 6 peculiarities of the English language that are mind-boggling for English learners. From the days of Chaucer and Shakespeare to the present the English language has been filled with some amazingly peculiar and bizarre examples of speech and grammar. As the English sailed around the globe colonizing, it to the extent the sun never set on the British Empire the number of words that were adopted by the language could not help but grow. Along with this vocabulary growth Soda did the number of expressions, and grammatical rules that seemed to make no sense when actually examined. One could say that English has been beating up other languages in dark alleys, then going through their pockets for loose grammar, and spare vocabulary for centuries. Chop down or chop up? English can be a confusing method of communication even for native speakers. One chops down a tree, but then chops up firewood. Trying to explain the different uses of up and down to a non-native speaker of English, can be one of the more daunting exercises one can subject themselves to. Uke words. Then imagine why a new learner might be confused when being confronted with words that have uke in them. The fact that uke can be pronounced many different ways, cough, rough, bow, through, thorough, thought. While other words are spelled differently but pronounced the same way, such as sell and sell, wheel and wheel, new and new. Then there is the classic there, there and there. Read or read? Further confusion arises from words that are spelled the same but are pronounced differently. Route being pronounced either root or route, read being pronounced read or read. Other words that also fall into this special class of confusion are either, content, tier, dove, invalid, desert and sewer. Silent letters. Then we find ourselves in a special little minefield, the world of words that have a silent letter in them. Some examples from this world of pain are nat, knife, aisle, debt, soften and dumb. Uke words. Our next top on this train ride into the absurd are words that contain uke but sound different. Blood and flood sound like cut or mud. Good, hood, stood, wood, shook, brook, crook, look all sound alike. Food, boot, mood, scoot, roof and hoof all have a long u sound. Floor and door have long o sounds. Buffalo what? We are now possibly at the deepest pit of grammatical hell with the following sentence. Buffalo, buffalo, buffalo, buffalo, buffalo, buffalo, buffalo, buffalo. This sentence is grammatically correct because buffalo is a noun, a hooved animal that is sometimes incorrectly called a bison, it is a city in New York state and it is also a verb that means to intimidate or overall someone. So to paraphrase this sentence so that it does not hurt your brain, here goes. Bison from Buffalo, New York, that are intimidated by other bison in the community also intimidate other bison in Buffalo. What are your favorite English peculiarities? How these peculiarities came about are as organic and ever-evolving as the English language continues to adapt to our ever-changing world. Native speakers take these types of expressions and stride generally not even thinking about the actual word structure being used. These peculiarities can be maddening for someone trying to learn English however. Are you ready to teach English abroad? Thanks so much for watching. We are ITTT the leading provider for Teflon TESOL training courses. If you like this video, please subscribe by clicking that button down here and click on any of the videos here on the left for more interesting teaching tips for getting certified to teach English abroad and online.