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Monday, July 29, 2019

English words which confuse foreigners - how do you explain them? Owing to and due to



Owing To and Due To
I wrote this on the polyglot page in Facebook in reply to a query about which words people find confusing.
Owing to and due to are confusing. Owing to means because of. Due to is caused by. You start a sentence with Owing to. Owing to bad weather, the trains will be late. The lateness of the trains is due to bad weather.

Several times a week I visit Toastmasters Speakers' Clubs in Singapore and the UK and worldwide. I am often invited to be the Grammarian or Language Evaluator because I am a native English speaker.

I present a word of the day. Here is one I presented recently.

American - British English
automobile - car
hood of car - bonnet
cookie - biscuit
fall - autumn
cookie - biscuit
faucet - tap
pants - trousers
sidewalk - pavement
truck  -  lorry
trunk of automobile  - boot of car 
underpants - pants

British English - American
autumn - fall
biscuit - cookie
bonnet of car - hood
car - automobile
Lorry - truck
pants - underpants
pavement - roadway
tap - faucet
trousers - pants
boot of car - trunk of car


Taboo word – Actually!
*Please tap/clap if you hear the word of the day
or the taboo word!
LANGUAGE EVALUATION
COMPLIMENTS I shall be back to compliment those who used the word of the day. J
DELIGHTS I shall listen for delightful words and phrases:
alliteration; assonance; similes; metaphors; repetition, triads.

TIPS I shall offer free tips on:
Americanisms. British English. Singlish. Accents and Vocabulary.
Practising Perfect Pronunciation: l, r, s, t. Intonation and rhythm.
Good Grammar. Tenses; present and past. Articles 'a' and 'the'.


Come and visit one of Singapore's Toastmasters clubs.

About the Author
Angela Lansbury, travel writer and photographer, author and language teacher to individuals and companies.

Angela Lansbury, the author, - not related to Angela Lansbury the actress nor any of the other dozen people named Angela Lansbury or Lansbury.

I have many more posts on Americanisms and language. I teach English and other languages. I am a polyglot. Please share links to your favourite posts.

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