word forms | GuruEAP

Success failure effort belief

Posted on November 22, 2017March 13, 2018 by Pak Guru

These words – success, failure, effort, belief – take different forms and collocate strongly with other words.

They’re also problematic for Indonesian scholars. Success has become sukses, effort is translated from upaya, and belief is subject to the same word form error as life (see note below).

Use a dictionary to complete the following text with suitable forms of these words.

Instructions

Enter the following items into the gaps, then click 'Check your answers!'

failure, success, succeed, fails, fail, successfully, failed, believe, effort, successful, belief

Bill is a (1) olympic runner. He has won several gold medals and has achieved (2) in many other competitions. Ever since he was a child, he has always been a (3) . Last year he (4) broke several world records. What does he think are the factors influencing his (5) ? Clean living, plenty of training, and of course the desire to (6) !

Budi is a (7) as a runner. He (8) every time he enters a race. Ever since he began running he has been a (9) . As a child he (10) . As a teenager he (11) , and now as a middle age man he continues to (12) . He believes his constant (13) to win may be related to his fondness for nightclubs and the fact that he eats nothing but bakso (with white rice, of course).

It seems that in order to (14) , a runner needs to make an (15) to maintain the correct lifestyle and to maintain a (16) in winning. It is only when we (17) we will win that we can avoid (18) and achieve (19) .

Note to Indonesian scholars

In English effort is a noun (not a verb). So what is a good translation for mengupaya untuk..?

Word form errors made with belief and believe are the same as errors made with life and live.

Photos that never forget

Posted on March 8, 2017March 13, 2018 by Pak Guru

I keep my photos because they can memorise the moment.

But in order to memorise anything they would need consciousness, which is of course impossible. A photograph does not have a brain:

Only humans can memorise things, so perhaps you mean:

I keep my photos because they help me to remember the moment.

Be careful with ‘memorise‘. We don’t usually memorise ‘moments’. We generally memorise information, and this often requires continued and intensive concentration. For example if you want to remember somebody’s phone number, you must first of all memorise it. The memory of the number then stays in your head ready for the next time you need it. With a photograph, the memory might not stay in your head. Rather, you remember the moment whenever you look at the photograph. In this sense the photo acts as ‘a reminder‘.

Indonesians would do well to read through the previous paragraph and consider the translations of ingat and its forms, and also hafal and its forms.

Ethnic(ity)

Posted on February 13, 2017March 13, 2018 by Pak Guru

Different ethnics will have different languages to communicate.

This is one of those situations where the English word has been borrowed and its use altered. In this case what was in English an adjective has been turned into a noun.

English offers two word forms – ethnic (adjective), ethnicity (noun):

Different ethnic groups will have different languages to communicate.
People with different ethnicity will have different languages to communicate.

And by the way, how exactly do you describe your own ethnicity? Comments below!