04-28-2003, 01:22 AM | #11 |
Iron Throne Cult
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Yes that's what I was leaning towards. I had 'a' originally, but I was just reading through this morning and I suddenly thought, is that right? And after running over it a few times it started to look and sound completely meaningless! Cool, thanks guys [img]smile.gif[/img] . LOL it really is such a small thing, obviously my tutor isn't going be reading along and suddenly pull up when he sees an incorrect an , but it was bugging me that I couldn't figure out what was right! If you say 'an unique' enough times it starts to sound okay!
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04-28-2003, 01:29 AM | #12 | |
Iron Throne Cult
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Quote:
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04-28-2003, 01:51 AM | #13 |
40th Level Warrior
Join Date: July 11, 2002
Location: Chicago, IL
Posts: 11,916
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Seraph, Vaskez, and Reeka are right. Which is why I think "an historic" only applies when you pronounce the "h" in historic.
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04-28-2003, 02:21 AM | #14 | |
Quintesson
Join Date: September 12, 2001
Location: Ewing, NJ
Age: 42
Posts: 1,079
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Quote:
"an historic" has to do with the (British?) pronunciation of historic as "iss tor ic". [ 04-28-2003, 02:25 AM: Message edited by: Seraph ] |
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04-28-2003, 04:21 AM | #15 |
Vampire
Join Date: April 28, 2001
Location: Cambridge
Age: 40
Posts: 3,877
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Yup, Vaskez and Reeka are right.... A dictionary will tell you the phonetic pronouciations....
But since you are doing a degree on this, you hardly need us mouthing about it
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04-28-2003, 10:10 AM | #16 |
40th Level Warrior
Join Date: October 29, 2001
Location: Western Wilds of Michigan
Posts: 11,752
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Boy, it's easy to get bogged down in the details...
My first choice would be to reword the sentence so I didn't have to deal with the awkward phrase. So I'd look at something like "Its unique contribution..." The second reason I'd do that is it gets rid of the passive voice situation. I'm not particularly militant about it, but if you're dealing with someone who worries about whether it's "a unique" or "an unique", that will be the least of your worries. Or third, you could flip it around: It contributed uniquely... Again, active voice instead of passive voice. You could try "It made a unique contribution..." but that doesn't get rid of the phrasing. Ah well... rotsa ruck!
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04-28-2003, 10:11 AM | #17 |
Jack Burton
Join Date: March 21, 2001
Location: Philippines, but now Harbor City Sydney
Age: 41
Posts: 5,556
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i thought that if you use vowels (A-E-I-O-U) then you make use of an then the rest A... ?? or am i wrong ?
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04-28-2003, 10:53 AM | #18 |
Quth-Maren
Join Date: February 17, 2003
Location: Portsmouth
Age: 34
Posts: 4,145
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My sister, my friend and I all say A, althogh it is prob'ly wrong, but Hey! it sounds right.
That's wot matters.
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04-28-2003, 11:52 AM | #19 |
Ironworks Moderator
Join Date: March 1, 2001
Location: Midlands, South Carolina
Age: 48
Posts: 14,759
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English is not the only language that changes it's rules for the sound or flow of the sentence. In spanish, they use the letter "Y" to mean "and". Sometimes, depending on the need...the letter "E" is used instead. That makes the pronouncing of the sentence flow with more beauty and not so harsh sounding .
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04-28-2003, 05:10 PM | #20 | |
Iron Throne Cult
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Quote:
Yes, Seraph, that's what I mean. An historic is fine when you pronounce it istoric, but it's becoming really common to say an historic when you pronounce the h which seems inconsistent. Well Bungleau, that's probably good advice for some situations but I'm writing a report and reporting what the various variables contributed to predicting the criterion. That's the clearest way of expressing it. Like I said, it doesn't really matter at all. It was just bugging me that both sounded right, and like dear Alex said, I'm a pedant
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