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Dates - Which writing is correct? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Questions About Your Target Languages |  | |
| chenshujian Diglot Senior Member ChinaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5451 days ago 122 posts - 139 votes  Speaks: Mandarin*, English Studies: French | Message 1 of 9 05 April 2012 at 3:10am | IP Logged | ||
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25th March 2005
25th March, 2005 Which one is correct? It would be nice if you could tell me more about the writing of dates. Thank you. Edited by Fasulye on 09 April 2012 at 3:50am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| mikonai Diglot Senior Member United States weirdnamewriting.bloRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4930 days ago 178 posts - 281 votes Speaks: English*, Italian Studies: Swahili, German | Message 2 of 9 05 April 2012 at 3:26am | IP Logged | ||
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Either one is correct.
Many people like the second one (25th March, 2005) better, because when we say it out loud there's often a pause where the comma is. Certain situations call for a specific way of writing the date, but most of the time it doesn't matter. In the USA, we could also write the same date like this: 3/25/05, because March is the 3rd month, and then we use the last two numbers of the year. In most other countries you switch the month and day, so it's 25/3/05. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Hekje Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4704 days ago 842 posts - 1330 votes Speaks: English*, Dutch Studies: French, Indonesian | Message 3 of 9 05 April 2012 at 7:10am | IP Logged | ||
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In American English, I have only ever seen a full date written out the following way:
"March 25, 2005" (without quotes). You would never write down "25th" when writing out the date in full, even though we would say it when reading out loud. "I'll see you March 25th" or "We'll have lunch on the 6th", however - where the month and day stand alone - are both fine. And Mikonai's second paragraph is correct as well. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| PillowRock Groupie United States Joined 4735 days ago 87 posts - 151 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Spanish | Message 4 of 9 05 April 2012 at 8:17am | IP Logged | ||
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Regardless of whether writing out the words or writing a numeric date, Americans generally write dates in the order:
Month Day Year So the numeric version of "March 25, 2005" would be usually be written as "3/25/2005" (or sometimes "3/25/05") in the US. I believe that the British write "25/3/2005" like the rest of Europe. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Ogrim Heptaglot Senior Member France Joined 4640 days ago 991 posts - 1896 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, French, Romansh, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Catalan, Latin, Greek, Romanian | Message 5 of 9 05 April 2012 at 10:55am | IP Logged | ||
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Yes, in British English you usually write 25/3/2005 or "25 March 2005", without the "th" and no comma. However you can say: I'll meet you on the 25th", meaning that the month is known to both.
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Ygangerg Pentaglot Senior Member United States Joined 5319 days ago 100 posts - 140 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Arabic (Written), Mandarin, French Studies: German | Message 6 of 9 23 April 2012 at 7:48pm | IP Logged | ||
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If you're talking to people who say "March twenty-fifth" when they're speaking, you should write "March 25" or "3/25/2005." "25/3/2005" would be considered quite incorrect in the U.S. I've noticed here in China one tends to go with "2005/3/25."
A pretty safe guideline, as people have mentioned above, is to be sure to know whether you're corresponding with someone in the Americas (mm/dd/yyyy) or Europe (dd/mm/yyyy). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Spanky Senior Member Canada Joined 5957 days ago 1021 posts - 1714 votes Studies: French | Message 7 of 9 24 April 2012 at 12:06am | IP Logged | ||
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In Canada, there appears AFAIK to be a lack of complete concensus about the 3/25/2005 or 25/3/2005 format in government, business, education or real life.
It is an easy matter to figure out if one of the first two numbers is greater than 12, but for example standing frozen by indecision on April 23, 2012 with a can-opener in one hand and in the other hand a can of tuna with a stamped expiry date of 03/09/2012 quickly transforms into an exciting game of botulism roulette (and hence I believe the ISO for expiry dates now utilizes a two character alphabetic system for months (ie. either 03 SE 2012 or 9 MR 2012). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tibbles Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5192 days ago 245 posts - 422 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Korean | Message 8 of 9 24 April 2012 at 7:22am | IP Logged | ||
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The reason that Americans write mm/dd/yy is because that's the way we tend to say dates in everyday speech, as in July 4th. It is also acceptable in the US to say the day first, provided that it is followed by "of", as in Fourth of July.
That's one of the great things about Chinese. It orders things biggest to smallest, be they dates or street addresses. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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