Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 May 4

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May 4

Specially and especially

I don't understand the difference between the above two words?? --Extra999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 03:41, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

'specially is a truncated form of especially. rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

It can be that, but typically, especially is the adverb from especial, while specially is the adverb from special. These words are related, but are not quite synonymous. -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 04:01, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but no one says "especial". Likewise, no one says "specially" in its 'special' sense ("in a special way", as in "I sang the song really specially"). rʨanaɢ (talk) 04:06, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Sometimes special is used. Furthermore, what is the difference between special and especial. --Extra999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 04:13, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Of course "special" is used; the only words I said are not usually used are "especial" and "specially".

As for your question, see wikt:special and wikt:especial on our sister project, Wiktionary. rʨanaɢ (talk) 04:29, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

"Buy our product in these specially marked packages." Is that really a contraction of "especially"? I don't think so. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 05:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Hm, I hadn't thought of that. Especially is typically used to modify adjectives ("he's especially tall"), not verbs. so I guess this is a legitimate, albeit rather fossilized, use of specially.

But I still maintain that people don't really say especial. rʨanaɢ (talk) 05:49, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I've never heard anyone say "especial", aside from a native speaker of Spanish trying to say "special" in English, but that's a separate issue. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:06, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

And "specially" is not all that "fossilized". Here's a cereal ad that uses it,[1] in fact cereal is what I had in mind when I brought it up. So I wonder if it's used for anything other than advertising? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:09, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

(That's what I meant by "fossilized"—I can't think of any other contexts where it's used productively. rʨanaɢ (talk) 06:13, 4 May 2010 (UTC))

If you google ["specially marked"] and then ["specially"] by itself, you'll get tons of references, many of them, though not all, connected with advertising; and some of them, though by no means all, being used where "especially" would make more sense. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:15, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

To further muddy the waters, here are EO's lookups on "special" and "especial": [2] [3] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:18, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Fowler's says "(E)special(ly). The characteristic sense of the longer adjective and adverb is per-eminence or the particular as opposed to the ordinary, that of the others being limitation or the particular as opposed to the general". The first example given is "He is my especial friend" which would mean "bestestest friend ever and ever" whereas "special friend" merely means a good friend, perhaps one of a number of good friends. It depends a lot on context but "especially prepared" is most likely wrong as something might be specially prepared for a situation but the preparations probably are not totally unique and unprecedented while "a specially critical situation" sounds really not as critical as an especially critical one. Fowler's notes though that special is largely taking the place of especial. meltBanana 12:57, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

"Especially prepared" could easily be correct, depending on the context. Maybe someone packed way more stuff than necessary for an overnight trip or for camping in the backyard—he's not just prepared, but especially prepared. Specially prepared, on the other hand, has a sense more like "I prepared this meal just for you", although personally I don't hear it used like that and I certainly don't hear "specially critical situation". I think these are dictionary words that no one (at least no one in my dialect) uses. rʨanaɢ (talk) 14:12, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I wonder if the specially + verb construction is actually a misused word in place of specifically. As in, "The cereal boxes with the free toy inside have been specifically marked to note the giveaway." kind of thing. Matt Deres (talk) 18:34, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Not really. That conveys no more information than "The cereal boxes with the free toy inside have been marked to note the giveaway" - so 'specifically' is tautologous here. But 'specially' has a role to play, particularly in a marketing context. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 19:39, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I take "specially marked" to be equivalent to "marked uniquely", i.e. marked differently from other boxes. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 19:47, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This is all OR, but if someone told me, "I made this meal especially for you.", I would understand it to mean that they made the meal with me, as opposed to anyone else, in mind. If they told me, "I made this meal specially for you", I would understand it to mean that they made the meal in a special manner, and the meal is for me. In the second case, you could just as easily put "specially" in front of "made"; if you put "especially" in front of "made", it would be odd, but I guess it would mean that someone made, rather than bought, the meal, and you would probably hear them emphasize "made".

Specialness is something inherent to an entity or process. The fallacy of "special pleading" occurs when someone argues that x, which is a member of X, should not be subject to rules that apply to X because of a special property of x sets it apart from the other members of X. Especialness, on the other hand, requires a relation between the entity or process and something else that is unique or distinctive or noteworthy. Often, the something else is implicit, as in "I especially want to visit Paris" (as opposed to other places, or, if "visit" is emphasized, as opposed to living there or changing planes there). So, while "I made this meal specially" makes sense, "I made this meal especially" doesn't make sense, unless "this" in emphasized and what's meant is that the speaker made this particular meal rather than some other meal, and in this case, even, it is unidiomatic. If the speaker made several meals but devoted extra effort to this meal, then he or she could say, "I worked hard on this meal especially"; if he or she said, "I worked hard on this meal specially", it would sound odd, maybe even ungrammatical, and would, to me at least, be interpreted to mean that he or she worked hard on the meal and the work was special (in some other way than what "worked hard" indicates).--Atemperman (talk) 23:25, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

To my ears especially is a cutesy version of specially. Specially is for standard use. Especially is for use when one wants to add flair to the word. But please correct me if I am wrong. I did no research. Bus stop (talk) 00:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I think you're wrong. In my idiolect at least, I can say "X is especially good" but certainly not *"X is specially good". Like I said above, especially goes with adjectives (for me at least), and specially with verbs if anything. rʨanaɢ (talk) 02:58, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Yes, you are right. So, I guess there are areas of overlap and areas in which only one of those two words will do.

I made this cake especially for you.

I made this cake specially for you.

I think in the above two instances either word will do. So I would think the above usage illustrates an area of overlap. To add flair to the statement, one would choose especially. Bus stop (talk) 03:08, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd generally hear a difference in those sentences.

"I made this cake especially for you." - I made this cake for you in particular, putting in an effort so that you might have cake.

"I made this cake specially for you." - I made this cake in a special way, for you. This would be an odd thing to say.

So I would end up agreeing with Rjanag, since the uses of "specially" mostly do not apply to my life. But I would probably parse "specially" in the second sentence as intending "especially", if that was what you seemed likely to mean. 86.178.228.18 (talk) 14:48, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

If you want a professional opinion, read page 863 of Merriam-Webster's dictionary of English usage. jnestorius^(talk) 17:16, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

German question

I came across this kind of German sentence:

A muß als B kürzer sein.

The intended meaning is "A must be shorter than B". But does it mean that? To my ear, it sounds like it means instead "as B, A must be shorter" and the correct way would be A muß kürzer sein als B. Am I correct here? JIP | Talk 05:12, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I'd say it does mean "A must be shorter than B", but it's definitely an unusual word order. The expected word orders are A muss kürzer als B sein and A muss kürzer sein als B. But despite its unusual word order, it doesn't wind up meaning anything different. +Angr 05:33, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

If the sentence were Latin, this would be a most expected word order. I know it's pretty improbable, but could the author of the sentence have been somehow influenced by Latin? --Магьосник (talk) 07:17, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

A big mistake of mine. A Latin sentence would probably look something like this: A quam B brevior esse debet, which when translated word by word into German, gives A als B kürzer sein muß. Anyone, please correct me if I'm talking nonsense! --Магьосник (talk) 08:05, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure I quite agree with Angr. Consider the following variation: "Ihr müsst als Polizisten besser sein" versus "Ihr müsst besser sein als Polizisten."

To me, the second version means "You must be better than policemen", while the first one can mean something like "As policemen, you must be better" meaning "In your function/position as policemen, you must be better (than normal civilians)" or "Being policemen, you must be better." So, I guess "A muß als B kürzer sein" can also mean "When A is perceived/acting as B, it must be better shorter (than when it isn't)." No references for the moment, but this is what my gut tells me. I would certainly pick A muß kürzer sein als B or A muß kürzer als B sein to lose ambiguity. ---Sluzzelin talk 10:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, you're a native speaker and I'm not so I'll defer to your judgment. I do think it depends a lot on what A and B are, though. If B is something that A can't act as / be perceived as, then the sentence probably would be interpreted as a weird word order meaning "A must be shorter than B". But if A can act as / be perceived as B, then you're right. And I'd certainly interpret "Ihr müsst als Polizisten besser sein" as you did (either "As policemen, you must be better [than civilians]" or "As policemen, you must be better [than you have been up till now]"). +Angr 10:59, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I suppose if I wanted to express the "as policemen" phrase unambiguously, I'd write "Als Polizisten müsst Ihr besser sein." The word order suggested by JIP should perhaps be avoided altogether. ---Sluzzelin talk 11:04, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Hi, native speaker here. A muß als B kürzer sein would mean something like A must be shorter when used as B or As B, A must be shorter. Might make sense on some kind of assembly manual, like, trim part A to not exceed size nnn when used in place of B. ;-)

A muß kürzer sein als B would be the most common way to phrase A must be shorter than B. -- 78.43.60.58 (talk) 13:34, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Totally agreed with those saying it means "(perceived/used) as B, A must be shorter." BTW, in that meaning it's a very common word order (compare Sluzzelin's example), and I daresay it's even more common than introducing the sentence with "als B" (unless that aspect should be stressed of course, but that's another topic). It only sounds odd because it uses the placeholders A and B instead of "real words."

There is no way this sentence means "A is shorter than B" (= comparison) in German. Don't ask me for a grammatical reason, but German doesn't allow to express a comparison of A and B with that word order. --Ibn Battuta (talk) 06:20, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

After thinking about this some more and going through other examples, I think "als" has to follow the comparative adjective ("kürzer als") in order to to mean "than" in the comparative sense. It doesn't have to follow immediately ("kürzer [...] als" is possible too), but it cannot precede the adjective. (I'm sure there is a more linguistically or grammatically sound way of phrasing this). ---Sluzzelin talk 06:36, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

What about Als Martin bin ich kleiner, als Johann nicht. Is that grammatical in the meaning "I'm shorter than Martin but not than Johann"? +Angr 08:28, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I don't think so. I'd understand it as "When I am (being) Martin, I am shorter/smaller. When I am Johann, I am not." It could be said by an actor referring to different roles, for example. ---Sluzzelin talk 09:10, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

The dual meaning of "als" ("than"/"as") makes this a bit trickier. I'm trying to come up with an analogous example where the prepositioning would simply render the sentence ungrammatical, without any other meaning, but so far I couldn't think of anything. ---Sluzzelin talk 09:16, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Okay, I was hoping it would be possible to topicalize "als Martin" by fronting it (the way you can topicalize a direct object by fronting it, e.g. Martin mag ich gerne, Johann nicht), but I guess it isn't. My nonnative intuition of German is good enough to know that *Martin bin ich kleiner als, Johann nicht is ungrammatical. +Angr 09:19, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Alright, now I must ask you. Is the following sentence grammatical in English:

"Than Martin(,) I am shorter."

? ---Sluzzelin talk 10:51, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

No, but "Martin, I am shorter than" is. +Angr 10:55, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Aha, wow! I wouldn't have guessed, though now I can sort of hear it with a strong emphasis on Martin (As in your example "Martin, I am shorter than, but not Johann.") Learned something new, thanks! ---Sluzzelin talk 10:59, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

To topicalize "als Martin", you'd have to say "Kleiner als Martin bin ich, kleiner als Johann nicht" (you'd differentiate between topicalizing "kleiner" and topicalizing Martin by stressing the one or the other). I'm not entirely sure about the rule for that, but Sluzzelin seems to be right about "als" having to follow "kleiner" -- Ferkelparade π 11:05, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

What if you use denn to mean "than" rather than als? How do things like "A muss denn B kürzer sein" or "Denn Martin bin ich kleiner, denn Johann nicht" sound? I know that using denn in the meaning of "than" sounds pretty odd anyway except in ...denn je and when what's being compared already starts with als (e.g. "Putin ist erfolgreicher als Premierminister denn als Präsident"), but putting that aside, are these sentences better than their equivalents with als, since denn can't mean "as"? +Angr 11:13, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It is hard for me to say what it sounds like, because of the unorthodox usage of "denn" (as already explained by yourself). Still, in this case at least there is no room for a different interpretation, and I would understand it the way you intend it to be understood. You might be onto something. I'd appreciate input by the other native speakers who commented in this thread. ---Sluzzelin talk 11:19, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

Sorry, my English is not very good, I hope you'll understand what I mean: "A muss denn B kürzer sein sounds very odd to me." It's possible to say "A muss kürzer denn B sein." In my opinion the function of "als" differs: A ist kürzer als B (that would be "A is shorter than B"): "als" is part of the comparison, you have two things and you compare them. In "A ist als B kürzer" it is not because you can also say "A ist kürzer", "als B" just defines A and we have no second thing to compare. If we have more information the sentence can be: "A als B ist kürzer als C." Maybe this example can show what I mean: "Martin ist als Feuerwehrmann sehr erfolgreich." > "Martin ist als Feuerwehrmann erfolgreicher" and we could add "als Thomas", "als in seinem vorherigen Beruf" etc.--84.140.29.100 (talk) 18:33, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

I vote for Sluzzelin's "1.) adjective in the comparative 2.) (optional extra stuff) 3.) comparative particle (= als, denn)" rule. :o) It's true, the whole mess is due to "als" having two meanings. Usually "Hans is größer als Peter" [sorry, couldn't resist the English stereotype about German names] would always be understood to be mean "Hans is taller than Peter," but with specific context it could also be "Hans - being/as Peter - is taller." As "denn" doesn't have that possibility, the sentence "Hans denn Peter ist größer" would be understood as "Hans > Peter"... but it is not grammatically correct; even "denn" has to follow the adjective in the comparative. Those unflexible German speakers...

Angr, thanks for pointing out the flexibility in English. Yet my sense is that "Martin, I am shorter than" would not be considered official standard English. Sort of like an ellipsis that you can use in ordinary speech, even find in a novel, but that everyone agrees is not a complete sentence. (In fact, the "Martin I am shorter than" may actually be an ellipsis?) But I may be very wrong here. So what's your sense?

Finally, wondering if German has any alternative to the Martin structure, I came up with an odd thing: "(...) Da ist Egon größer." [likewise: "Egon ist da größer"] Obviously "da" is not a comparative particle and can be used in tons of non-comparative sentences, simply as a reference to what's been talked about. Yet it seems to fulfill a very similar function here: It indicates who he is taller than (i.e. he's taller than the others mentioned "there"/"da"). I can't yet quite figure out what I'm trying to say, but is there something like, um, words having the "function" of referring to "objects of comparison"? No, cross that out... Just asking: What's "da" in this context? --Ibn Battuta (talk) 03:51, 7 May 2010 (UTC)

people speaking hindi alone

May i please know how many people speak Hindi ALONE (exception: hindi + english) and what percentage of the people speak Tamil alone (exception: tamil + english) or Tamil including other languages? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.21.50.214 (talk) 08:18, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

It isn't clear what you are looking for. Do you want numbers of people who speak only Hindi or only Tamil as monolinguals? Or do you want numbers of people who speak Hindi as monolinguals as well as those who speak Hindi and English, but no other language; and those who speak Tamil as monolinguals as well as those who speak Tamil and English but no other language? A further area of uncertainty is how broadly you want to define Hindi. Do you want to include only those who speak Standard Hindi, or do you want to define Hindi more broadly to include speakers of all variants based on Khari boli or Hindustani (which would include Urdu)? Or, do you want to include people who speak any of the dialects often considered dialects of Hindi, even though many of these are much further from Standard Hindi than is Urdu? It is difficult to get reliable numbers just for speakers of Hindi as a native language because of differences in the definition of Hindi. I am not aware of any statistics on those who speak Hindi (however it is defined) alone, or just Hindi and English. Nor am I aware of such statistics for Tamil, or just Tamil and English. The statistics that exist give 1) numbers of people who speak either of these languages as a first or native language and 2) total numbers that speak either of these languages, including those whose first or native language is not either of these languages. Both sets of numbers would include people who speak other languages in addition Hindi or Tamil without identifying what those other languages are, so that we can't isolate those who speak only English in addition to Hindi or Tamil. Marco polo (talk) 14:23, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

I think he is asking about:

• How many people can speak only, Hindi or Hindi+English, no other formulas.
• How many percentage of people (out of total world's population) can speak only, Tamil or Tamil+English, no other formulas.

--Extra 999 (Contact ^me + _contribs) 09:04, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

I need to know the Total number of people speaking hindi (either alone or combined with english but should not include other languages). Total number of people speaking tamil (either alone or combined with ANY language). I think it is clear now. Please let me know. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 125.21.50.214 (talk) 09:27, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Hello 125.21.50.214. The question is actually complicated to answer, because it turns out statistics on second languages are hard to find. I can get you started, though.

* Our article on Hindi says Hindi is the first language for 490 million people and the second language for between 120 and 225 million people. There are slightly different figures given in the Census of India article. It's going to be difficult to find any statistics that get to the level of detail needed to figure out how many of these speak no other language or only English.

* Our article Tamil language says 66 million people speak Tamil as a first language (again the Census of India article has a slightly smaller number). You will need to keep looking, however, for statistics on how many people also speak Tamil as a second language.

So, very very roughly, your answer is going to be probably less than 500 million for Hindi and more than 65 million for Tamil. You might want to check back for a couple of more days in case anyone else has better luck searching. Best, WikiJedits (talk) 14:48, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

Phonetics

What's the difference between a word that's written in phonetics /like.this/ or [like.this]? ChrisDHDR 16:05, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Basically, it's a distinction between a broad transcription (virgules) and a narrow transcription (brackets). See Phonetic transcription#Narrow versus broad transcription and International Phonetic Alphabet#Brackets and phonemes. Deor (talk) 16:43, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

The difference is between phonological underlying representations and surface pronunciations. For example, the underlying representation of bank is /bænk/, but it's pronounced as [bæŋk]. rʨanaɢ (talk) 17:29, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Well, slashes are also used to indicate broad phonetic transcription and brackets narrow phonetic transcription, so that bank is broadly /bæŋk/ and narrowly [b̥æ̃ŋkˀ] or the like. +Angr 17:40, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

To make it more confusing, broad phonetic transcription can also be given between brackets. — Ƶ§œš¹ _{[aɪm ˈfɹ̠ˤʷɛ̃ɾ̃ˡi]} 19:03, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

That's true. The difference is not set in stone—people adopt ad-hoc transcription conventions for the task at hand. When in doubt, it's always best to check what the standard in a particular article is (in the cases where it's important, the author will usually mention it early in the article with something along the lines of "in this article I use square brackets for X and slashes for Y). rʨanaɢ (talk) 20:35, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

One significant difference: phonemic transcription (between '/') is meaningless outside the context of a specific language (or a specific dialect of a language), because phonemes are defined only in that domain. Phonetic transcription (between '[' and ']') is in principle independent of language, though in practice one might ignore phonetic details which are not relevant to the matter under discussion. --ColinFine (talk) 23:04, 6 May 2010 (UTC)

active voice passive voice?

In a MA thesis, a student who is writing in english as a second language, writes the following:

"It is investigated which measures both parties agreed upon to resolve their conflict. Furthermore it is analyzed to what extent these measures have in fact been implemented. Finally it is explored in what ways unresolved conflict issues continue to impact the lives of Nicaraguans today."

This seems awkward to me in regular english, but I'm not sure how to explain what is wrong grammatically, or how to correct the text. Any suggestions? Thanks if you can help. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.98.238.113 (talk) 16:58, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

It's kind of an "impersonal passive", which is fine in Latin, but a little bit dubious in English (especially when it calls attention to itself as a kind of constantly-repeated stylistic tic). AnonMoos (talk) 17:13, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This is awkward but I think not quite "wrong". I agree with AnonMoos that this kind of structure should be avoided and certainly not repeated. I would recast this as "This thesis investigates ... It analyzes ... Finally, it explores ...". The student has probably been told to avoid first-person and second-person pronouns in academic writing, but hasn't been shown the kinds of structures that work. Marco polo (talk) 17:21, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Agree with Marco polo. Rather than "it is..." and a past tense - which is a construction I found occurred a lot in the North of England - use the present tense, active voice. (No doubt someone with more current grammatical expertise will be along to tell you the exact terminology, but hey I finished teaching English 15 years ago!) --TammyMoet (talk) 17:27, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

As Marco polo says, this construction is not actively incorrect, but does seem more awkward than it need be. Some academic establishments are, or used to be, quite rigid about required styles in theses and similar papers. If the one concerned here still insists on the passive voice, one (of several) minimal but more natural way in which the passage could be recast more naturally is as follows:

"The measures that both parties agreed upon to resolve their conflict are investigated. Furthermore, the extent to which these measures have in fact been implemented is analyzed. Finally, the ways that unresolved conflict issues continue to impact the lives of Nicaraguans today are explored."

It might be useful to consult some recent past theses on similar topics in the establishment's library to see what has lately been deemed acceptable. 87.81.230.195 (talk) 20:42, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This sort of thing is a style issue which will depend on what subject or publication you're writing for. In technical writing, the impersonal passive is sometimes required as standard. A thesis is clearly not supposed to be written in "regular English", but rather in the accepted style of the people who will be marking it. It is entirely possible that this is the recommended style: if this is an excerpt from the summary, I'd think this style was quite appropriate. I'd check what guidance they had been given before recommending changes: they surely have a style guide, if only a couple of pages in a larger booklet. 86.178.228.18 (talk) 20:51, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

Regardless of style, this sentence is questionable at best; I'm not even sure if it's grammatical to use an expletive with this verb. We can say "it is known that...", "it is said that...", "it is shown that...", etc., but not *"it is eaten that...", *"it is played that...". In generative terms, this is explained by positing that only verbs that take a CP (or proposition) as their argument can be in this construction. Investigate is only marginal in that sense (the only way I can use it grammatically like that is "this experiment investigates whether X can Y". rʨanaɢ (talk) 20:59, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

This is presumably a thesis submitted to satisfy the requirements for a degree. I suppose that someone at the institution where the thesis will be filed could have created a requirement that theses must use this kind of awkward and opaque structure (though I doubt it). If so, the requirement is deplorable, but it will have to be met. However, at the institution where I completed my postgraduate degrees, my committee would not have accepted such contorted prose. Marco polo (talk) 23:13, 4 May 2010 (UTC)

What seems most likely to me is that it's a thesis from a foreign institution in the department where they write their theses in English. I see this sort of thing a lot in, for example, psychology or neuroscience (or English departments) in Taiwan where part of the exercise is to write your thesis in English; in many of those the committee also is composed of non-native speakers, so some errors slip by. rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:01, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

(Of course, when I say "foreign" I mean "not in the US, UK, Australia, or another English-speaking country". Bad, I know, but you know what I mean... rʨanaɢ (talk) 03:02, 5 May 2010 (UTC))

Normally, I'd have said the tortured structure was a clear error, and unlikely to be mandatory. However, notice that each sentence has clearly been arranged to bring a highly specific verb ("investigated", "analysed", "explored") to the front in the same form. Given the particular verbs used, it seems plausible that this is a required style: this should be checked before suggesting they change it. 86.178.228.18 (talk) 14:43, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

1.) Ask what's common in the field. Fields differ in whether they allow first person usage, and yes, some may consider "weird" structures normal (jargon). 2.) Context and tense: There's a difference (I believe) between "It is analyzed" (= this study does it; there's actually an identifiable actor) and "it has been analyzed" (= some other people out there have done so; you describe the general situation, not stressing the actor(s)). At least in my own field, the latter seems to be quite common. Maybe if you point out that difference, the author of the thesis will understand when to avoid such structures and when it's okay? Just my 2 Nicaraguan centavos... --Ibn Battuta (talk) 06:27, 5 May 2010 (UTC)

It seems to me that this is not a second-language issue but simply the author trying to avoid using the word "I," which he/she may have been told does not belong in academic writing. The use of the passive voice would sound just as awkward in Spanish, I think, assuming that's the student's native language. -- Mwalcoff (talk) 23:26, 5 May 2010 (UTC)