Hello!
In this video we're going to look at 'some' and 'any'. In scene 1 we're looking at 'some
people' and the interrogative 'any time?' and the negative 'not any money'. The second
scene is a table where we discuss those issues again and the third scene we talk about 'any
time' with no limit. Hope you enjoy it!
In scene one, we're looking at 'some' and 'not any'. Here's a picture to be going on
with, two people having a conversation outside a coffee house - she looks happy, he looks
rather sad and she's saying "let's have some coffee". Oh dear! He says "I can't, I'm sorry,
I don't any money", don't have any money. She says "that's alright, don't worry, I've
got some money", "I've got some money". Notice the way we say 'some' there. We don't say
'some' we say 'sm coffee' and 'sm money' because English is a stressed-timed language. I'm
going to make another video about stressing but in the meantime here's the two pronunciations
of 'some':..when it's stressed and ...when it's unstressed - that's in the International
Phonetic Alphabet. I'm going to put these two 'somes' in brackets because you don't
really have to say them, you can also say 'let's have coffee' and 'I've got money' but
it's also very common to use the weak form there.
Now let's move on to the second half of scene one, here's another picture, we're going to
get the question form here. There's a young man sitting at the table and a woman offering
him something and it seems he's not very hungry. She says 'Would you like some cookies?' would
you like some cookies (or biscuits? - depending on which country you're coming from). And
she goes on to say 'there are some left', 'there are some left, from earlier', 'there
are some left'. Notice the pronunciation difference - 'would you like some cookies?', 'there are
some left' - there's no noun after 'some' there. And he's not very hungry and he replies
in the negative 'no, I don't want any, thanks', 'I don't want any, thanks'. Both 'some' and
'any' there are alone, they've got no noun after them. And she tries again, tries to
offer him something different 'would you like any soup?' - She's not sure now, and he
replies 'no soup, thanks.' He doesn't reply 'any' because you can't use 'any' by itself
without changing the meaning but we'll see that in scene three.
Now let's have another look at these various phrases in the table. Here we've got a table,
you can always pause the video if you want to, and in the meantime I'll just write the
website address here - 'grammarbites.co.uk/definitions' where you can get more information on any
word in capitals like 'count' and 'mass'. In the meantime 'I had some sandwiches, some
tea' you can use 'some' or 'any' with count nouns and mass nouns. Then the next one 'did
you get any sandwiches?', 'did you get some sandwiches?'- in questions you can use 'some'
or 'any' but there is a bit of a difference in the meaning. And finally, the negative
'I didn't get any sandwiches or tea' and we also use any with verbs like 'doubt' or 'wonder'
which have a sort of negative feeling to them and I'll just write in also we sometimes use
it with 'if' clauses. Sentences like 'I'll ask him if he has any time'. If somebody asks
you a question, for example in a restaurant like 'any coffee?' or 'any dessert' and the
answer is 'no' the answer is 'no' or 'no, thank you' not 'any' because 'any' sounds
positive, a bit like the way we describe it in the next scene, in the scene three. Now
if you want to pause the video and look at the tables some more, do, otherwise I'm moving
on to scene three.
And here we have a figure emerging from the mist, who is it? It's Spiderman! Is he swinging?
Is he jumping? No, he's cooking! Because, Spiderman can do anything, Spiderman can do
anything. So here, 'any' is positive which means that there is no limit. I'll write at
the top here 'any equals no limit', he can do everything. Whatever happens, he can do
it. Now I'm going to write four sentences on the right and talk about each one to help
show the meaning of 'any'. And here's the first sentence: 'This is a difficult time
for any family'; the loss of a job, or a death, for example, is a difficult time for all families,
whichever family you choose will find this difficult. And here's the next sentence: 'Feel
free to join any of these online groups'; you know there are lots of online groups these
days which do different activates and you may join all of them or one of them of two
of them, whichever. And here's the next sentence: 'If you see any leaks, let me know' - sounds
like a plumber speaking; 'If you see a big leak or a small leak or two leaks, whatever
you see, let me know'. And here's another sentence: 'In any activity carried out by
two groups, one will be better than the other'. It doesn't matter which activity you were
talking about, this will be true.
Now my last sentence contains a very common phrase, 'in any case', here it is. 'We had
no telephone, and in any case there was no time to call a doctor', so it really doesn't
matter if we had a telephone or not because there was no time. Instead of 'in any case'
we can also say 'anyway' which means roughly the same thing - 'we had no telephone, and
anyway there was no time to call a doctor'. I'll just write 'anyway' at the bottom here.
So, that's how we use 'any' in a positive sense, meaning activities with no limit. Alright,
that's all - bye for now!