Learn the many uses of "SOME" in English

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Well, that is some wine for $1,000.

I don't kind of have that - I don't have something like that to pay for it.

Hey, E, you were reading my mind.

Hi, James from engVid.

Today I'd like to work on the word "some".

A simple enough word, but like many things that seem simple, to actually explain it properly

So, we're going to take the time today and we're going to go through this word.

Now, why are we doing "some"?

Well, "some" is used in English as a determiner, but it's also used as a pronoun, an adjective,

and an adverb, and that's what I meant by it's not quite easy, so you'll see it in sentences

and you'll think, "Well, what's it doing there?"

The other thing is we can take the word "some" and add it to words to make the words more

formal or we can make it much more casual, right?

So, we can go from business English to bar English just by using the word "some".

That's kind of cool, so I thought it would be really good that we took the time to go

over it, and E agrees with me because he wants to be - he's going to help me out here, right?

Anyway, before this lesson gets tiresome, just started on it, why don't we go to the

board, check out how "some" is used.

We can talk about how - where you shouldn't get confused by it, because there's another

word that's similar to it, and we'll break into the four parts and give you examples.

Don't forget we always do our quiz, so make sure you stay to the very end, okay?

Anyway, let's go to the board and get started.

So, "some", it's an unspecified amount.

This is a nice fancy word for meaning "we don't know", but it's not specific, remember?

If you've heard the word "specific", "specific" means something like one or two or this rag,

It's very, very specific.

When it's not, it's an approximate, right?

So, "some" is an unspecified amount, so we don't know really what the number or the size

We do know something about "some", though.

We know it's more than one or two, but it's less than many.

An example, if I say, "Can you give me some money?", I'm doubting you guys are going to

give me a million dollars.

You might give me a dollar or two, you might give me five.

Probably more than a dollar or two, because I said give me some money, right?

You might give me five, six, maybe three, four, but you're not going to give me a million.

And that's how we know "some" falls into that ballpark or that area there, that grey area.

Now, we don't want to confuse "some" with its homonym "sum", S-U-M.

This has two particular meanings, which is different than the unspecified meaning of

So, let's get through it quickly.

They sound the same, right?

But what's the difference?

When you see this word here, it means a particular amount of money.

And that means it could be a large sum or a small sum, and you'll hear people say it

And if it's a large sum, it means a lot of money.

It's not being specified, so it's kind of similar in that case, but we are talking about

money specifically.

That's what makes it specific.

So, a large sum would be a lot of money, and a small sum would be a small amount of money.

So, if you say he asked a large sum for a bottle of water, that means he asked for a

lot of money for this water.

Or the house was a small sum, it wasn't very much, not a lot of money.

The second meaning for this sum is the total result of adding items or numbers.

You'll primarily find this word here in mathematics when you add two numbers together, when you

have that plus sign, and you say two plus two, the sum is four.

But anyway, so that's the sum when we put things together.

You can also have a sum as any item, any two items, right?

The sum of a man is not his parts, meaning when you take all the things together, there

could be more to that man than just the sum of his parts, all the parts added together.

And that's when we take items, because it doesn't have to be just numbers.

For instance, the sum of your skills doesn't equal who you are as a person.

That's a big philosophical statement for saying just because you can run, read, jump, play

baseball, that's still not who you are, you're bigger than that, that sum, the addition of

So, now that we've got this one out of the way, but you've learned a second word, you're

welcome, let's go back to sum, and we'll talk about how sum is this simple, yet, I'd like

to say simple elegance, but it's got so much complexity to it.

And we'll look at how sum can be used as a pronoun, an adverb, adjective, and a determiner.

So, the first one we're going to look at is sum as a pronoun.

As you see in this sentence, we have, "Some have left already."

Well, we could have said, "They have left already."

So, remember how I said it can replace words?

And if I didn't mention it at the beginning, sum can actually replace another word.

And this is how we do it with pronouns.

Instead of, "They have left already", we say, "Some have left".

Now, how many have left?

Let's go back to the board, an unspecified amount.

So, we don't know if it's three, four, five, or six, but some have left.

So, they left the party already.

Some have left the party already, an example.

As a determiner, a determiner tells us what we're talking about.

It determines the object we're talking about.

And you know "the" or "the", "an" or "a" are also determiners, right?

So, this falls in that category.

So, when I say, "Please bring some chairs", this is where it's determining how many chairs.

Now, once again, I'm going to go back to the top of the board, I'm going to ask you a question.

How many chairs should you bring?

30?

50?

100?

That would be many chairs.

Maybe I'm having some friends for dinner, and I've got a small house, or maybe a medium

Probably want three, four, five chairs, so bring me some chairs, please.

We've determined that number being less than many, but more than one or two by "some chairs".

It's not modifying the chairs, it's not saying this is a "some chair".

I wouldn't know what that meant in English, but I know I need a number of chairs, but

Next, we can use "some" as an adverb.

What do you mean an adverb?

To modify how a verb is being utilized or used.

In this case, we say the sentence, "He had grown some since last year."

Well, your boy, your son was about this tall, but now he's taller.

He's grown some.

He's changed in height.

Growing is what things do, biological things, you know, people and plants, animals, they

So, he has grown some, and I'm saying there's been a change in the growth.

Unspecified, once again, because I'm not saying he has grown - okay, depends where you're

If you're in North America, he could have grown two feet.

If you're in - if you're in Europe, Asia, he has grown, I don't know what two feet would

be, 25 centimeters.

You figure it out.

No, that would be like 10 inches.

A foot, whatever.

But you get the point.

There's been a change, unspecified, so the person isn't saying specifically he has grown

75 centimeters in one year.

He's grown some, an approximate amount.

And finally, we can use it as an adjective, right?

And here's one of my favorite - let me read it first, and I'll explain why it's one of

my favorite lines in literature.

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than other animals.

So, in this case, we're modifying animals, some animals, we're not just talking about

a number of animals, we're saying a specific group of animals, but that group hasn't been

It's unspecified.

So, which animals are there?

Now, this line is a great line because it comes from a book called Animal Farm.

And if you want to enhance your reading skills, I would suggest you pick it up.

It's by George Orwell.

It's very timely.

He wrote it way back, I can't remember if it was after World War I or World War II,

and he was talking about, I guess it was communism, and how communism at that time, so if you

live in a state, a communist state, I'm not putting it down, this is Orwell's work, but

he was talking about how sometimes communism can lead to having, first, all people are

equal, but then having a separation where some people get to be a little bit better

than the others, which is kind of against the idea of communism.

So, it was his critique about communism.

So, this is a great line because he says, it starts off with, "Comrade, all animals

are equal, but some animals are a little bit more equal, you know what I'm saying?"

So, of course that's not being equal, and that was the whole point of that particular

So, George Orwell, Animal Farm.

It's great, especially if you want to get better at understanding our idioms, our cultural

You say that to a Canadian American, a British person, they're like, "Oh, yeah, yeah, I get

it right away."

So, it will help you deepen your English understanding while you are getting to know about us.

So, now I've broken down "some" in its four parts.

We talked about something that would be not exactly the same because it's a homophone,

and we have to do something interesting.

Notice I said "something", right?

Ooh, don't you just love it?

As I said, this word is found - we use it in so - oh, jeez, here I go, go - so many

different ways, you know, yeah, we use it in so many different ways, it's actually kind

So, let's go to the second part where we're going to do the quiz.

I'll introduce you to a way to make "some" a little bit more formal, and throw in a little

bit of vocab that you can use at your next party or business meeting, right?

Let's go to the board and do the quiz.

[Snaps fingers]

And we're back.

Now, I had made an unspecified mistake on the first board.

Did you catch it?

Did you see what I forgot to do?

Or were you unspecified?

Let's go to the board.

Yeah, on the first board I forgot to put the "i" in there, so yeah, I'm human, I make mistakes.

But let's go to the board because we want you not to make mistakes, and we're going

to do our quick quiz with a bit of a bonus, and of course, the homework, yeah?

All right, so I want you to put "some" in the correct place in the sentence, so in these

four or five sentences - five sentences, that's interesting - "some" can replace - remember

we talked about "some" can replace words as well as modify - in that case, we can put

"some" in these sentences, and I want you to figure out where it would be, okay?

And then I want you to tell me - oh, because this is the way it rolls around here - what

kind of modification was it, because I said not only can you replace a word, it could

be modified, so it's not just a determiner, right?

It could be an adjective, and a pronoun, and finally a - well, adjective, adverb, pronoun,

and determiner, all four.

All right, cool.

So, let's take a look at the first sentence.

And by the way, they were on the first board, even though I made an unspecified mistake.

So, we did it, and if you understood it, this should be a piece of cake, like, really easy

If you're having a problem, go back, listen to what the lesson was, okay, then come back

But let's go to the board for now.

Number one, "He had grown a moderate amount since I last saw him."

Well, let's get an earmark it.

What part do we have to change?

Well, "He had grown", here, "a moderate amount", and remember we said when we use it in the

what kind of way?

The adverb way, we use it as an adverb.

How did he grow?

He had grown some.

In this case, it means a moderate amount, not being determined.

I think I was talking about, you know, two feet, or 25 centimeters, or something like

That was that one there.

Let's look at the second one.

"I made an unspecified amount of money."

What would that be?

Look at this, we're going to go like, "I made", whoa, whoa, whoa, look at that.

We can get rid of all of that, and we can just say "some", right?

And what would that be, "some"?

It would be a determiner, right?

So in this case, determiner, how much money?

Some money, right?

What else can we replace here for the third one?

"All animals are equal, but a few animals are more equal than the other animals."

That was my George Orwell quote that I told you I really love, one of my favorite quotes.

So what would we be talking about?

That's right, "a few".

And in this case, "a few" is modifying the type of animal, so it would be an - just stop

off the board for a second - an adjective, right?

So it's a pronoun-adjective, modifying this noun, telling you what kind of animals.

Some animals, right?

Next, "People have been talking behind your back."

What could that possibly be?

Now, I know it seems weird, and some people might say, "Well, is that even right?"

And it's like, yeah, it is, because in English you'll hear people say, "Some may say this

is a good idea", and that is referring to people.

How many people?

It doesn't mean all of them, it said "some", so it could be a small group, 10, 15%.

In this case, we go here, we can get rid of this, and we'd use "some" as being used as

It's replacing people.

Pretty cool, right?

So let's do number five.

"You will make your money back and plenty more."

Okay, let me - let's do that one, can you do that one?

Yeah, some of you are pretty smart, you caught on saying, "Hey dude, I'm no genius here,

but you told us'some', S-U-M was, you know, you add things together, and I added one,

two, three, four.

What is this number five?"

Well, you notice it says C bonus, so you can't answer this question until we actually look

at the bonus section, and we'll come back here.

I'm always here to give you a little bit more, I'm going to give you what I promised, plus

a little bit more.

So, what does this sentence mean?

So let's look at the bonus section, we'll get an understanding of the sentence and what

we have to replace.

"And then some".

In English, when we say "and then some", we mean a lot, or plenty, right?

I'm going to cook you some dinner and then some, I'm going to give you even more than

you expect, a lot.

Or you're going to make all of your money back and then some, plenty, which means a

So right here, we can say this, "You will make your money back", and we're going to

get rid of this part here, and "plenty more" is necessary, you can say "and then some".

Told you I'd teach you.

So you can say "and then some" and you're saying a lot more.

So you might be saying, "Well, James, well, okay, that's great, because'some' was first

you taught me was unspecified, so I don't really know, and now you're telling me if

I say 'and then some', like, you're going to be in trouble, and then some".

A lot of trouble, right?

And now you're telling me it means a lot, could it ever mean a little?

You've come to the right place, my friend.

I will go to the board and I will show you another meaningful sum, yeah?

If we add the word "what after", and we say "somewhat", it can mean a little bit or moderate,

which means, you know, a small change, medium change.

This is an adverb.

Of course, at the top, it's a phrase, because it's three words, so it's not a word, right?

So that's a phrase, but in this case, we can use it as an adverb to say "somewhat".

He's changed somewhat.

He's changed a little, but not a huge change, which is almost the opposite of this one,

which is he's changed and then some, which is a lot.

So we can go "a lot" or "a little".

And now I'm going to give you something that's - I told you I'd give you, you know, a boardroom

or a business type meaning for "some" where we modify a word.

When you're tired, you're out of energy, but when something is tiresome - this is interesting

- you might be tired because someone is annoying you and taking your energy away, or they're

boring you and making you go to sleep.

"Tiresome", which is an adjective.

His speech was tiresome, or it was a tiresome speech.

An adjective meaning saying that it was either annoying me, making me angry, or boring me

and putting me to sleep.

Well, hopefully this lesson hasn't been tiresome for you, okay?

I hope it's been somewhat interesting, right, because I've taught you "some" and showed

you it's not just this simple word, right?

And then "some", I gave you another word that sounds the same, a homophone.

I also said "homonym" because they're from the same family, as in homophone means sound,

homonym, similar meaning, right?

Or similar sound meaning it means similar in some way, as in the word "homo" or "homo"

for saying similar.

So, we've done all of that.

You've done your quiz.

I hope you did well.

You got the extra bonus one.

Maybe some of you were really sneaky and read up there already and go, "I know the answer!"

I've always said to students, if you hear someone teaching someone else and you can

hear it and it's okay, listen and learn.

Or in this case, use your eyes and learn.

Perhaps you can put it together, which means your understanding of English is getting better.

And I like to say you're becoming a native speaker, or my phrase is "future native speaker".

So, in order to enhance your ability to become a future native speaker, I'm going to give

you homework because that's necessary.

It's one thing to watch a lesson.

It's another thing to engage with the topic or the work to improve yourself.

So, similar to what we've done here, I'm giving you these three sentences.

And what I want you to do, because you'll notice there are four things we said some

can be, I want you, in the comments below, either on YouTube or on engVid, to determine

which one these are.

So, when we have "Some can't be trusted with great responsibility", is that a pronoun,

adverb, determiner, or adjective?

Number two, "We had some money hidden away", is that a pronoun, da-da-da-da?

And you can guess.

Put it in the comments below.

So, you're going to put one, you'll put down adverb, da-da-da, two, da-da-da, and as always,

the crowd or your other fellow students will give you a little thumbs up or thumbs down

if they think it's right or wrong, and we'll say, "This one is worth 100 points per."

See if you can get 300 points.

Well, anyway, this has been some fun, see how I use that.

I'm looking forward to teaching you guys again.

Have a great day, but before I go, don't forget to go to www.engvid.com to do the quiz that

follows that, and see what other wonderful teachers we have, and other lessons with similar

Vocabulary, grammar, conversation, listening, we got it all.

That was somewhat fun.