Hi, everyone. Nesse episódio do podcast Inglês Online eu falo sobre as palavras plenty e room.
Transcrição
Hi, everyone. How’s it going? Today we have a new episode of the inglesonline podcast. To download or just listen to other episodes and download transcripts, go to inglesonline.com.br and click Podcast Inglesonline.
Are you familiar with the word ‘plenty’? That’s p-l-e-n-t-y, plenty. Plenty means a good amount; actually, a large amount of something. Usually when you say that there’s plenty of something, you mean that there’s enough of it or even more than enough.
To exemplify how you can use ‘plenty’ in conversation, let me start with a popular saying: There’s plenty of fish in the sea. What does that mean? That’s usually said in the context of telling someone who just got out of a relationship that this person will definitely find someone new… Why? Because there is plenty of fish in the sea. There’s no shortage of available people to be in a relationship with – or, at least, that’s what the saying means. Don’t worry, you’ll find someone… there’s plenty of fish in the sea.
Now, I’ve said “there IS plenty of fish” because the plural form of ‘fish’ is… fish. Some people say “There are plenty of fish” but “There’s plenty of fish” is what I hear and see most often. When we’re talking about uncountable things, such as food, information, time, room, we say “there’s plenty of food”, “there’s plenty of time”, “there’s plenty of room”, and “there’s plenty of information”. What does that mean again? That means there’s a very good amount of food, of time, of information and of room. There’s probably more than enough food, time, information and room.
And by the way, that’s right: I mentioned “room” as an example of something uncountable. I’m not talking about the rooms in a house, of course! We can count those, right? How many rooms are there in your house or apartment? Maybe two: one living room and one bedroom. Or perhaps you live in a studio with only one room. So that’s not the kind of room I’m talking about here. Room also means space – let me give you a few examples to illustrate this meaning of the word room. Let’s say you’re a teacher at a language school and you’re planning a class for 80 students. It’s a lot of students, right? Usually the classes in this school are attended by 20, 30 students at most. So you call the school coordinator and you let her know that you need a classroom with enough room for 80 students.
What does that mean? That means you need a classroom with enough space to accomodate 80 people, plus one – you. You need a classroom that’s big enough for 80 students and one teacher. You need a classroom with enough room, with enough space to accomodate 81 people. So when you tell the school coordinator about your plans, she says “Our classrooms are definitely not large enough to accomodate 80 students… none of them. I think our convention center is the only closed space with enough room for that.” That means the school’s convention center is the only closed space large enough to accomodate 80 students. There isn’t enough room in the classrooms for 80 students. In the convention center, on the other hand, there’s plenty of room for eighty students.
Here’s a very common expression: make room for something or someone. Imagine that you work for a small company with three other people, including your boss. Now your boss has decided to hire another two people. He says “Team, I know it looks like there’s no room for anyone else in our small office, but we’re going to have to make room for two new employees. I’m counting on you to make this work.” Your boss is asking the team to make room for two new employees. Maybe you’ll have to move your desks closer together, but you guys will have to, somehow, make room for another two employees. That means you’ll have to, somehow, create some space that will be enough to accomodate two new employees.
So it is very common to hear people say “Oh, there isn’t enough room for this or that here”. “My apartment is very small. There isn’t enough room to throw a party”. Or, “I wanna buy a new car but it can’t be too small. I have four kids so it has to be a car with plenty of room for all of us”. So this person needs a car with enough room for four kids, plus the adults. This person needs a car with plenty of room, right?
So back to the word ‘plenty’. Every time you hear there’s plenty of something, you can be sure that there’s no shortage of that thing. Whenever someone says “There’s plenty of room in our office to accomodate 50 people”, this person is saying “Don’t worry about the size of the office. It’ll be enough; it’ll probably be more than enough. There’s plenty of room for 50 people”. We could say about the Internet – there’s plenty of information on pretty much any topic you can think of. Would you agree? I’d say anyone would be able to find plenty of information on pretty much anything when they look it up on the Internet.
Let’s say someone says “I’m not sure we have enough food for everybody” and the other person is sure there’s more than enough… that person could say “Oh, we have plenty”. Plenty of what? Plenty of food. That means, we have a large amount of food. Don’t you worry about it. Or you’re at a meeting and you ask “Do we have enough time to finish this project?” Your colleague says “Plenty.” What does he mean? Plenty of time. We have plenty of time to finish the project. We have an ample amount of time. We have more than enough time. We have plenty of time.
That’s all for today, everyone. How about you leave some examples in the comments? Talk to you next time.
Key expressions
there’s plenty of
there’s plenty of fish in the sea
there isn’t enough room
make room for
Glossary
a saying = um ditado
there’s no shortage of (something) = (alguma coisa) é algo que com certeza não está em falta
move your desks closer together = puxar/trazer (mover) suas mesas para elas ficarem mais próximas
on pretty much anything = sobre praticamente qualquer coisa
Ana criou um blog de dicas de inglês em 2006, e depois de muito pesquisar o que faz alguém ganhar fluência numa segunda língua, criou seu primeiro curso de inglês em 2009.
Hi Ana. How are you doing? I enjoyed so much your explanation about the meaning of “Plenty”. You used many examples thai I’ll be very usefull im my daily life. Nowadays i’ve been studying english at wizard school, but i intend to start traveling abroad to increase my knowledge and experience.
Bye bye.
Hi Ana, I would like to say to you that I think your work wonderful. Congratulations. It is being very useful for me and for sure to many people too. I have accessed your page everyday and therefore I hope and also I have sure I will be plenty of English one day.
Thank you very much
Everlon
When I watch “Friends” at the first time ( The Sitcom) I enjoy when Ross became depressed as he lost his wife for another relationship and Joey ( another character) explain the women are just ice-cream and he says: ” There’s a lot of flavors out there! There’s Rocky Road, and Cookie Dough, and Bing” Cherry Vanilla. You could get’em with Jimmies, or nuts or whipped cream! … Welcome back to the world! Grab a spoon!
As they say; the most old wine, the best become. Congratulations Ana, your voice is so sweet and every class you give us the best,
I’m one of pupils of your English Course. Ana, I have realized that you used to use the expression “how is it going?” in the podcasts. How is IT going. The thing is, you’re talking to ME, in this case. Why do you say “how is it going?” and not “How are YOU going”?
Vc pode pensar no IT como sujeito indefinido (exemplo, quando dizemos Tá chovendo. Quem tá chovendo?? Ninguém. Tá chovendo.) ou como se o IT fosse equivalente äs “coisas” (Como tão as coisas?)
Percebeu como vc não questiona o que diz em português? Tente na medida do possível se concentrar em listening que vc compreende, e vá se acostumando com a mecânica da língua (assim como aconteceu com o português). Apareça lá no Curso tbem!!
