On Thu, 14 Jul 2005 07:02:52 +0800, Lion <Nospam@com.sg> wrote:
> "Chris Croughton" <chris@keristor.net> wrote ...
>> Lion <Nospam@com.sg> wrote:
>>
>>> Pardon my ignorance. What's the meaning of 'what's with' in this
>>> context.
>>> When written in full, what do these two words stand for ?
>>
>> It's an American colloqialism, an idiom which doesn't make much sense
>> literally. "What is the situation regarding ..." might be a more full
>> translation of it in this case. In some others it's a contraction of
>> "What is happening with ...", as in "What's with the picnic on
>> Saturday?"
>>
>> So what the poster meant in this case was something like:
>>
>> "What is the situation regarding the use of the double negative in
>> English?"
>>
>> It's an idiom which has, via television and other media, made its way
>> into English as well, unfortunately...
>
> Interesting. Many thanks.
>
> By the way, looking back at what I've written, is it more correct for me to
> write "When written out in full ..."?
I don't think there is any difference in correctness, there is possibly
a slight difference in meaning but it's very subtle. To me "written out
in full" implies being a bit more long-winded (using more words) than
"written in full". However, I generally write more words than are
really necessary anyway, so I'm not the best example (if you want short
and to the point I'm not the person to write it) <g>.
I think that I would use "written in full" to mean that the sentence is
grammatically complete and the meaning is clear, whereas I'd use
"written out in full" for something which went down to the last detail.
However, I wouldn't claim that this difference in meaning is universally
recognised among English speakers, it may just be the way I learnt the
phrases. In practice both are understadable and will mean effectively
the same thing.
Chris C
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