Conversational English - So & Such

Hi. My name is Rebecca, and in today's lesson, I'll explain the difference between two commonly

confused words, "so" and "such". All right? Let's have a look at the board. The word "so"

should be used with an adjective or an adverb. All right? The word "such" should be used

with a noun. It could be a singular noun or a plural noun, but it should be used with

a noun. And I'm going to give you some examples so you understand exactly how it works. It's

really quite simple, so stay with me, and I think you can master this in no time. All

right? So, we should be saying, "He's so tall." Right? "He's so tall." Or, "He's such a tall

man." All right? See the difference? "So" plus the adjective, "such" plus the noun.

Now, here, because it's a singular noun, we had to add the word "a". All right? You'll

see later that we don't need to. Let's take another example. "It's so hot." Or, "It's

such a hot day." All right? Another one. "That store is so expensive." Or, "It's such an

expensive shop." All right? What you don't want to say is, "It's so expensive shop."

That you can't say, because you need to say, "Such an expensive shop." Or, "Just so expensive."

All right? Another example. "That cake is so delicious." Or, "That's such a delicious

cake." All right? See the difference? Quite different. Quite different. Another one. "They

are so friendly." Or, "They are such friendly people." All right? Now, here also, it's "such"

plus a noun, but this time, we don't need to say, "Such a friendly people." We just

say, "Such friendly people." Next one. "That apartment is so luxurious." Or, "Those are

such luxurious apartments." What does the word "luxurious" mean? It has a lot of luxury.

It's very fancy. Okay? Very spacious, and so on. Luxurious. Usually also expensive. All

right? We can also use "so" with adverbs. So we could say, for example, "He runs so

quickly." "She speaks so slowly." "He drives so carefully." All right? So you can also

use "so" with an adverb, not just with an adjective.

There are also a couple of other expressions which you should be familiar with. "It's been

so long since I've seen you." Right? "It's been so long." That means a long time went

by since I last saw you. "It's been so long since we last met." Or, "It's been such a

long time since we last met." So again, here, we have to add "such" plus a noun.

Another example to keep in mind, we say "so much" or "so many". For example, "We have

so much time before our flight." Or, "We have so many hours before our flight." Right? Or,

"We have such a lot of time before our flight." All right? So I hope you see the difference

between "so" and "such". When I come back, you'll have a chance to do a little exercise

to see how well you've understood these points.

Now, let me ask you, why do you think we use the words "so" and "such"? Why can't we just

say, "It's hot"? Why do we need to say, "It's so hot"? What do you think? Well, it's because

we want to emphasize something. Right? We could say, "He's tall." Or we could say, "He's

so tall." When we say, "He's so tall", we are emphasizing that he's really tall. Okay?

We could say, "He's a tall man." That's kind of just a description. Or we could just say,

"He's such a tall man." Then again, we are emphasizing it. So both these words, "so"

and "such", are added when you want to emphasize whatever you're saying. Okay?

Now let's do a little quiz to see if you've understood which one to use. All right? First

one, "You look _____ tired." What should it be? "You look so tired." Or, "You look such

tired." It should be "so". Okay? Because it's an adjective. Next, "He's _____ a nice man."

"He's _____ a nice man." Should it be, "He's so a nice man." Or, "He's such a nice man."

Which one? Okay? Good. Next one, "Venice is _____ a lovely city." "So a lovely city."

Or, "Such a lovely city." What should we say? Okay? "Such a lovely city." Because we have

a noun at the end there. "She paints _____ beautifully." "So beautifully." Or, "Such

beautifully." "So beautifully." This time, we had an adverb. Next, "The food was _____

delicious." "The food was so delicious." Or, "The food was such delicious." I hope you

said, "So delicious." Next one, and the last one, "The hotel had _____ comfortable beds."

"So comfortable beds." Or, "Such comfortable beds." Which one? Okay. I hope you got all

those right. If you'd like to do some more practice on these two words, "so" and "such",

please go to our website, www.engvid.com. You can do a quiz on this, and also look at

videos on many other topics in English. All right? Thanks very much for watching. Bye

for now.