Hi everyone! And welcome to Like A Native Speaker.
In today's lesson we're going to talk about stuff, and ....things!
So a few weeks ago I talked a lot about stuff and things
in my general extenders video
but today I want to talk about stuff and things as
nouns by themselves, not at the end of sentences.
So stuff and things are nouns that are used
when we want to talk about an undetermined amount of something.
Either, we don't know how many there are, or
there's just too many to count.
You'll see this most commonly in, "I have a lot of things to do."
or, "I have so much stuff to do!"
So things or stuff could really be anything.
They could be objects, or actions, or
even people depending on your sentence.
Let's dive into the differences between stuff and things.
The most obvious difference is that things are countable.
One thing, two things, many things. So many things.
But stuff is uncountable.
Some stuff, a lot of stuff, too much stuff.
So things are countable, stuff is uncountable,
but we still use them much the same.
You just have to be careful with those quantifiers,
much, many, a lot of, not enough. Things like that.
So what is the difference in meaning or usage?
Well, the main thing is that stuff
usually refers to a wide variety of different kinds of things.
So for example, I'm moving pretty soon, and
right now I have too much stuff.
There's just stuff everywhere.
Because I'm talking so generally, using 'things' would be a bit strange.
It's kind of unnatural in that way.
So in this case 'things' usually refers to a
narrower or maybe more specific group.
The benefit of thing is that we can use it in singular,
and we use it so often when we don't know or
can't remember what the object or action is.
Hey um... can you pass me the thing? The....
The thing.
You know, the thing, the, the...
No, no, the thing with the buttons.
No, the black thing, the other black thing with the buttons.
The... you use.... for the...
The... yeah! No wait, Yes. Yes!
The... this thing! ....what's it called?
The remote?
Yes, the remote!
So to quickly review all the stuff we talked about:
Stuff is an uncountable noun.
Things are, of course, a countable noun.
Stuff is used when there's a wide variety of
objects or actions.
Things are usually a bit more narrow.
But thing, of course, can also be used in the singular.
Usually if we don't know what it's called, or
in my case, can't remember.
How about in your language? Do you have a word
or expression that serves the same kind of function as
stuff or things?
What is it? Do you use it in a similar way?
Let me know! Tell me in the comments, make sure to subscribe,
and I'll see you next time!