Get best of the week

Popular errors in English among IT professionals

image

Based on many years of experience teaching English to IT professionals (programmers, business analysts, testers, marketing specialists), I have compiled a list of the most common mistakes among “IT specialists” in the English language.

1) Accent


CONTENT - CONTENT. Since in the Russian language in the word content the emphasis falls on the second syllable, there is a temptation to pronounce the English word in the same way. Be vigilant, you should pronounce cOntent, where the first syllable is stressed.

repOrt . The second syllable is stressed, not the first!

suppOrt is pronounced as support.
a cOmment, to cOmment - in both the noun and the verb, the stress falls on the first syllable.

2) Pronunciation


company is pronounced kampani, not kampani in any way.
e-commerce, eco-friendly, ebay and all words with such a beginning are pronounced with the sound of And, and not E ( and Comers, and co-friends, and Bay).

3) Monotonous speech


If you listen to the same text read on the one hand by a native speaker, and on the other hand, not by a native speaker (without accent), you can immediately understand which one is who, even without seeing the appearance of the speakers. "Like this?" you ask. It is very simple: native speakers use a lot of different intonations, pauses, logical stresses in speech , which makes their speech lively, energetic and literally attracts attention; while non-native speakers (especially Russian speakers) are very restrained in their feelings during a conversation. A more expressive language with a wider range of emotions is especially useful during meetings, presentations and demos. Based on this, an urgent recommendation to dilute your speech with the help of everyone's favorite fall-rise tone (downward-upward tone) when the timbre of the voice drops and then rises.

4) False translator friends (false friends) - words that sound the same in 2 different languages, but mean completely different concepts


accurate does not mean accurate, accurate = accurate (eg an accurate report, an accurate estimation).
a list is not a sheet, a list = list (eg a list of features).
a magazine means a magazine, not a store.
actual = actual, valid, genuine (the actual name / address). Actual problem = a relevant problem (and not an actual problem).
To the question “How are you?” the answer is “I'm normal”, the answer is “I'm Ok / Nothing special”. Normal = normal, not normal (eg Normally, my working day consists of 8 hours).
a notebook = notebook, not a laptop at all (laptop = a laptop).

5) Literal translation from Russian


Caution: WRONG examples are listed below!

I'm agree = I agree (must be I agree ).
to feel yourself good = feel good (correctly say to feel good ).
to behave yourself well = behave yourself (instead, you must speak to behave yourself well ).
It's warmly = warm (you need It's warm ). After It is ... you need to put an adjective , not an adverb (Eg It is correct , It is necessary , It is bad ).
I knew that ... = I found out that ... (correctly I've learned that ).

6) Past Simple vs Present Perfect


Practice shows that all students of English are reluctant to use Present Perfect in their speech. The fact that Russian does not have this time is only to blame, there is only the past tense. Present Perfect also indicates a past action, but only with a visible result in the present and without an exact indication of the time the action took place.

Compare:

a) I have fixed all the bugs. ( Present Perfect )

VS

c) I fixed all the bugs yesterday. ( Past Simple )

7) Prepositions


AT the meeting (not ON). It should be remembered that the preposition AT (eg at the wedding / lesson / seminar / training, etc.) is used with events and events : ON means on the physical surface : ON the table, ON the floor, ON the wall, etc.

to influence sb / sth , as well as to enter (without pretext)! It is clear why the Russian speakers passionately want to insert prepositions after these words, as they are in the Russian language: influence NA, go in B. However, remember the examples:

Eg Music influences my mood .
To enter the room / to enter university .

It must be remembered that the following words are used with the preposition TO . In the Russian language there is no pretext after these words: according to something, listen to something, explain to someone.

according TO
to listen TO
to explain TO

8) to say / to tell


These words mean the same thing, but are used in different ways. After to tell, you definitely need to add an object ( tell me / tell your mother ), while after to say the object is not put ( to say that ..., to say hello, to say sorry, to say thank you ).

Eg He told me that he was being promoted.
He said that he was being promoted.

9) Countable and uncountable nouns


knowledge, news, advice - words with the highest frequency of misuse; the

word knowledge is never used in the plural (and in Russian most often in the plural - knowledge)

Eg Knowledge is power.

The same can be said for the word advice .

Eg Your advice is valuable for me.

The word news, even in its form, resembles the word in the plural, and yet it is uncountable and is used with the verb in the singular.

Eg The news that you shared is uplifting.

It is important to note that the above errors are inherent not only to IT-specialists, but also to all Russian-speaking people studying English. Armed with knowledge of language interference ( when the native language “interferes” with the study of a foreign language ), you can first understand the nature of these errors, and secondly, more successfully avoid them in speech.

Thank you for the attention! I will be glad to answer any questions.

More articles:


All Articles