I started a Preposition Guide for non-native English speakers.

Question

When writing in English as a non-native speaker one of the difficulties I encounter are prepositions that are used in a less literal sense, like at an address, in a city, etc. These prepositions are often different in different languages.

A nice example is 'in the street' vs 'on the street'. In Dutch the meaning of those are completely opposite. In the street (in de straat) in Dutch means 'in the area of the street', e.g. in a house along the street. In English this would be 'on the street'. While on the street (op de straat) in Dutch means 'on top of the asphalt of the street', which is 'in the street' in English.

I started this guide to help non-native English speakers with these kind of prepositions. It should be expanded to include other places that are used in texts.

Help and corrections are appreciated.

Comments

Unfortunately, not all English speakers speak the same English language.  I am thinking here of US English and English English.  For example:

"in behalf of" (US) versus "on behalf of" (English)

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I'm US and I never say "in behalf of"; I always say "on behalf of". Never heard of "in behalf of"...

Answer 1

Just to add to the confusion, as I notice Ros has already commented while I was typing this, American English and British English don't always use prepositions in the same way. Your guide looks more like American English to me, since as an Englishman I would normally say "He lives in West Street" not "He lives on West Street", which sounds very American. "He lives on West Street" would also be used in England for a homeless person who lives on the streets, mostly in West Street! See for example the discussion at https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/54251/on-an-american-street-but-in-a-british-one-do-the-twain-ever-meet.

The intersection example is also quite American, as in England I would mostly say "She lives on the corner of Church Street". If the road met more than one other road then I would say "She lives on the corner of Church Street and Main Street". If I read "She lived at Main Street and Church Street" then I would interpret that as meaning that for a while she lived in Main Street, then she moved house and lived in Church Street!