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Ask for help > Countable or uncountable?
Countable or uncountable?
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roael
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Countable or uncountable?
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Do we say I need to buy a lettuce or I need to buy some lettuce? Thanks in advance. |
18 Sep 2019
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FrauSue
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Hi Roael, Both are possible. A lettuce is one single vegetable. Some lettuce is more vague - it could refer to several lettuces, or a bag of pre-washed leaves. |
18 Sep 2019
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mistertroy2000
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We say "I need to buy a head of lettuce." or "I need to buy some lettuce." If you need to heads, you say "I need two heads of lettuce." the heads (whole round units) are countable. If you want to put lettuce on your sandwich, it�s uncountable and you�d say "I need to put some lettuce on my sandwich." If you are extremely picky and want a specific amount of lettuce on your sandwich, you can say "I�d like two (three, four, five...) leaves of lettuce." We never say "I need a lettuce." please do not teach that to your students. |
18 Sep 2019
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kohai
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Countable AND uncountable. The difference has already been explained in the previous answers. Honestly speaking, till today, I thought that lettuce can only be uncountable, but even in Oxford Advanced Learner�s Dictionary one of the example sentences says "Buy a lettuce and some tomatoes."
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18 Sep 2019
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roael
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Thanks. |
18 Sep 2019
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douglas
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Is this a BE / AE thing? I don�t think I have ever used lettuce as a countable noun. |
19 Sep 2019
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Aisha77
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Douglas, you are right, for the American slang lettuce is JUST uncountable, but for British can be both, depending on if you are talking about the lettuce as a whole bud or just the sliced pieces in a salad or similar...
edit: btw, mistertroy2000 in British English you can say one lettuce, two lettuces and so on so it is perfectly fine to teach that if you are teaching British English instead of American... |
19 Sep 2019
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cunliffe
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Yes, I am English and I buy a lettuce, usually an iceberg lettuce, btw. You can buy packets of pre-washed, pre-shredded lettuce. Most packets are actually mixed leaves, rather than straight lettuce. |
19 Sep 2019
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douglas
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Cool! I learned something new. :)
OBTW: We buy heads of lettuce (or bags, packages, etc.)-- it�s not just slang
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20 Sep 2019
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FrauSue
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Thanks Cunliffe and Aisha for backing me up! I was starting to wonder if too much time abroad had made my English wobbly ... |
21 Sep 2019
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