A mouthful of English

When we speak, we tend to omit things we’ve already mentioned because old information is considered unnecessary. In English we often use auxiliary verbs to avoid repetition: The wine was great, but the food wasn’t (great). She’s going to Scotland, and I am (going to Scotland) too . A common structure to do this is so + auxiliary verb + subject : She’s going to Scotland, and so am I . ‘So am I’ here means ‘I’m going to Scotland too .’ The auxiliary verb ( am ) is the verb in the sentence we don’t want to repeat – I ’m going to Scotland . A few more examples: She’s hungry, and so am I .             (= I am hungry too.) ‘I can swim.’ ‘ So can I !’                 (= I can swim too!) Everyone has finished, and so have I .         (= I have finished too.) Remember that we use do in the simple present and did in the simple pas...

Sometimes, the answer to a question is just a simple yes or no : ‘Are you ready?’ ‘Yes. ’ But we can be a bit more emphatic by using a short answer , repeating the verb at the beginning of the question: ‘ Are you ready?’ ‘Yes, I am .’                                 When we do this, we can even omit the word yes : ‘ Are you ready? ’ ‘ I am !’ These are called short answers because we omit a part of the sentence we don’t want to repeat. The complete – or long – answer would be Yes, I am ready . This kind of answer is very common in English: ‘ Can we win?’ ‘Yes, we can . ’   ‘ Do you like music?’ ‘Yes, I do .’ When the answer is negative, we only have to add not at the end: ‘ Did you go to the concert?’ ‘No, I didn’t. ’ ‘ Have you been using my computer?’ ‘No, I haven’t. ’ ...