Behooves is archaic. It has gone out of use. You can say "It is incumbent on us". It means that the duty to be performed is a burden which is ours to carry. It is a word that might be used on formal occasions. Normally people would say "It is our duty" or one of the many other simpler alternatives. From Wikipedia. Incumbent is more often used as a noun, meaning the current holder of an office. So, you could say that "Obama is the incumbent President" Imperative denotes something which is urgent and must be carried out.
Over here we've lost that distinction. "Imperative for us" and "incumbent upon us" have essentially the same meaning. Neither is used in colloquial speech. They both brand the speaker/writer as educated, intellectual and/or a show-off--one who displays his knowledge and vocabulary to impress others.
It behooves me to point out that in some quarters the word is still used. Also I think urgent would best be replaced by important. One can easily say "It is imperative that we eliminate child poverty by 2025." That hardly suggests urgency. @FR. While I agree that "It is critical that..." is more powerful than "It is imperative that we....", the latter is - for me - a lot easier to say. I would edit it out of most writing, but in speech that, and incumbent upon, are what will come naturally to me. Unfortunately, most of the time I am just too lazy to edit my speech on the fly.
It is incumbent on me to behoove Saint not to use the word behoove, unless he wants to sound like someone from the 19th century. Yes that is a valid use of the word. Imperative is often used with words indicating urgency, but I agree that it can be used as you suggest..
Asia stocks take cue from Wall Street, zip higher take cue =? zip higher = ? Not zipping files with Winzip? Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Cue Used in the theatre for an action which is used as a prompt for another action to be performed. So, an actors cue to begin a speech could be when another actor turns around. The word is the written form of the letter q, standing for quando, Latin for "when".
The original meaning of "zip" was "to move very quickly." It has no etymology; it was just a cute sound that suggested speed. "Zipper" was originally a trademark for the now-ubiquitous slide-tooth fasteners on clothing, which allow you to "zip" your clothes, briefcases and other containers open or shut very quickly. Eventually "zip" and "unzip" became verbs for fastening and unfastening clothes much more quickly than can be done with buttons, laces, etc. At the same time, "zip" also acquired a more general definition of moving very quickly, or doing anything very quickly. "Zipping" and "unzipping" computer files came into use when files became very large and processing speed became very fast. Using WinZip or any other "zip" software is somewhat similar to opening or closing a physical container quickly by using a zipper.
Nonetheless, this is what the dictionaries tell us. It's not clear whether it originated in England or the U.S. "Whomp" is even more recent. "Kowabunga" is from the Howdy Doody TV show. The actor playing Indian Chief Thunderthud made up this greeting to distinguish it from the "feminine grammar" of Princess Summerfall Winterspring, who always said, "Kowagoopa." [Edit: I had reversed the two Indians.]
Zap is even later. First known use 1929. Bonk, 1931. First use of whoosh as a verb, 1909. Many of these types of words seem to have been coined quite recently. Pop, as in going pop, is earlier: 15th Century.
Shakespeare could have done with popped in Macbeth. The WITCHES vanish. BANQUO The earth hath bubbles, as the water has, And these are of them. Whither are they vanished? MACBETH Into the air, and what seemed corporal Melted, as breath into the wind. Would they had stayed. BANQUO You could say that they "popped". It's a new word.
I am possibly overfond of commas, and would put two in the sentence above: He came to my house to return my books, spent an hour doing revision of history with me, and then watched a video with me for another one and half hours. "Doing" is better than to do. "Then" is an alternative to "after that". I would prefer to make shorter sentences. You could say this: He came to my house to return my books. We spent an hour on history revision, then watched a video for one and half hours. Your question. "Why id the English language so difficult to learn?" The main difficulty for foreigners is getting the word order right. The order of words is seemingly arbitrary, but fixed. If you get them in the wrong order, we notice it it straight away. We also use connective words, like the "on" in "We spent an hour on history revision", which don't mean anything, but if you choose the wrong one, are also blatant mistakes.
The phonetics of English is a big problem for most foreigners. Our language has a large number of phonemes, and many of them sound alike to a speaker of--for example--Spanish and Japanese, which have a much smaller number. We have several phonemes that most languages don't have, which are difficult to pronounce, like our gargled R (although the British pronounced it as a flap, as in most other languages), and our two TH sounds. English grammar isn't really any more complicated than most other languages, but it's still difficult to learn. The only language I'm familiar with whose grammar is somewhat similar to ours is, surprisingly, Chinese. The most closely related major language to English is German, and although the similarities in grammar and vocabulary are obvious, the differences are daunting. And German pronunciation is difficult for many anglophones. Dutch is also closely related, and it's phonetics are quite a bit more similar to English, but its grammar and vocabulary are closer to German than to English. Frisian is said to be the language most closely related to English, but it has a very small population of speakers so few of us have ever seen or heard it.
in my scholastic experience I have encountered teachers of English mentioning how screwed up standard English grammer is. german is also excessive in their finality's concerning der, die and das, dass.
Here is some Frisian: It may be close to Old English, but I can only guess at a few words. I think that a person used to modern English would understand more of Italian.
Spanish is probably the easiest language for a modern English speaker to understand. Many of the words are similar to English. Here is a newspaper headline: I don't know what it means, but I think I see audience, national, quarter or four, and tiger. Condena is condemn possibly? La Audiencia Nacional condena a cuatro de los ´Tigres de Arkan´
Because Spanish is a Romance language--a descendant of Latin. The other best-known Romance languages are Catalan, Portuguese, French, Italian, Romanian and Occitan (Provençal is the best-known dialect of Occitan). When the Normans conquered England in 1066, French became the country's official language in scholarship, government and business. Many French words were absorbed into English. This phenomenon recurred during the Renaissance, as Latin became the language of scholarship and French the language of diplomacy. And it popped up again in the 19th century as scientists and other scholars borrowed Latin words. La Audiencia Nacional is the Supreme Court. Arkan was an outlaw in Serbia (real name Željko Ražnatović) toward the end of the era of Yugoslavia. The Tigers of Arkan (which has been translated into Spanish for this Spanish publication--I have no idea how it is written in Serbo-Croatian) were a paramilitary organization he put together to fight for Serbian independence. Yes. The infinitive is condenar.
I wonder if there is a link between condemn and contempt? Here is Arkan with his Tigers. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! A career criminal politician. Aren't they all? A trophy point to anyone who can discover what his nickname Arkan means.
This link shows the introduction of other languages into English. http://www.slate.com/blogs/lexicon_...tributed_to_english_vocabulary_over_time.html
