OLD SCHOOL Vocabulary...too formal!

1,056,304 views ・ 2013-09-21

English with Ronnie


Please double-click on the English subtitles below to play the video.

00:03
Hello, and welcome to my lesson. I hope you are happy.
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What? What's going on? Today, I'm going to teach you some words that you will say in
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English. They are definitely English words. You will use the words correctly in a beautiful,
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grammatically correct sentence, but they make me go, "What? That's weird. That's weird.
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"You speak like a grandmother or a grandfather." This lesson is called "Olde School" or -- uh-oh!
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"Too formal! What are you doing?" So one of the goals that I've always had since I started
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teaching ESL, or teaching English, is that textbook English and the way that a lot of
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people teach you how to speak... it's not "cool". You sound like you are reading a textbook.
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One of my goals in life is to make everyone that I teach sound natural, normal, and not
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like an old person even if you are an old person. That's cool. I want you to learn words
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that I and other normal -- normal? Not normal -- and natural English speakers would use.
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So "Olde School". "Ronnie, you've spelled "old school" wrong." Guess what? A long time
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ago, this is how they spelled "old", but they didn't say "oldie", they said "old". "Olde school"
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"Olde school" means it's old. So let's look at the first one: "Telephone".
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We never, ever, ever, ever, ever say "telephone"; we say "phone" or "mobile" or "cell". "Telephone"
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is really, really, really old. Do you remember the really old telephones that you had to
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dial -- you stick your finger and you go [makes clicking sounds]? And if you made a mistake,
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you had to start again. I remember being a little Ronnie, and I had to dial my best friend's
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number, and it had three nines in it. [Shudders] "I made a mistake." So "telephone" -- old.
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Now we have these wonderful cell phones. You press a button, and your friend is right there
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-- "Hi", okay? Don't use the word "telephone"; it's strange.
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The other one is: "Television". Do you have a television? I don't. I hate television.
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So much so that I don't even call it that; I call it a TV. Please call it a "TV", not
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a "television". "Television" is old, very old.
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This word: "refrigerator" -- "Ronnie, there's a space here." Yeah. Ronnie has trouble spelling.
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And the reason why I have trouble spelling this word is we never, ever, ever say this
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word: "refrigerator". I'm tired by the time I get to this space here, so instead of saying
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"refrigerator", do you know what we say? "I'm hungry. I'm going to go to the fridge." and
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get a Coke or a drink. So normally, we shorten this, and we call it a "fridge", "fridge".
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"Automobile", "auto". If you speak any of the Latin languages, you can understand "auto"
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means "self"; "mobile" means "move". "Look at me. I'm going in my self-move to the -- to
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the mall. Would you like a drive?" "No. I'll take the bus, thank you." So "automobile"
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and "auto", we do not use. We call it one of these [makes car noise] a "car". I have
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seen a textbook -- one or two in my day -- and it actually says "automobile". So I looked
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at the date: "Published 2010." Really? You put "automobile" in a textbook? Give your
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head a shake. The next one is a modal verb. If you do not
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know what a modal verb is, go look in a grammar book. "Shall" is a modal verb. However, we
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never use this. The only time you will see this modal verb used is if you are reading
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rules of something. If you go to a public swimming pool, or if you go on the subway,
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all of the rules are written with this word. "You shall not spit in the pool. You shall
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not -- in the pool." Okay, I'm not going to do that. "You shall not run around the pool
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because you're going to die." "Shall" -- we always use "will" or negative "won't". This
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has... replaced our modal verb "shall". Please don't say this; it's weird. "You shall give
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me a dollar." What? "You will give me a dollar." "You're going to give me a dollar." Everyone
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give me a dollar. The next one is an expression: "What a pity"
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or "What a shame!" Now, if you were -- let's see -- maybe a 70-year-old grandmother or
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grandfather living in England, you would say this all the time. My grandmother -- God rest
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her soul -- would say this, "What a pity. What a shame." She's from Scotland. She says
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this all the time, "What a pity. What a shame." We go, "That sucks." Okay? If something is
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bad, you can -- you can say that. You can say, "Wow. That sucks." or "That blows." Don't
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say this. You can even say, "That's bad." "What a pity" or "What a shame" -- it's way,
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way too old. Too old. Too old. Bye-bye. "Pardon me!" Pardon me; I forgot the "S".
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"Pardon me" -- again, my grandmother says this all the time. Pardon me -- we say now:
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"Excuse me." Why would you say this? We use this expression in a lot of situations. The
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first one is if you [makes fart sound]. That was with my mouth, yeah? You're going to say,
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"Excuse me." [Makes burp sound] The second -- burp. I did that again with my mouth. You're
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going to say, again, "Excuse me." You can say "Pardon me" when you fart or burp, but
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it's more natural to say, "Excuse me." The other thing is if you're shopping and there're
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people in the way, you can say, "Excuse me. Excuse me. Excuse me! Move." And they will
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eventually maybe move. So "excuse me" is a very, very polite way of getting someone to
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move out of the way and excusing yourself if you have gas. People also use it to get
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your attention. Today, I was buying chicken -- I love chicken -- and I put all my groceries
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-- that means food -- into a bag, and I went away. And I was organizing my bag. And a girl
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said, "Excuse me!" I was like, "What? Oh, hi." "You forgot your chicken." "Oh, my God!
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I forgot my chicken! I love chicken." So she was nice enough to tell me and not steal my
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chicken. Thank you to the lady at the supermarket today that did not steal my chicken. I love you.
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Were you a vegetarian? I would have taken that, for sure.
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The next set of words are words that are too formal, okay? Again, when you say them, you're
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correct. I hear people say, "I entered the building." Are you Elvis Presley? Okay? You
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are not, like, "[makes trumpet sound] Bobby is now entering the building!" "Bobby! Yeah!
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Bobby! Yeah! Come on in, Bobby! Sit down! Shut up." No. You're just going to say, "Hey.
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I went in." " I went in the classroom." " I went in the mall." " I went in the car." Okay?
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Please don't say, "entered". Strange. The opposite of this is when you're leaving
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-- sayonara -- "Exited". Now these are past tense for a good reason. You're just going
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to say "left". Not this hand. It's the same spelling, but "I left". "Yesterday, I left
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work." You're not going to say, "I exited work at 5 p.m. yesterday." Hello. Learn some
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cool words. "Departed". So departed is this: you are going
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on an airplane, and it's your first trip anywhere in the world, and all of your parents and
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all of your friends are saying "Goodbye! Have a -- Bon voyage! You're departing. Bye!" Not
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going to happen. You're just going to say, "I left." "Yesterday, I left the bar because
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I was too drunk to figure out what I was doing." So these two words -- bye-bye. Take them out.
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"Left". Easy. This word: "received" [makes panting sound].
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"I received mail." Hmm. If you ever watch movies, or if you have an email account,
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it says, very famously, "You've got mail. You've got mail." It doesn't say, "You've received
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mail. You've received mail." Instead of saying "received", say "got". People are going to
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say: "I received a beer from the bartender." Guess what? You didn't. You got a beer, okay?
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Next word. I hear a lot of people use this when they talk about playing sports. So people
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say, "I participated in a football game yesterday." What did you do? Were you, like, the cheerleader
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going, like, "Yeah! Come on, team!" No. You're going to say, "I played football yesterday."
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You're not participating in it; you're playing it.
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The next one is "joined". I hear a lot of people say, "I joined the restaurant yesterday."
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You joined the restaurant? Okay. Or "I joined the nightclub yesterday." Did you join it?
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Is there a membership fee? "Join" we only use if you have to pay a membership fee, and
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you're going to join something for a month. So you can join EngVid. That's free. Please
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join. Instead of saying "joined" for casual things that you do, you're going to say
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"went to". So you're going to say, "I went to the restaurant." "I went to a party." I hear a
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lot of people say, "I joined the party." Did you? Were you, like, just, "Use your membership
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card. Come on in. Have a beer." No. "I went to the party." Two more, then we're done.
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Olde school! "Located". "I located my marker." Did you
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search for it? Did you put out an APB? Did you call the police and go, "We have a missing
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marker. Please get all hands on deck, and get this marker found." No. "Found". "I found
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my marker. It's right here the whole time floating in air."
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Hello. Were you born -- good -- in the 1950s? Okay. If you were, maybe you remember disco
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dancing the night away. Maybe you wore bell-bottoms. Maybe you like John Travolta. I like John
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Travolta. "Disco" is a kind of music. ABBA -- that's all I got. John Travolta. "Disco
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-- disco fever boogie." Disco is super, super, super, super old. You would never find a "disco"
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in any country that speaks English. Maybe someplace in Europe you would find a "disco".
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"Disco" is a type of music from the 70s. In these here parts, we go to a "nightclub" or
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a "bar". Disco -- old, outdated -- don't use it. Too "olde school".
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Last one: "occupation". I hear people say, "Ronnie, what is your occupation?" "I don't
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know. What's my occupation?" Instead of saying "occupation", you want to ask someone, "What's
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your job?" And I tell them, "I am an undercover spy, a secret agent, working for the monkeys
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in the -- in the, in the, in the, in the, in the jungles of Brazil. That's it. That's
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all I got. Olde school. Don't do it. Bye.
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Can I have a mustache when I come back?
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