advise vs. piece of advice
Posted: Wed Sep 30, 2009 7:28 pm
Is there some "technical term" for "piece of", as used in
"piece of advice"?
For example, if I say to you,
"Let me advise you further about this matter.",
it is just interpreted as a neutral informative statement.
But the minute we hear,
"Let me give you a piece of advice about that",
it is immediately interpreted as either emotionally charged, as if you are about to lambaste somebody, or at best it is sort of "lecture mode"; patronizing.
So is there a term for "leading phraseology that signals either displeasure or some other emotion"....the only thing I can come up with is "code word".
The issue came up because some of my Russian friends see "piece of advice" translated to their language to be equivalent to simply the noun "advice". So unwittingly, they are saying things like "Let me give you a piece of advice", not realizing it may be coming off as if they had said, "Let me give you a piece of my mind".
But I do not know if there is some grammatical term I can use to explain this....perhaps is "piece of" considered a "particle"...could that be the word I am after?
Ok, thanks in advance for any response!
"piece of advice"?
For example, if I say to you,
"Let me advise you further about this matter.",
it is just interpreted as a neutral informative statement.
But the minute we hear,
"Let me give you a piece of advice about that",
it is immediately interpreted as either emotionally charged, as if you are about to lambaste somebody, or at best it is sort of "lecture mode"; patronizing.
So is there a term for "leading phraseology that signals either displeasure or some other emotion"....the only thing I can come up with is "code word".
The issue came up because some of my Russian friends see "piece of advice" translated to their language to be equivalent to simply the noun "advice". So unwittingly, they are saying things like "Let me give you a piece of advice", not realizing it may be coming off as if they had said, "Let me give you a piece of my mind".
But I do not know if there is some grammatical term I can use to explain this....perhaps is "piece of" considered a "particle"...could that be the word I am after?
Ok, thanks in advance for any response!