HOW do we express a period of time in the past? Let’s say the period is from 2002 to 2006. Is it “five to nine years ago” or “nine to five years ago”? We say 500 to 400 BC, not 400 to 500 BC, don’t we? – Nasir

In daily speech, we don’t say “I lived there from nine to five years ago.”, but we mention the years and/or months, like “I lived there from 2002 to 2006 ”, or “I worked there from April 1970 to June 1996.” When we give the names of the years and/or months, we start from the earlier date and follow it with the later date. You are quite right in saying “We say 500 to 400 BC”, because 500 BC was the earlier date and 400 BC was the later date.

However, when periods of time are listed or tabulated in official documents or articles, without naming the precise year and/or month, we start from the smaller number and follow it with the larger number, as seen in the following excerpts from the Internet:

The district nurses taking part in the survey had been qualified for a wide range of periods ... 20.3% qualified five to nine years ago;

Wake up your brain!

22.5% qualified 10 to 14 years ago;

15% qualified 15 to 19 years ago;

14.8% qualified 20 to 24 years ago;

(from nursingtimes.net, April 8, 2003)

Roughly how long ago did that (did the most recent of those incidents) happen?

Under two years ago

Two to four years ago

Five to nine years ago

More than 10 years ago ...

(From a questionnaire to victims of crime in 1996 Scottish Crime Survey; “incidents” refer to incidents of housebreaking)

It doesn’t seem to matter that we are going backwards in time as we do so.

English on the radio

There is a radio station which airs a programme called “Wake up your brain”. Is that proper English? You don’t “wake up someone”, you “wake someone up”, right? – Ganesh

Are you speaking about a Malaysian radio station? There is a radio station in North West Hampshire, England, called Andover Sound, which has a programme with an identical name, i.e. “Wake Up Your Brain!” (www.andover sound.com/pages/extranet/wake-up-your-brain-i-1150.php)

The sentence “Wake up your brain!” is in the imperative mood, where the verb (“wake up” here) tells us to do something. In such sentences, the two parts of the phrasal verb (wake + up) can be next to each other, with the object “your brain” coming after it. Another example of this usage is in the name of the 2010 album by Paul Weller, an English singer/songwriter, called “Wake Up The Nation”. Such a structure also adds drama and urgency to a title. We can’t, however, use this structure with a pronoun, e.g. “Wake up them!”, although colloquially, we can, for example, tell someone close to us who’s sleeping late: “Hey, you, wake up! It’s late!”

In sentences which are statements, “wake” is separated from “up” by the object. Here are two examples from the Internet:

“Light-emitting computer screens wake the brain up, not put it to sleep, so it makes sense to ban the PC from the bedroom.” (from guardian.co.uk, July 26, 2005)

Mayor Ray Nagin has predicted that up to 10,000 people will be found to have died in the floods that followed the assault of Hurricane Katrina. “It [the scene below the water] is going to be awful and it’s going to wake the nation up again,” he said. (from telegraph.co.uk, Sept 7, 2005)

‘In’ and ‘at’

I am confused about the usage of these two prepositions: “in” and “at”. There are times when they are interchangeable, but with subtle differences. Can you clarify the differences please? – Woo Weng Leong

This is a very broad question, since these two prepositions are used in countless expressions in English. But I will try to tell you which preposition is used before some commonly used nouns. I will divide the expressions into those that have to do with place and those that have to do with time. Now and then I shall have to include the preposition “on” as well.

Place

We use “in” before the name of a continent, a country, a state and a town, e.g. in Asia, in Europe, in China, in Germany, in Johor, in Florida, in Kuala Lumpur, in London.

British English usually uses “in” before the name of a street or road, while American English usually uses “on”, e.g. in Oxford Street, London; in London Road, Leicester; on 42nd Street, New York; on Main Street, Columbus, Ohio.

At a location such as a building, including our own house, we use “at”, e.g. “I live at 680 Jalan Delima, P.J.”; “Meet me at the Central Market/Bukit Jalil Stadium, etc.”

You say you are “at home” when you are in the house or flat you live in. In British English, if you are still a pupil of a school, you say: “I am still at school”; if you are a college or university student you say “I am studying at college/university.” But if you haven’t come home from school yet and someone asks your mother where you are, she can, for example, reply: “My son/daughter is still at/in school, practising for Sports Day.”

If your father is working late, and someone asks you where your father is, you say “He is still at work.” or “ He is still at the office.”

There is a very important distinction between “at a/the hospital” and “in hospital”. You can say that a doctor works at a hospital, but a patient who occupies a hospital bed is in hospital.

Such a person is said to be hospitalized, not “warded” as some Malaysians like to say.

When you are in a car driven by someone else, you can be in the front seat or in a back seat. When you are the driver of the car, you are said to be at the steering wheel of the car.

Time

We use “in” before the names of centuries, decades, years and months, but “on” before the name of a day, or a certain date in a month. And we use “at” before the hours. For example, if someone’s birth certificate includes the following particulars – “2.30pm, Monday 20.12.1976”, we can say that she was born:

at 2.30 pm

on Monday

in December

on the 20th day of that month

in 1976

in the 20th century

in the eighth decade of that century

When speaking of the times of the year/month/week, we say “at the beginning of the year/month/week , “at the end of the year/month/week”, BUT “in the middle of the year/month/week”. But when speaking of a weekend, we say “at the weekend” or “over the weekend”

When speaking of the times of the day, we say in the morning/afternoon/evening, BUT at night.

Finally, we say “at present”, BUT “in the past” and “in the future”.

That is all I have time and space for, but when in doubt, it is useful to look up a dictionary for the relevant preposition and the noun or phrase used with it. There are several online Advanced Learner’s dictionaries which give you examples of usage.

Using ‘may’

I received this e-mail at work and would like to know if the use of “may” in the sentence is correct. It sounds strange to me.

“May you need discussion with Don, do let me know to invite for discussion.” – Scout

No, the sentence is not grammatically correct. It might have been written in a hurry. “May” is certainly out of place there. Did the writer mean to write “maybe”? It’s hard to tell what the writer meant to say. The following is my guess:

“Should/If you need to have a discussion with Don, do let me know, and I’ll invite him over for a discussion.”

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