Hello! Hoje tem a segunda parte do podcast que gravei com Steve Ford (veja a primeira parte aqui). Nessa parte, falamos sobre as perguntas do Wallace, Ailton, Tiago, Barbara e Danubia:

* Issue, matter and topic – what’s the difference?

* This and that

* Conditional 2

* Pronunciation of a and an

* How do I say ‘os olhos da cara’?

Obs.: Só um aviso (just a heads up) – essa conversa foi gravada no Skype, e por isso infelizmente o volume da minha voz saiu um pouco mais baixo do que normalmente sai nos podcasts.

Transcrição

(Ana) Let’s go back to the questions.

(Steve) You bet!

So Wallace… Wallace asks about three possible translations of “assunto”, which are issue, matter and topic. And how would he know which one to use? I mean, how would you differentiate?

(Steve) Ok, now, it’s good. This is where, like, English teachers would say that you can break this down, you can categorize this into “register”. I like to call it levels of formality. So, really you could break it down, you could categorize it into levels of formality. So it depends on the context. Topic is more semi-formal or familiar, and… While the next one, matter, is a little more formal. And then issue (which is an American pronunciation – iSSue, which is British) would be the most formal of the three, so..

(Ana) Issue would be the most formal?

(Steve) Yeah. This is a very… So you would hear, you would hear that, like, you know, like maybe politicians saying “Well, this is a very pressing issue and we will try to resolve it as soon as possible”. “A pressing matter”, not too far off… And then “a pressing topic”, well…

(Ana) What would you say if, let’s say, we were discussing the agenda for a meeting. Which one would you use? Like, we have five possible, what? Topics, or issues…

(Steve) Yeah, I think I would say topic.

(Ana) OK. Alright, let’s take a look at another one. We have a question sent by Tiago. He asks about this or that. He says… well, he mentioned a podcast that I did a while ago and I talked about this expression “That ship has sailed”. You know, and he’s asking “Why isn’t it “this” ship has sailed?” And he mentions that he’s not talking only about this expression, but in general. Maybe that’s because it’s very common to teach that, you know, if you’re talking about something that is near you, you use ‘this’ and if it’s far from you, you use ‘that’… Why wouldn’t you say “This ship has sailed”?

(Steve) Exactly, so it’s a question of distance in terms of an objective sense, so ‘this’ would be closer to you and then, ‘that’ would be further away from you. So, I mean, yeah, if you said “that ship has sailed” and “this ship has sailed”… In a subjective sense, I guess you could use both and I guess that’s the question he’s asking.

Now, if you were referring to the… physically to the ship and you said “this ship has sailed”… It’s almost like you’re pointing to the picture. Like, you have, somehow you have a represantation of the ship close to you, so that you can exemplify it, so that you can show it. And the same thing “That ship has sailed”. So maybe the picture is further away from you on the wall ...