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#17 (permalink) Mon May 12, 2008 13:53 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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Or irresponsible. He could've infected the whole team.  |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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#18 (permalink) Mon May 12, 2008 14:19 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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Oh, now it makes more sense ! I never believed in people's responsibility  |
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Lost_Soul I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 15 Sep 2006 Posts: 1861 Location: South Park, Colorado, USA
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#19 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 4:22 am "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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By the way, Molly, did you know that a Google search for "looking forward to see" can produce over a million results? To me, the use of 'see' is not only wrong but also extremely unnatural in that phrase. What do Google results actually mean? |
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Yankee I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 16 Apr 2006 Posts: 8265 Location: USA
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#20 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 6:47 am "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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Lesson? Don't trust Google if you want native-speaker results. Check all results. Consult many sources, including native-speakers that may be around you at the time, and then decide. In looking at "keep silence" and "keep silent", I've checked Google, the BNC, the BYU Corpus of American English, native-speakers here, my English husband, the Bible, law books, and a few major newspapers.
Now, do you think "keep silence" is wrong, incorrect English? If so, which sources have you checked?
And "looking forward to see" is not always incorrect. Sometimes, there's an ellipted "in order to".
"At the next meeting, we'll be looking forward to see how we can change things."
"You must look forward to see what the consequence of our actions will be." |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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#21 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 8:56 am "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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| I heard 'keep silent' to be used in a number of contexts. Teachers, when explaining the lesson, often address their disobedient students to be silent. At the same time I second Alex's assumption that 'keep silence' can be a common mistake among the non-native speakers. |
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Pamela I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 14 Mar 2006 Posts: 1239 Location: Rf
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#22 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 9:03 am "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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| Quote: |
| At the same time I second Alex's assumption that 'keep silence' can be a common mistake among the non-native speakers. |
And can also be perfectly correct native English. |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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#23 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 17:22 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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And that brings us back to square one. 
I think it unlikely that you will hear the collocation 'keep silence' used very often. I agree with Alan that 'maintain silence' would be a far more likely collocation. . |
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Yankee I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 16 Apr 2006 Posts: 8265 Location: USA
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#24 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 19:42 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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| Yankee wrote: |
And that brings us back to square one. 
I think it unlikely that you will hear the collocation 'keep silence' used very often. . |
Which leaves students thinking "but where and when can it be used? Half-answers are often not very helpful in the ESL world, Amy.
| Quote: |
| I agree with Alan that 'maintain silence' would be a far more likely collocation. |
Is that an example of the shakiness of native-speaker intuition?
The BNC:
maintain silence 4 keep silence 4
The American Corpus:
maintain silence 8 keep silence 14
Google:
32,500 English pages for "maintain silence 282,000 English pages for "keep silence". |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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#25 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 21:00 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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"Keep silent" is the correct form.
I've not run across "keep silence" before... at least not while listening to, or reading, a native speaker.
now.... one could maintain silence.
but "keep silence" is not common.
We either maintain silence or we keep silent. _________________ Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee. |
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Prezbucky I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 2528 Location: Nashville, TN (USA)
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#26 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 21:48 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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| Quote: |
| I've not run across "keep silence" before... at least not while listening to, or reading, a native speaker. |
Please, read the quote below and ask youself if your knowledege of the language is incomplete. If it is, that would put you in a group of millions of native-speakers and would be a natural situation. If, on the other hand, you think that your knowledge is complete, that you have come across every possible utterance there is to come across, that would make you a very special individual:
"But research in sociolinguistics has highlighted the variability of the competences of different native speakers belonging to different social groupings and even the dialectal varaibility of a single speaker's language. As soon as the non-uniformity of the language is accepted as normal, it is evident that the native speakers' knowledge of their language, as a social or cultural phenomenon, is incomplete. "
First you say that "keep silent" is the correct form then you say "keep silence" is not common. Does that mean that you admit that "keep silence" is also a correct form? |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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#27 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 22:04 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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Molly, are you trying to pick fights with native speakers?
If you want to know my qualifications, they are these:
- BA-Journalism, University of Wisconsin - MBA, Belmont University - Copy editor, Daily Cardinal (UW student newspaper -- worked there during my years at UW) - A lifetime of speaking, hearing and reading English every day.
That is not to say that education is everything... though we wrote an awful lot in journalism classes. The MBA program was also full of writing.
I will say it again: "keep silence" is not common. _________________ Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee. |
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Prezbucky I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 2528 Location: Nashville, TN (USA)
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#28 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 22:10 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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"Maintain silence" is used in lieu of "keep silence".
The generally accepted forms are:
- Keep silent - Maintain silence
(I would imagine one would hear "maintain silence" a lot in the military.... sort of like "maintain discipline". _________________ Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee. |
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Prezbucky I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 2528 Location: Nashville, TN (USA)
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#29 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 22:13 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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Amy, re: "looking forward to see"
Google searches, IMO, are generally useless in determining correct usage.
If a million people are wrong but only four are right... which example should we follow? _________________ Billie Jean is not my lover. Hee. |
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Prezbucky I'm a Communicator ;-)

Joined: 07 Nov 2006 Posts: 2528 Location: Nashville, TN (USA)
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#30 (permalink) Tue May 13, 2008 22:13 pm "keep silence" vs "keep silent" |
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I will say it again: "keep silence" is not common.
That, I understood, but "not common" does not mean incorrect. How can "keep silent" be correct, but "keep silence" not.
And , even with your BA in Journalism, you are not familiar with the work of major journalists:
U.S. Lawyers Keep Silence on Listening In
www.nytimes.com/2006/03/18/nyregion/18detain.html
And more..
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So, when you say something such as this:
| Quote: |
| I've not run across "keep silence" before... at least not while listening to, or reading, a native speaker. |
How do you want us non-natives to react?
It's not about picking fights, it's about asking native-speakers to be honest. IMO, more of you need to say "well, it may exist and be correct English usage, but I've not come across it, so I suggest you ask another native-speaker for their advice, use a native-speaker corpus, read a lot of native texts, search various text-types, and so on. And please, oh please, don't take my word on usage as sacred."
Could you do that? |
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Molly I'm a Communicator ;-)
Joined: 12 Feb 2008 Posts: 4017
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| "that" (The winter of New York is much severer than that of Tokyo.) | "will" in conditional type 1 |