Verbs of Mouths (1)
How long have you been speaking English? And how good is your spoken English? If I tell you that there is a
secret about spoken English that is not known to learners of
English? Will you be surprised? Well don’t be.
Well, what does the secret have to do with you? If you get it, you can speak better English:
The verbs of mouth talked about here are the four of the busiest
verbs in spoken English. They are:
say, talk, tell, and speak
The four verbs of mouth seem easy. Well, think again! There are differences, sometimes huge ones,
between them. What are they? You’re going to do an easier pair first,
namely, talk and say:
Pair One: Talk and Say
Now read the following two sentences:
The MD said that
things will be all right.
The MD talked that
things will be all right.
I don’t know if things will be all right, but what I know is
there is something wrong with:
The MD talked
that things will be all right.
Why is it wrong? What
is the difference between ‘talk’ and ‘say’?
Before you get the answer, think about the question:
Which one will you take when you have a view to express at a meeting, talk or say?
If you look up the meaning of ‘talk’ from the Oxford online
dictionary (talk), ‘talk’ is
causal as it means saying something aloud, or speaking to
someone, as shown in the two examples below:
Talk
|
Something
|
We
talked about
|
the new division (at the meeting).
|
Talk
|
Somebody
|
The
CEO talked to
|
his friend (about the new project).
|
Simply put, you don’t use ‘talk’ to express an idea, that a few words follow 'talk', and talk 'talk' does not come with other verbs:
Talk about a new project
talk to the CEO
What about ‘say’
The financial secretary said that the fund stood at 1 million.
↓
↓
↓
that + the
fund stood at 1 million --------> (an
idea, a thought)
In a word, it is all about what follows 'talk' and 'say':
‘talk’ comes with a few words, but
‘say’ comes with a 'sentence'
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