole article where this sentence appears in the very opening paragraph.
 
Last edited:

Raymott

VIP Member
Joined
Jun 29, 2008
Member Type
Academic
Native Language
English
Home Country
Australia
Current Location
Australia
The meaning is the one of your first suggestion. The reason why I used a personal pronoun is that I tried to combine "Today is Monday" + "Today the city looks very different" into one sentence. Adding "a Monday" after today seems to convey exactly what I meand. Thanks.

PS by the way, this is the link to the whole article where this sentence appears in the very opening paragraph.
As a beginning of an article, or a stand-alone sentence, I'd have to call this wrong - meaningless, in fact. The city cannot look different unless it looked some other way before. And you've given no other indication of what Monday means as far as it being different. Different from what?
I'm trying to find the paragraph or article before this one to see what I'm missing, and how it looked before.
 

BobK

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Jul 29, 2006
Location
Spencers Wood, near Reading, UK
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
English
Home Country
UK
Current Location
UK
I think the point may be that however the city looks it always looks worse when the person watching it has a week of work to look forward to. Of course, it is an unreasonable assumption, but it's nevertheless a common one. (I haven't followed the link, so this may be way off base.) ;-)

b
 

5jj

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Oct 14, 2010
Member Type
English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
Czech Republic
Current Location
Czech Republic
I was surprised to find that the sentence in the article seemed acceptable to me - Sighet looks very different today, ( which happens to be) a Monday. I read it in the sense that BobK suggested: 'Cities always look different on Mondays, therefore - today being Monday - the city looks different'.
 

bhaisahab

Moderator
Staff member
Joined
Apr 12, 2008
Member Type
Retired English Teacher
Native Language
British English
Home Country
England
Current Location
Ireland
My sentence I want to submit reads as follows:

The city looks very different today, that is Monday.

I'm not sure it is idiomatic so I'd like to ask you about it.
Thanks!
Andrea
This was the original post, the sentence is quite different to the one in the article, which made it's first appearance in post 11. I have no objection at all to the sentence in the article, it reads like it's following on from a paragraph about the weekend.
 

licinio

Junior Member
Joined
May 8, 2006
Member Type
Interested in Language
Native Language
Italian
Home Country
Italy
Current Location
Italy
This was the original post, the sentence is quite different to the one in the article, which made it's first appearance in post 11. I have no objection at all to the sentence in the article, it reads like it's following on from a paragraph about the weekend.

Of course it is different. When you all told me "that is Monday" didn't sound right, I picked the suggestion I liked best and changed it!
I noticed Fivedjejon brings up a relative clause again in brackets, which was originally my idea. Maybe my mistake was to choose the wrong relative ("that" for "which") and omit the indeterminative article in front of Monday.
So, to go back to the original question, would this sentence be correct: "Sighet looks very different today, which is a Monday."?
Thanks.
A
 
Last edited:
Status
Not open for further replies.
Top