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hi everybody welcome back to ask alicia
the weekly series where you ask me
questions and i answer them maybe first
question this week comes from rizal
kuzwandi again hi again rizal rizal says
hi alicia what is the difference between
task duty job and assignment and how do
we use them thanks okay good question
let's start with the word duty duty is
the least commonly used of these words
that you've introduced here we use duty
to talk about our responsibilities or
our obligations we use this word however
for kind of specific jobs so people who
work in like the government who do like
civil service related jobs and people
who are members of the military use the
word duty to describe their
responsibilities
for example
my duty is to serve my country
it is my duty as mayor to do the best i
can for my city
we don't use the word duty or the plural
duties very much except in these kinds
of settings you might see this on like a
contract or perhaps a job application or
a job information form but in general
the word duty is most commonly used in
these kinds of environments
let's move on then to the word job so we
use the word job to refer generally to
the type of work we do like i'm a
teacher
i'm a photographer i'm in finance so
it's our job our job title or the kind
of work that we do that's our job
i make youtube videos as part of my job
we're journalists so we have busy jobs
okay finally then the words task and
assignment these really do have quite
similar meanings
but assignment is used more when we're
students like when we have homework we
often call it a homework assignment so
that's something we have to take home
complete and bring back we use
assignment to mean like a thing that we
need to do
assignment is also used quite
specifically in the journalism and media
related fields so when we receive a task
when we receive something that we need
to travel for like we travel and we
interview someone or we travel to
collect information that's called an
assignment in the journalism and media
related fields so in that case
assignment can be quite specific to a
field in most other cases though just
talking about your to-do lists the
everyday items you need to take care of
we use the word task to describe that so
in like your computer or your smartphone
or maybe in a notebook somewhere you
might have a task list so your task list
is your list of responsibilities the
small things you need to do throughout
your day or throughout your week task is
probably the most commonly used word
from this list that you have presented
here some examples i have an assignment
in la this month
where's your next assignment
so for other work for most general work
we can use the word task to talk about
those small things we need to do
throughout the day i hope that this
helps you understand the differences
between these words thanks very much for
the question okay let's move on to your
next question next question comes from
trang again hi trang trang says hello
alicia what's the difference between
just and only ah good question um it
does depend on how the word is used in
the sentence in some cases just and only
can be used interchangeably we can use
them in the same way let's compare with
two sentences
i want just one cookie
i want only one cookie
so here in both of these example
sentences just and only precede proceed
means come before the word or the
expression one cookie so they're
modifying one cookie we always put just
and only directly before the word or
phrase that we are modifying please be
careful a point that many native
speakers make mistakes with is they'll
put it before the verb not before like
the actual thing they want to modify so
in these example sentences we can use
the two words in the same way they mean
like one thing
that's it we want to emphasize the one
thing
in other situations though the two words
have different functions so we can use
just to talk about very recently
completed actions to talk about actions
that were planned for completion very
recently and to talk about actions that
are going to happen in the very near
future for example
i just finished my homework
i was just about to call you
i'm just about to leave
so these are example sentences which in
order are recently finished action
recently planned action that did not
happen and upcoming action in the very
near future we can use just to do this
but we cannot use only to do this so
this is an example of the various ways
that just can be used only is used for
that kind of emphasis feeling that we
talked about in the cookie example
sentence if you want some more
information on the placement of only and
how it affects the meaning of a sentence
please check out the whiteboard video
that's on the youtube channel that
details the use of the word only and the
placement of the word only it's a big
point for native speakers and learners
alike i think so i hope that that helps
you thanks very much for the question
okay let's move along to your next
question next question this week comes
from gerardo hi gerardo gerardo says
how does the letter t sound in the words
party and started yeah good question so
the t sound in words like this uh it
becomes quite soft so you'll notice uh
in these patterns we have a vowel
followed by r
t and then something at the end in this
case we're looking at like e d or maybe
y sounds so in the examples that you
included party it's like a d sound and
started so party and started it's like a
d sound the t sound that is not
pronounced party and started are
difficult to say in fast speech we make
the sounds much softer like a d sound
party and started so three more words
that follow the same pronunciation rule
are
parted
blurted and sporty
so here we see vowel plus r t
plus something else so we have sporty in
the last example and then these words
that end in e d with parted and blurted
so you'll notice that that t sound
becomes very soft like a d so parted
blurted sporty party started so this is
a kind of a good guideline i think for
when you see that rt and you see a vowel
before it
but it's not at the end of a word so
please note that this pronunciation
rule applies when the t is not the last
letter in the word if for example the
word is start or part
or blurt the t sound is quite clear
but when it's not the last letter in the
word it's like started
party blurted then the t sound becomes
more like a d sound so we would not say
blurted party started it's a little too
much it's kind of difficult to say in
fast speech so i hope that this helps
you with the pronunciation of t sounds
that follow this spelling rule thanks
very much for the question okay let's
move on to your next question next
question comes from
john hi john john says hi alicia i would
like to ask the difference between can't
and couldn't is it possible to use both
of them to say something is impossible
to do at present which of the two is
preferred or can i just use them
interchangeably
thanks
in statements we use can't for present
tense and couldn't for past tense
examples i can't help you right now
he can't come to the phone
we couldn't finish all the food
she couldn't find the stapler
so cant is used to refer to impossible
things in the present couldn't is used
to refer to impossible things in the
past so we cannot use them
interchangeably so present tense can't
past tense couldn't less commonly there
is the expression i couldn't so we use
this expression when there's something
kind of tempting or interesting that
we're a little bit interested about but
we kind of want to like hold back a bit
so for example like three donuts for me
i couldn't so it's like there's some
kind of temptation or something like
that but that's a sort of set special
expression and it's not so commonly used
another example might be like a
promotion but i would have to leave all
my team members behind i couldn't do
that so it's kind of like there's a
reluctant feeling to do something so it
doesn't necessarily mean the speaker is
going to choose one way or the other but
it's just kind of this shock direct like
surprised expression that shows a
decision is difficult so in that case i
couldn't refers to a present tense
feeling like that's not possible i
shouldn't do that that's kind of the
feel there but in all other cases as i
talked about in my example sentences we
use couldn't for past tense
impossibility so please use can't for
present tense couldn't for past tense i
hope that this helps answer your
question thanks very much for sending it
along okay on to our next question this
week next question this week comes from
stanislav hi stanislav stanislav says
what idiom can i use to describe past
work if its results were unuseful and
unnecessary and there was no practical
outcome but that wasn't clear from the
start in my native language this is
called work for a shelf it means that
the results will be put on a shelf and
then forgotten ah interesting actually
we use shelf in this way too when we say
we're going to put something on a shelf
after we finish it it doesn't really
mean that it was unnecessary or unuseful
but it's just kind of like you say
there's not really a practical outcome
for it like we finished this thing it's
done i'm not going to do anything with
it i'll just put it on the shelf we also
use this as a verb to shelf something
means to put it off to the side and kind
of forget about it like something that's
finished we don't have to deal with it
anymore we shelf that thing some
examples i shelved that vase i took a
week to paint
don't leave that project on the shelf
so in this case in english it doesn't
necessarily mean that the item was bad
or was not useful or whatever it just
means it's like not so important right
now so we put it on the shelf we like
don't think about it so much we just put
it somewhere where it's not in the way
sometimes literally so i hope that this
helps answer your question interesting
one thanks very much for sending it
along okay that is everything that i
have for this week thanks as always for
sending your questions remember you can
send them to me at englishclass101.com
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much for watching this week's episode of
ask alicia and i will see you again next
week bye bye
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