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Pamela81 Posted 15 years ago
Grammar

To talk -to speak- to discuss BY

Hello!

please can you comment the following sentences?

"We talked yesterday BY telephone"

"We talked yesterday On the telephone"

"We discussed yesterday BY telephone"

"We discussed yesterday On the telephone"

"We spoke yesterday BY telephone"

"We spoke yesterday On the telephone"

Thanks

Pamela
  

Top answer

"We talked yesterday by telephone" puts the emphasis on how we talked. Did we talk in person or did we talk on the phone? "We talked yesterday on the telephone" gives the information of how we talked, but it's not emphasized.

— Chalkbrd

  • "We talked yesterday by telephone" puts the emphasis on how we talked.
  • Did we talk in person or did we talk on the phone?
  • "We talked yesterday on the telephone" gives the information of how we talked, but it's not emphasized.
  • "We discussed yesterday by telephone" doesn't sound natural to me at all.
  • I don't think I'd say this.
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4 Answers
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"We talked yesterday by telephone" puts the emphasis on how we talked. Did we talk in person or did we talk on the phone?

"We talked yesterday on the telephone" gives the information of how we talked, but it's not emphasized.

"We discussed yesterday by telephone" doesn't sound natural to me at all. I don't think I'd say this. I'm not sure why, but it just sounds odd to my ears
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By the way, in reading this again, I wanted to clarify that "we discussed" would need to have the topic you discussed mentioned. We discussed on the phone yesterday whether to use by or on in this situation. We discussed what?

Chalk
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Dear,

thank you very much! This thing creates me problems everytime I must speak on the telephone. So "on the phone" is OK.

Thanks

Pamela
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Yes, "on the phone" is fine.

Chalk
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