Lots of people learn English at school

but textbooks can't keep up with real-life English

So today I wanted to tell you about

five words and phrases that are outdated

I hear lots of people still using these words

Do you too? You can tell me in the comments

The first word I've heard students use,

which is not used so often anymore, is 'seldom'

'Seldom', meaning not often or not frequently.

So in the past, this word was used more often,

but these days, you're not really gonna hear

people say 'seldom' in speaking.

It has the feeling of being very kind of posh,

but in an outdated kind of way.

So I would say to not use the word seldom,

instead you can say 'rarely'

'I rarely do something'

So yeah, instead of seldom, you can say, rarely.

Next, we have the question, 'how do you do?'

Which again has the feeling of being a very

well-spoken traditional English gentlemen.

'How do you do?'

Yeah, people don't really speak like that anymore,

Instead you can say, 'how are you?'

So in a previous video,

I was mentioning cultural differences,

and I mentioned how in the UK people often say,

"How are you?"

Which is similar to (Chinese)

And some people commented saying,

"Can you say, how do you do?"

But that's not really used so often anymore.

Again, that's quite old-fashioned, outdated.

So just say, 'how are you?'

That's fine. Or 'how's it going?'

'Hey, what's up?'

Something like that.

Then we've got the word, the web.

So previously, maybe 10 or 20 years ago,

people would say, "the web" for the internet.

Which is short for, like website, the World Wide Web.

People don't say 'web' anymore.

They say 'internet'

Yeah, so that's an outdated word.

You might still see it occasionally

but just so you know,

in speaking people don't really say the web anymore.

They say the internet instead.

Then we have 'courting', 'to court' someone.

Which is sort of like,

(Chinese)

Like pursuing or trying to woo someone.

This word 'courting'

Again maybe it was used in the past,

but it's not used anymore.

In fact, the concept of courting someone,

is also a little bit outdated.

Like I said in my dating video,

even though it still might mostly be the guy

who pursues the girl, it's becoming less

and less clear-cut like that.

So you wouldn't really say 'he's pursuing her'

You might say 'he likes her'

or 'he's interested in her'

or maybe 'he wants to ask her out'

or 'he wants to go out with her'

And it can be the other way as well.

'To go out with someone' in British English

can mean just to go outside with friends,

but it can also mean they are in a relationship.

So instead of 'courting', you could maybe say 'pursuing'

but it's better to say,

'she likes him'

or 'she's interested in him',

or 'she wants to go out with him'.

And the last one is mother or grandmother.

So you definitely will have seen these words in textbooks.

And they're technically correct.

There's nothing wrong with them

It's that, in speaking,

people don't really say mother or grandmother so often.

Most people say 'mum'

Grandmother can be different ones depending on the person.

Some people say 'grandma',

some people say 'grannie',

some people say 'nan'.

Those are the most common ones.

So me for example,

I had one grandma on one side of the family

and one we called granny on the other side.

And I think that was to distinguish

between the two, which one is which.

'Grandmother' would sound sort of outdated, yeah.

People don't really say that, especially in speaking.

You might see it written down,

but yeah, that's just mother

and grandmother can be mum or grandma, grannie, nan.

So that's pretty much all I wanted to mention today.

I hope there hasn't been too much sound getting in the way

'cause I am outside.

It's a lovely day today.

and thanks for watching, see you next time!