Inwardly vs. inside

lost_soul · Thu Sep 21, 2006 14:09 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

English Grammar Error, Intermediate level

ESL/EFL Test #14 "Great expectations...", question 6

Mary remains very calm and cool on the outside but you can tell that internally she's just as pleased as Dave.

(a) remains
(b) outside
(c) internally

English Grammar Error, Intermediate level

ESL/EFL Test #14 "Great expectations...", answer 6

Mary remains very calm and cool on the outside but you can tell that inwardly she's just as pleased as Dave.

Correct entry: inwardly
The error was: (c) internally

You have found the error but your entry is incorrect.
Mary remains very calm and cool on the outside but you can tell that inside she's just as pleased as Dave.
_________________________

Hi !

Can I also use "inside" here ?
(I have seen in a book the sentence "Inside, she's really very shy" where "inside" is apparently used in the sense of "invardly")

Thanks !!

Mister Micawber · Thu Sep 21, 2006 14:56 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

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Yes, I think you could.
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Canadian-American native speaker
who teaches English for a living at Mister Micawber's
ESL cafe: Interview with Mr. Micawber

bootedcat · Mon Sep 25, 2006 14:33 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Some people on the FreeNode IRC channel #wikipedia-en said "internally" and "inwardly" are both right.

And I also found this American Heritage sense entry for "internal":

internal, adj.
4. Of or relating to mental or spiritual nature: "An internal sense of righteousness dwindles into an external concern for reputation" A.R. Gurney, Jr.

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/internal

Mister Micawber · Mon Sep 25, 2006 14:55 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

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It is not a matter of what synonyms are possible here, bootedcat-- it is a matter of which word collocates usually or best in the sentence in natural English. This is where Googling can help you-- by locating the ways in which we usually say things (high collocations):

I looked calm on the outside, but on the inside my emotions were all fighting for position

Strong on the inside, calm on the outside.

"I was calm on the outside, but on the inside, I was glowing."

a fierce competitor on the inside but calm on the outside

etc.
.
_________________
Canadian-American native speaker
who teaches English for a living at Mister Micawber's
ESL cafe: Interview with Mr. Micawber

bootedcat · Mon Sep 25, 2006 15:07 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

I know conventions come first.

I agree that "inside" is very popular for this purpose, and in fact "on the inside" is the best candidate here because it is the perfect counterpart of "on the outside", lexically, syntactically, semantically, and pragmatically.

What I want to point out is that "internally" in the original question is actually popular. See the result counts of these two Google searches:

"he is internally": 25,500
"he is inwardly": 792

Yankee · Mon Sep 25, 2006 15:50 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Hi bootedcat

I think you neglected the quotation marks in your Google search for "he is internally" and that alters the number of search results dramatically:
http://www.google.de/search?hs=8Oq&hl=en&client=firefox-a&rls=org.mozilla%3Ade-DE%3Aofficial_s&q=%22he+is+internally%22&btnG=Search

Wink

Amy
_________________
Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

bootedcat · Mon Sep 25, 2006 15:56 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

No, i didn't.

Using your link, I still see 25,500.

Note that your search is with google.de, while mine is with the original google (www.google.com):

http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=mozclient&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&q=%22he+is+internally%22

I also have Windows Me running inside VMWare; it returns 31,000.

That probably has something to do with my IP. I use a proxy with my native machine's Firefox, while my virtual machine (Windows Me) is without proxy. Google automatically chooses a server near the visitor IP to serve the visitor, and different Google servers have slightly different versions of indexed data, but the result count contrast ratio for the same IP should be consistent.

Yankee · Mon Sep 25, 2006 16:24 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Hi bootedcat

That's very strange. My Google results (with quotes) were only 1330 (and still are). Without quotes I get 24,000.

Amy
_________________
Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

bootedcat · Mon Sep 25, 2006 16:38 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Yankee · Mon Sep 25, 2006 16:52 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Hi bootedcat

I checked my browser settings and they were set for "moderate" filtering. I changed it to "no filtering" and now I get a similar number of results as you do. I wonder if that tells us anything about the "internally" results... Laughing

Thanks for the info.

Amy
_________________
Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

bootedcat · Mon Sep 25, 2006 17:01 pm *Inwardly vs. inside*

Google result counts are estimated and, if additional conditions such as "moderate filtering" is set, highly inaccurate.

Alan · Mon Sep 25, 2006 17:16 pm *Google*

Hi,

I never dreamt when I wrote that test, it would generate such a googleania!

Alan
_________________
English as a Second Language
You can read my ESL story Prepositions

Tamara · Mon Sep 25, 2006 17:24 pm *Google*

Sorry, Alan, I can't resist... Smile

“I can resist anything but temptation”. © Oscar Wilde
Smile

35,400 for "he is internally"
23,400,000 for he is internally

804 for "he is inwardly"
2,660,000 for he is inwardly

And... what? Smile

_________________
It’s impossible to learn swimming without entering the water…

Yankee · Mon Sep 25, 2006 18:04 pm *I can't resist either...*

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By the way, the BNC has results for neither "he is internally" nor "he is inwardly". Nothing! Shocked

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So, what have we learned from all this?

Teacher knows best. Very Happy

_________________
Amy
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ESL teacher, translator, and a native speaker of American English

Torsten · Mon Sep 25, 2006 18:15 pm *BNC vs. Google*

Well, BNC does have a few results for "inwardly she" (as opposed to "he inwardly".)
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