| Hey, everybody! Welcome back to Ask Alisha, the weekly series where you ask me questions and I answer them, maybe! |
| Okay. Let’s get to your first question this week. |
| First question this week comes from Hamza. |
| Hi, Hamza. |
| Hamza says… |
| “What’s the difference between ‘collaborate’ and ‘cooperate’ and how do we use these words in sentences?” |
| Well, it depends a little bit on the situation. Let’s talk about “cooperate” first. |
| So, “to cooperate” means to do something in accordance with rules, like to follow rules, to do something that’s, like in line with society’s expectations. This is one use of “cooperate.” |
| For example, you might have seen a sign in English that says: |
| “No smoking here. Thank you for your cooperation.” |
| So that’s an example of “cooperate” used as a noun, as “cooperation,” but it means thank you for following the rules. Thank you for your cooperation. So, it’s like you’re following some kind of societal guideline. So, “cooperate” can have this meaning. |
| We also see “cooperate” used to mean working together, especially when it’s like two people or two groups that might not usually work together. |
| For example: |
| “The two countries cooperated to reduce pollution in the ocean.” |
| In that example sentence, it sounds like the two countries might not otherwise work together. We use “cooperate” to express that both parties, both groups get some kind of benefit from the situation. |
| So, “cooperate” has these two primary meanings of following rules and of working together with somebody for mutual benefit, usually, somebody that you wouldn’t work with. |
| So, let’s compare this then to “collaborate.” |
| “Collaborate” and the second meaning of “cooperate” share the meaning of working together with someone, yes, but when we use the word “collaborate,” it’s like you’re working together closely with someone to make something very intellectual, like creative or artistic. So this can be like music, it could be a research paper, it could be a movie. It’s like two people or two groups combine their specialties to make something special, to make something unique. |
| So, for example: |
| “My two favorite musicians collaborated and made an amazing album.” |
| “Let’s all collaborate to make the event a success.” |
| Or, “Researchers from the engineering department and the computer science department collaborated on this research paper.” |
| So, those are situations in which “collaborate” is much more natural to use than “cooperate.” It also sounds, when we use “collaborate,” like it’s kind of natural for those people to work together. If you use “cooperate,” it kind of sounds like it’s not so natural or they might not do those things. |
| There’s one other meaning of “collaborate,” which is like to help the enemy or to work for the enemy. So like, if you imagine a spy from one country goes to another country and starts working for the other country, we can use “collaborate” to describe that relationship as in… |
| “They spy started collaborating with our enemies.” |
| Or, “We suspect that one of our employees may be collaborating with a competitor.” |
| So that means working together with someone and it’s usually used in a negative situation. So, it’s used to mean like someone is working for someone else to, like reduce our credibility or to hurt us somehow and give someone else an advantage. So there is also this meaning of “collaborate,” but generally, you’ll hear it used to mean the first meaning that I described. So, I hope that this helps you. Thanks for the question. |
| Okay. Let’s move on to your next question. |
| Next question comes from Andreia Oliveira. |
| Hi, Andreia! |
| Andreia says… |
| “Hi, Alisha! I love your videos very much.” |
| Cool! |
| “Could you help me with the differences between ‘warranty’ and ‘guarantee’?” |
| Yeah, sure. Nice question. As nouns, “warranty” and “guarantee,” these two mean the same thing. They both refer to a promise. It’s some kind of promise about, like a product or a service. So, when you buy a product like a new piece of equipment or you buy some kind of, like machine, for example, you might see it says like “2-year warranty” or “lifetime guarantee.” So that refers to the length of time that the person who made the product promises it will be good. So, if it breaks, you can get a refund or you can exchange it for free or something like that. |
| So, in this sense, warranty and guarantee have the same meaning, this kind of product promise. However, “guarantee” can be used as a verb and in some of these verb uses, it has a little bit of a different meaning than just simply promise. So, one of these is like to say something with confidence. One of the meanings of guarantee is like to say something or to share an opinion with confidence. |
| For example: |
| “I guarantee you’ll love this restaurant.” |
| So that’s like someone saying, I know 100%, I am very confident that you will enjoy this restaurant. We can’t use “warranty” to describe that. We can’t use that in any way to describe that kind of confident opinion sharing. So, “guarantee” has this meaning. |
| We also have another meaning of “guarantee” which is to secure against. |
| So, for example: |
| “The insurance company secured the house against storm damage” |
| Another way to say that is the insurance company promised the house would be safe from storm damage. So, “to secure against” is a special meaning of guarantee and, again, we cannot use “warranty” to have this meaning at all. |
| So, a good way to know which meaning of “guarantee” is being used is to look at the word that follows the verb. So “guaranteed the house against storm damage,” if you look after the word “guarantee” and you see “against” is somewhere after it, it’s a pretty good chance that it’s this “secure against” meaning. |
| If however, it’s just someone kind of sharing an opinion, it’s probably that asserting something with confidence, saying something with confidence meaning. And yes, we can also use “guarantee” as a verb to mean making a promise. So I hope that this helps you understand “warranty” and “guarantee” and the different ways that we can use the word “guarantee” as a verb. Thanks for the question. |
| Okay. Let’s move on to our next question. |
| Next question comes from Bianca. |
| Hi, Bianca! |
| Bianca says… |
| “Hi, Alisha! I think the words ‘too, also, likewise, even, and as well’ have similar meanings. What are their differences and in which situations do I use them?” |
| Yep, common question, okay. So let’s review. “Too, also, and as well” have the same functions. So, we use them in just different parts of the sentence. |
| So, “too” tends to fall at the end of a sentence like… |
| “I want to go to the movies too.” |
| Or, “She bought a coffee too.” |
| “As well” typically falls at the end of a sentence, but it sounds a little bit more formal than too. In everyday speech, we tend to use “too” more often. You may see “too” used before a verb, like… |
| “I too want to go to the movies.” |
| Or, “She too bought a coffee.” |
| This use, however, sounds a little bit old fashioned and we tend not to use it seriously. If you hear this, it’s probably being used for humor. |
| So, keep in mind, again, in sum here, “too” and “as well” can go at the end of the sentence. That’s typically where they go. |
| “Also,” on the other hand, typically comes before a verb, like… |
| “I also want to go to the movies.” |
| Or “She also bought a coffee.” |
| So, we typically find it before the verb. You may see “also” at the beginning of a sentence. This happens when the speaker wants to add some information and they kind of just forgot it in the first sentence, so you might see it at the beginning of a sentence as well. |
| “Likewise,” to move on to the next item in your list, tends to be used by itself. It’s like a response to something someone else said. It’s like saying “me too” and it’s kind of friendly, but a little bit polite. |
| So, for example, if speaker A says, “I had a great time chatting with you.” |
| B might say, “Likewise! It was fun.” |
| So, it’s like saying “me too,” but it’s a little more friendly and polite and, usually, we just use it alone. |
| Finally, “even.” So, “even” is probably the most different of all of these words that you introduce. Before we talk about “even,” let’s take a look at an example situation. |
| “I’m so excited for my friends to come over to my house this weekend. I deep cleaned my house, I bought a bunch of snacks and drinks and I picked out some movies to watch. I even bought some games to play.” |
| So, you’ll notice that “even” comes before the last item in this situation, “I even bought some games to play.” So we use “even” in place of like “and.” When we want to emphasize that we’re doing something with all of our effort or that we’re kind of really focused on something, so the speaker expresses this excitement and the speaker did thing A and B and C to prepare for her friends to come over and then there’s this other thing that’s even more like intense, or she’s kind of expressing excitement by using “even” here, instead of just “and.” |
| So, we tend to use even to express emphasis. This sounds like a lot more like excited than just saying “and I bought some games to play.” If you say, “I even bought some games to play,” it’s like showing your commitment, I guess, or like your intensity in this situation. So, I hope that this is a good introduction to the differences between these words. Maybe I can make a whiteboard about this in the future. Thanks very much for the question! |
| Okay. Let’s move on to your next question. |
| Next question comes from Emma. |
| Hi, Emma! |
| Emmay says… |
| “Hi, Alisha! I’m wondering when we use the expression, ‘you guys’? Can I use this in a formal situation and can I use this with male and female friends? What about kids? When my kids are fighting, is it okay to say, ‘you guys stop fighting’? Thanks!” |
| Yeah, nice question. Generally, when you say “you guys” or even “hi, guys” “hey, guys” as a greeting, it means everyone or everybody. It refers to all people whether they’re men or women. So, this is also like a very common way for people on YouTube to say hello to their viewers. They maybe start the video by saying, “Hi, guys!” or “Hey, guys!” It’s very common to do, but it is important to note that especially over the last few years, people are considering carefully the words that they are choosing and “guys,” in this expression can, for some people, feel like it’s a little too male-centric and like women are kind of getting left out of the expression. So, because of this situation, some people are trying to use different ways to greet people or using different words instead of you guys as in the expression that you introduced. So, it’s good to consider this. For example, I don’t start videos by saying, “Hi, guys!” I say, “Hey, everybody” or “Hi, everyone.” That’s what I prefer to use. |
| So, some other words that people have suggested are words like “you all” or “ya’ll” or “folks” or “fam” or you can choose words that are specific to your group, like in your case, if you are talking to your kids, you could say, “Kids, stop fighting!” Or like, in our case, if we want to talk to the people who watch our videos or if I’m making something for like video or for audio content for the internet, I might say, “learners” for the people who watch this channel or I might say “viewers” or I might say “listeners.” |
| So, instead of saying “you guys,” you can kind of pick a more specific word that’s general for all genders. So, yes, to answer your question directly, you can use “you guys” to refer to your kids or to refer to your friends, but I think it’s maybe just good to consider that more and more people are being conscious and thinking carefully about the best words to use so that all genders can be covered in these everyday expressions, so I hope that this helps you. Thanks very much for the question. |
| Okay. Let’s move on to our next question. |
| Next question comes from Sergey. |
| Hi, Sergey! |
| Sergey says… |
| “Hi, Alisha. You are a great teacher and a jolly girl. I really like it. I heard the phrase ‘Go big or go home.” Could you please explain what it means?” |
| Yes! First, as an American English speaker, just a small side point, I strongly associate the word “jolly” with Santa Claus, so that’s why your question made me laugh a little bit. Jolly usually is only used to describe Santa Claus, but just a funny little note there. |
| Anyway, regarding your main question, “Go big or go home.” |
| “Go big or go home” is an expression that means do something with all your effort or your full intensity or don’t do it at all. It’s like saying do something, if you came all this way to do it or if you work this hard to do it, you should do it or you should just stay at home. So, you would hear this maybe in, like extreme sports or other kinds of, like intense activities or maybe if you go to a restaurant and there’s some amazing food there and you have one chance to eat it, your friend might say, “Go big or go home.” It’s a very casual, friendly, kind of rough expression. I used to use it a lot in videos. I guess I don’t use it so much these days, but it’s kind of like an encouragement phrase to say like, you know, do it with all your effort or don’t do it all. |
| So, “go big” refers to doing something with your effort, like having a big effort or “go home,” like don’t do it, just stay in your house. So, I hope that this helps you. Thanks very much for the question. |
| Okay. That is everything that I have for this week. Thank you as always for sending your questions. Thanks very much for watching this week’s episode of Ask Alisha and I will see you again next week. Bye-bye! |
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