Need correction. The demonstration.

Question

Hi Teachers,Please, could you correct this paragraph?There’s a minor demonstration in a London park. The demonstrators are protesting against the Conservative Party. There aren’t a lot of them. There are only a handful of demonstrators and a few policemen are watching them. There are also several reporters there. In fact, there are quite a few reporters. They are interviewing a couple of demonstrators and a few cameramen are filming the demonstration. There is also a group of Japanese tourists taking pictures of it.What is the difference between 'several' and 'quite a few' in terms of quantity? Is there any?Thanks in advance.

KrisBlueNZ · Accepted Answer

Hi again ThinkingSpain.

I will ignore the superfluous sentences, since I know you're doing that on purpose.

QUITE A FEW loosely implies "more than you think" or "more than you might expect". I'd estimate it means four to eight or thereabouts. A FEW just means a small number, say three to six.

SEVERAL is pretty close to A FEW.

A HANDFUL implies maybe four to eight.

"Japanese tourists taking pictures OF IT" sounds a bit amateurish. You can just remove the OF IT completely, since that's implied. They wouldn't go there to take pictures of something else, would they.

Tenacious Learner · Answer

Hi KrisBlueNZ,

Again, thank you very much for your reply and the explanations.

The readings I'm posting here are for low intermediate students. They've just finished the beginners level. This reading is for chapter 4, so it is just the begining of the other level. The one you corrected it's great, and of course I've kept it in my best readings folder in the computer. But not for this level. I hope I have explained my self about the why's I didn't use the one you corrected.

So the story should be like this:

There’s a minor demonstration in a London park. The demonstrators are protesting against the Conservative Party. There aren’t a lot of them. There are only a handful of demonstrators and a few policemen are watching them. There are also several reporters there. In fact, there are quite a few reporters. They are interviewing a couple of demonstrators and a few cameramen are filming the demonstration. There is also a group of Japanese tourists taking pictures.

Do you agree? Synonyms for quite a few are a large number of and many.

PS. I really liked 'handful'. I didn't know about this word before.

Best regards

TS

KrisBlueNZ · Answer

Actually there are two more corrections.

First, your two superfluous sentences probably should have semicolons before them, since they're an extension or elaboration of the sentences that precede them. "There aren't a lot of them; there are only a handful of ..." and "There are also several reporters there; in fact, there are quite a few reporters."

Second, you should say "There IS only a handful of protesters" instead of ARE, because a handful of something is a singular noun. This is only a small point and many people would not even notice the mismatch, since this mistake is common - I make it myself often.

Re HANDFUL, I didn't suggest that word - you used it yourself in your paragraph :-)

Laurading · Answer

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Tenacious Learner · Answer

Hi KrisBlueNZ,

Thanks again for your reply and helpful corrections.

I though you suggested 'handful'. Then someone else did it.

Do you agree? Synonyms for quite a few are a large number of and many.

Best regards

TS

KrisBlueNZ · Answer

No, HANDFUL is in your original message, in the fourth sentence: "There are only a handful of demonstrators and a few policemen are watching them"

No, QUITE A FEW, A LARGE NUMBER OF, and MANY all mean different things.

QUITE A FEW I've explained.

A LARGE NUMBER OF is harder to pin down. If you say "A large number of registered voters did not vote", for example, it means something like "a significant proportion". I would say it means at least 30% or so, maybe more than 50%. If you say "There was a large number of people at the party", that means, to me, that the number was large in proportion to the number you might expect, probably more than expected, or large in proportion to the number of people that the house (where the party was held) would be expected to hold. That's a pretty vague definition, I know, but it's a pretty vague phrase.

MANY has a similar meaning to A LARGE NUMBER OF.

These are just my impressions based on how I've heard those phrases used, and how I use them myself. Others will probably disagree with me.

Tenacious Learner · Answer

Hi KrisBlueNZ,

Thank you so much for sharing with me your impressions. They are really helpful.

Point taken. Mission accomplish.

See you around.

Best regards

TS

Need correction. The demonstration.

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