Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 42. You're listening to English as a Second Language podcast number 42. I'm Dr. Jeff McQuillen from the Center for Educational Development. Coming to you today from Los Angeles, California. Visit our website for more information about this podcast at www .eslpod .com Today we are going to talk about writing a formal email message. and what some of the expressions that we use in more formal writing. This could be for business
or this could be for school. Today we're going to use a school example. Let's get started. Dear Dr. Lee I don't know if you'll remember me, but I introduced myself to you after your keynote at last week's conference. As I mentioned to you, I have read all of your journal papers and I am a great admirer of your research. Your article in the top journal, Language Learning, was groundbreaking. The reason I am contacting you is that I would like to come to your university to study with
you. I met some of your students at the conference. and they couldn't stop singing your praises as a professor and as an advisor. I don't know if you are accepting any new students for the next year, but if so, I hope you will consider me. I have included two attachments to this email. I am sending a copy of my CV and I am also including a research paper I completed this year. I hope that these will give you an idea of my qualifications
and experience. Please let me know if you need more information or more samples of my academic work. It was a pleasure and a privilege to meet you at the conference and I hope to hear more about your research at a future conference. We listened today to a formal email by Lucy. I want to talk first about some of the expressions that we use in a formal letter or a formal email. The format or the way a formal email is organized
is very similar to a formal letter. The difference is that when you have a paper letter that you send someone, you include your physical address where you are as well as the date. In a formal email, we usually just begin with the title or name of the person. A title is something like Mr. or Mrs. or Doctor. Lucy begins her email by saying Dear Dr. Lee. Dr. Lee is the person she's writing. Dear is a common expression we
use to begin a letter. After writing Dear Dr. Lee, you can put a comma or you can put a colon to A colon is, you probably know, one dot above the other, like two periods stacked one on top of the other. If it's a formal letter, we usually use a colon. If it's an informal letter, we usually use a comma, at least in the United States. Lucy begins her email by saying, to Dr. Lee, I don't know if you'll remember me, but I introduced
myself to you after your keynote. That first expression, I don't know if you'll remember me, we use a lot when we have met someone, perhaps a long time ago, and now we are trying to write them or talk to them again. We start by saying, I'm not sure if you'll remember me. I don't know if you'll remember me. The idea here is that we're being a little humble. We are not assuming. We're not thinking that the other person will
remember us because we're so important. So to be more humble, to have a little more humility, we would say, I don't know if you'll remember me. Lucy said that she introduced herself to Dr. Lee after her keynote at last week's conference. A keynote in business or in the university is a formal address. It's a formal speech that someone gives to a large group of people. Usually we have a keynote at a conference. A conference
is a big meeting. where many people come together to talk about something they're all interested in, for business or for university related topics. There can also be political conferences. Any big meeting of people where you have lots of different speeches and speakers is often called
a conference. Lucy then says, as I mentioned to you this expression as I mentioned to you we used to remind the other person of the conversation we had you could also say as we discussed and then go on and say what you discussed what you are doing here is reminding the other person of what your previous conversation or communication was. We often use in a formal business letter if we are responding to a question or a request from someone for information, we use the expression
per your request, per PER. per your request, comma, I'm sending you the catalog that you wanted me to send you. So when we respond to someone's request, we use that expression per your request, in a business letter particularly. Lucy said that she had read all of Dr. Lee's journal papers Journal papers are scientific publications in an academic or university research magazine. A journal is a type of magazine. Research, you already know, are scientific investigations.
People who do research, like on medical research, you can do economic research and so forth. Lucy mentioned she had read an article by Dr. Lee in a top journal. When we say something, use the adjective top, we mean one of the best. He is a top basketball player, means he's one of the best basketball players there is. Lucy said in her second paragraph, the reason I am contacting you is that and Then she went on to say why she
was contacting or communicating with dr. Lee This is again a common expression that we use in American business letters or formal letters of any sort Letters in English are very direct In some countries, in some languages, we use a lot of different phrases and sentences before we get to the main reason why we are writing. But in American English, in particularly business English or formal English, we get right to the
point. We get right to the main reason. And we say, the reason I am writing you is that I want you to do something, for example. You can also say I am contacting you to ask you for a favor. Lucy says the reason I am contacting you is that I would like to come to your university to study with you. So she states the reason for her letter
very soon after the beginning. The first part or first paragraph of the letter or email here, it's an email, she reminds Dr. Lee that they met before and then she says, here's why I'm writing you. Lucy used the expression in her email that The students of Dr. Lee couldn't stop singing her praises. To sing someone's praises means to compliment them, to talk about how wonderful
they are. My father was singing my praises to my uncle saying he was Saying some wonderful things about me Probably not true, but there you go Another expression that Lucy used several times in the email is I hope She says at the end of the second paragraph. I hope you will consider me I hope that is a polite way of asking or requesting something from another person. And she uses that a couple of different times. In the third paragraph of her email, Lucy says
that she has included two attachments. This word attachments is a special word for email. An attachment you probably know is a document or a file, an electronic file that you put onto an email to send someone else. It could be a Microsoft Word document. It could be an MP3 audio file. We call all those things attachments and you include an attachment with your email. or to your email. Lucy said she was sending the professor a copy of her CV. CV, the letter C and the letter V,
stands for curriculum vitae. And a curriculum vitae is a Latin word. It means a list of your jobs and experiences and education. We often sometimes use the word resume. A CV and a resume are basically the same thing. Lucy sends her CV because she wants to give Dr. Lee an idea of her qualifications and experience. To give someone an idea means to give them information. I want to give you an idea of how cold it is in Minnesota. It means I want to give you information
about how cold it is. Lucy says at the end of her third paragraph, Please let me know if you need more information. Please let me know is a polite formal way telling the other person that it's okay for them to call you or email you to get more information. A similar expression would be feel free to call me or feel free to email. That means I want you to or it's okay for you to email or contact me in some way. Lucy
also uses the expression academic work. Academic work are publications, articles, research articles that a university person, a professor would publish, would put into a journal. Lucy closes her letter or her email by saying It was a pleasure and a privilege. This is again a formal expression. It is a pleasure to something that is a pleasure. It means it was good to you. You felt it was good. A privilege is a special opportunity that
only a small number of people get to have. It is a privilege to meet the Secretary General of the United Nations. Very few people get to meet him or her, and that's a special opportunity. We call that a privilege. It's always a good thing. So Lucy uses the expression, it was a pleasure and a privilege to meet you. And she says, I hope to hear more about your research. Once again, that expression, I hope to, I hope something. It's a formal way of saying that I
would like to, I am looking forward to. Lucy closes her email by saying, sincerely, comma, and then her name. Sincerely is how we close a letter or an email, a formal email. You can also use the word cordially. Cordially, comma, and then your name. Of course, in an email, you don't sign the email. You don't put your signature like you would on a letter. You just state your name or put your name. That's going to do it for today's English as a Second Language podcast.
Remember the scripts for our podcasts are now available on your iTunes feed or on our website. Email us and tell us who you are and where you are listening from. We would love to hear from you. Our email address is eslpod at eslpod .com. I'm Jeff McQuillan from Los Angeles, California. We'll see you next time on ESL Podcast. This podcast is copyright 2005.