Troop and Troupe - Commonly Confused Words

Troop and Troupe - Commonly Confused Words The words troop and troupe  are  homophones: they sound alike but have different meanings.As a noun, troop  refers to a group of soldiers or a collection of people or things. As a verb, troop means to move or spend time together. The noun troupe refers specifically to a group of theatrical  performers. The difference between trooper and trouper is discussed in the usage notes below. Examples My sister, who has been in the Girl Scouts for two years, wanted to earn enough money to send her entire troop to summer camp.A live jazz band will open for an international troupe of dancers, and clowns on stilts will sell hot dogs to customers in balcony seats.An encamped Boy Scout troop wanted to watch and hear a troupe perform at a nearby military base. When informed that the show was for the troops only, the boys had to entertain themselves by working on their merit badges.(Robert Oliver Shipman, A Pun My Word: A Humorously Enlightened Path to English Usage. Rowman Littlefield, 1991) Usage Notes troop or troupe, trooper or trouperThe older English spelling troop (used in the singular) refers to certain kinds of military unit, in artillery, armored formation, and cavalry. In the scouting movement, a troop is a group of three or more patrols. The plural troops is military usage for the whole body of soldiers, rather than units within it. The French spelling troupe was reborrowed in C19 to refer to a group of actors or entertainers, and is readily modified as in dance troupe, Moscow circus troupe, troupe of traveling players.The distinctions between troupe and troop carry over to trouper and trooper. Trouper refers to a member of an entertainment group, and trooper (in the UK) to a soldier associated with an armored unit or cavalry, and, in the US, a member of a state police force.(Pam Peters, The Cambridge Guide to English Usage. Cambridge University Press, 2004)trooper, trouperAn old trooper is an old cavalry soldier (supposedly good at swearing), old private soldier in a tan k regiment, or old mounted policeman. An old trouper is an old member of a theatrical company, or perhaps a good sort.(The Economist Style Guide. Profile Books, 2005) Practice Exercises (a) The magician and his _____ of jugglers packed the Chinese theater with thousands of people.(b) A gorilla will beat his chest, break branches, flash his teeth, and chargeall in the interest of protecting his _____. Answers to Practice Exercises (a) The magician and his  troupe  of jugglers packed the Chinese theater with thousands of people.(b) A gorilla will beat his chest, break branches, flash his teeth, and chargeall in the interest of protecting his  troop.

TOEIC Scores by Age, Gender, Country, and Education

TOEIC Scores by Age, Gender, Country, and Education If youve taken the TOEIC Listening and Reading exam, then you know that it can be difficult to ascertain how well youve done on the test. Even though many businesses and institutions have minimum TOEIC scores or proficiency levels for hiring, the levels may be quite different from another institutions base requirements. So, where do you stand with the scores youve earned? How do your scores compare with the scores of others who have taken the test? Here are the average TOEIC scores by a number of different factors: age, gender, country of birth, and education level.   Average TOEIC Scores by Country of Birth The first numbers after the countries are the mean or average TOEIC scores for the Listening Test. The second numbers are the mean or average TOEIC scores for the Reading Test. Remember that the highest possible score achievable on each exam is a 495 and anything over 450 is generally considered excellent with no real weaknesses in the language by the makers of the test, ETS.   ALBANIA 208   168  ALGERIA 344   299  ARGENTINA 368   340   BELGIUM 393   362BRAZIL 334   303  CAMEROON 322   282CANADA 432   393CHILE 257   218  CHINA, PEOPLES REPUBLIC 350   322COLOMBIA 343   304  COSTA RICA 378 326COTE DIVOIRE (IVORY COAST) 324 297  CZECH REPUBLIC 398 362  EGYPT 218 177  FRANCE 377   342  GERMANY 425   362  GREECE 321 247  HONG KONG 297 235  INDIA 408   361  INDONESIA 234 188ITALY 371   355  JAPAN 284   228KOREA (ROK) 351   295LEBANON 409   354MACAO 258 191MALAYSIA 362   294  MONGOLIA 247 189MOROCCO 375   324   PAKISTAN 299 227PERU 307 279  PHILIPPINES 384   325  POLAND 315   243  PORTUGAL 404   362  REUNION 352   318  RUSSIA 359   308  SENEGAL 344   298SLOVAKIA 358 317  SPAIN 345   335  TAIWAN 294   242  THAILAND 274 207  TUNISIA 374   334  TURKEY 355 299  Ã‚  UNITED ARAB EMIRATES 298   183  VIETNAM 249   229  Ã‚  Ã‚   Average TOEIC Scores by Age It appears as though the 26-30-year-olds have the highest average TOEIC scores in this set of statistics, even though they accounted for only17.6% of testers. Check it out: Age Average Listening Score Average Reading Score under 20 276 215 21-25 328 274 26-30 339 285 31-35 320 270 36-40 305 258 41-45 293 246 over 45 288 241 Average TOEIC Scores by Gender Just 44.1% of test-takers were female, compared to the 55.9% of testers who were male. On average, women outscored men on both the Listening and Reading tests.   Female Listening Score Average: 327Female Reading Score Average: 266Male Listening Score Average: 304Female Reading Score Average: 255 Average TOEIC Scores by Level of Education More than half (56.5%) of the test-takers sitting for the TOEIC exam were in college, attempting to earn their undergraduate degree at a four-year university. Here are the statistics, based on the levels of education of the testers. Again, the first score is for the Listening exam and the second is for the Reading portion. Graduate school: 351   310Undergraduate college:   338   285Junior high school: 284 214High school:  276   212Elementary school: 265   220Community college:  Ã‚  268   210Language institution:   268 194 Vocational school after high school:  258   193Vocational school:   236   169 TOEIC LISTENING PRACTICE

Technical writing Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Technical writing - Essay Example Therefore, the purpose of this memo is to provide information about the influence of the Japan’s business culture and negotiation styles on business. Despite the recent changes in the Japanese business culture, the Japanese negotiation style remains the most distinctive in the world. It is far different from negotiation styles in Japan’s closest neighbors such as Taiwan and Korea. Japanese executives adopt a subtle, low key bargaining, contrary to the typical aggressive haggling of Chinese and Korean business executives (Hodgson, Sano and Graham 39). This poses challenges in doing business because, Japanese tend to be slower and more deliberate in making concessions (Nishiyama 102). This takes a long time in making business decisions for the parties involved. Other challenges arise because of the Japanese’s retreat into vague statements or silence when there are complications, making of frequent referrals to the head office or superiors, and their nonverbal behav iors that are complex and confusing (Nishiyama 102). The memo has been written in this chosen arrangement technique because of its purpose. Being an informative memo, provision of information and details about Japan’s corporate culture and negotiation styles and how they pose challenges to doing business in Japan is the core function of this memo. ... Part B: A Report on the Challenges Associated with doing Business in Japan The major challenges that are associated with doing business in Japan are embedded in the country’s corporate culture and language. First, when one goes to do business in Japan, he or she faces challenges of acceptance. The Japanese does not accept foreigners readily and take them as their own as is the case in other countries. This creates a challenge in developing, and maintaining effective business relations within the Japanese system. Another challenge stems from how male Japanese relates with females. For instance, male Japanese executives have no experience in dealing with female managers, and have little or no protocol of doing so (Mente 79). Therefore, females doing business in Japan faces difficulties because some Japanese tends to believe that women are not meant to be business managers in the first place. The Japanese market is a difficult market. There are significant challenges associated w ith entry to the Japanese market, which is extremely expensive and time consuming. In some cases, it may be absolutely impossible to break into the distribution channels for certain products. This is because these channels are tightly knit that no foreigner can penetrate them (Mente 42). Inability to break into these channels has nothing to do with prices or product salability, but it is linked to the strong relationships between Japanese manufacturers, retailers and manufacturers. Unique culture and difficulty Japanese language creates significant challenges in doing business. Language barrier and misunderstanding of culture lead to miscommunication and misunderstanding (Haghirian 55). The