Overused and empty words

[bostonman]

I fucking hate "How are you? "How's is going?" and the like when there is no real interest in the answer. You aren't greeting me with those questions. You're asking me a question. Why would you ask a question if you didn't want the answer? Just say Hi. I don't need you to care about my life if you're the cashier at a store, I just need you to make proper change.

 

Yes - but that seems to be a universal thing, not just in English. The languages I know all have greetings that are similar to that. And I think it's always understood that it's colloquial for "hi" - that a literal answer to "how are you" is not really the point.

[gallahadesquire]

There are many words in English that are imported directly from another language, but have acquired a different pronunciation here, even British English words that are pronounced differently by Americans (e.g., think "clerk" pronounced by a New Yorker and a Londoner). Proper names are another "issue" (see Mike Carey's explanation above). I watch a lot of tennis on tv, and I cringe when I hear the American and British commentators' pronunciation of the players' non-English names.

 

Howard Cosell was announcing the location of the following week's broadcast of women's gymnastics, coming from Deh Plane, Illinois. [it's spelled Des Plaines and like so much bastardized Midwestern French, pronounced Des Plains. SImilarly, Joliet, not Jo-lee-ey.]

[gallahadesquire]

You are right, @Tarte Gogo. Do not pronounce the last consonant in French words, except if it is followed by an E which, in many cases, indicates that the word changes to feminine. Example: petit (small in masculine gender) is pronounced PETEE, but petite (small in feminine) becomes PETEET. A final E is not pronounced either, except if it has a written accent on it, like in aimé, santé....The first word in your handle is therefore pronounced TART.

 

BTW, I am a native French speaker.

 

It's been awhile, but sung French is an entirely different beast entirely. ALL of the final '-e"s are pronounced.

"Margherite" becomes Mar-gher-i-tuh"

[whipped guy]

I understand "heirloom." In the US, we think there are 3 kinds of tomatoes - big red ones, medium red ones, small red ones. There's traditionally been a limited selection of produce - one kind of corn, a few kinds of apples, a small variety of potato. The idea that someone out there is researching, learning, acquiring, and growing these heirloom fruits/vegetables (not a botanical thing, but that's another post) makes me want to appreciate, learn, and enjoy.

 

I fucking hate "How are you? "How's is going?" and the like when there is no real interest in the answer. You aren't greeting me with those questions. You're asking me a question. Why would you ask a question if you didn't want the answer? Just say Hi. I don't need you to care about my life if you're the cashier at a store, I just need you to make proper change.

Yes - but that seems to be a universal thing, not just in English. The languages I know all have greetings that are similar to that. And I think it's always understood that it's colloquial for "hi" - that a literal answer to "how are you" is not really the point.

When a cashier etc. greets me with a "How's it going?" or something similar I usually respond with, "I'm hanging in there!" Then usually add, "As long as it doesn't involve a bungee jump I'll survive!" That often elicits a laugh and I then add, "And I ain't jumpining out of an airplane either!"

 

Regarding tomatoes, I'll take the big juicy red ones any day of the week... I always grow Jet Stars. I really never met an heirloom tomato that I really liked taste-wise. Though they always look interesting regarding shape and coloration. So more if a visual thing. Same for corn.

[OCClient]

Using preventative when preventive was the original adjective drives me nuts.

Are you taking any preventative measures to avoid performance gaps?

We say corrective action, and so we also say preventive action, not preventative action. But with increased usage, preventative has becoming an accepted adjective.

 

Hope you are all having a proactive weekend. I brought work home. Trying to figure out how my team will get to the next level.

[rvwnsd]

Howard Cosell was announcing the location of the following week's broadcast of women's gymnastics, coming from Deh Plane, Illinois. [it's spelled Des Plaines and like so much bastardized Midwestern French, pronounced Des Plains. SImilarly, Joliet, not Jo-lee-ey.]

Just like Paso Robles, CA which locals pronounce "Pass-oh Robe-els" and, of course, "pierogi," which everyone pronounces as "per-oh-gey" despite its correct Polish pronunciation "pye-rahw-gey"

[+ Charlie]

Yes - but that seems to be a universal thing, not just in English. The languages I know all have greetings that are similar to that. And I think it's always understood that it's colloquial for "hi" - that a literal answer to "how are you" is not really the point.

.

I fucking hate "How are you? "How's is going?" and the like when there is no real interest in the answer. You aren't greeting me with those questions. You're asking me a question. Why would you ask a question if you didn't want the answer? Just say Hi. I don't need you to care about my life if you're the cashier at a store, I just need you to make proper change.

For example, the typical German greeting "Wie geht's?" translates as "How's it going?"

[rvwnsd]

...I fucking hate "How are you? "How's is going?" and the like when there is no real interest in the answer. You aren't greeting me with those questions. You're asking me a question. Why would you ask a question if you didn't want the answer? Just say Hi. I don't need you to care about my life if you're the cashier at a store, I just need you to make proper change.

I typically say "Hi, how are you?" because I want to know how the person is doing. Of course, that opens me up to folks who, in blistering detail and great lengths, tell me.

[bigvalboy]

I fucking hate "How are you? "How's is going?" and the like when there is no real interest in the answer. You aren't greeting me with those questions. You're asking me a question. Why would you ask a question if you didn't want the answer? Just say Hi. I don't need you to care about my life if you're the cashier at a store, I just need you to make proper change.

 

I understand your disdain, so long as you blame corporate, not the employee. Most companies force employees to give that specific greeting. Failure to do so often comes with consequences. When I get a "How are you" or "How's it going" I realize that the employee, who has to greet hundreds of people a day, doesn't really care about me, but I try to respond with a little humor or something to make them smile. These moments, however brief, are often a win win all the way around.

[whipped guy]

Using preventative when preventive was the original adjective drives me nuts.

Are you taking any preventative measures to avoid performance gaps?

We say corrective action, and so we also say preventive action, not preventative action. But with increased usage, preventative has becoming an accepted adjective.

 

Hope you are all having a proactive weekend. I brought work home. Trying to figure out how my team will get to the next level.

DITTO!

I always hated the pre-ven-ta-tive word! Prevention was something quite important in my line of work and we always took pre-ven-tive measures. Then they suddenly added an extra syllable!!! For what reason I'll never know! It always made the word seem redundant as in too much of a good thing to me, but such is "progress"! Or is that progression... no that's music as in harmonic progressions... but give it time...

[gallahadesquire]

As I am usually in an Electric Convenience Vehicle these days (our local Wegman's is over 138,000 square feet: "Bigger than two football fields"), being asked "How's it going?" requires either "Better than I look!" or "Very well, thank you, and how are you?"

 

On old Mad Magazine cartoon had the following caption, for a photo of a very ill-appearing man in a hospital bed:

 

Doctor: "And how are we today?"

Patient: "Well, between the way I feel, and the way you look, I'd say we're in pretty bad shape."

 

BTW: Disney World is no longer quite so accommodating to those of us in Electric Vehicles. The vehicles themselves, however, are quite a delightful alternative to standing in line. Still have to wait? It's your park. I might as well enjoy it.

 

We were at a loss one night, about a year and a half ago, for finding "fast food" anywhere at Disney Market Place. Cold (like the 40's), tired, and hungry, I went to a cross walk. My roommate (who is 5'1" and about 110) climbed on the back of the Vehicle and proceeded to do his Kate Winslet imitation ala TITANIC as we tooled down the sidewalk. Made more than one Disney employee's night that night.

 

PS to this riff: Play with the Disney employees. As long as one is not rude nor disrespectful, they love it, and will play back. I once asked how to remember the seven Dwarves:

 

"How do you remember them all?"

"Simple! There's 2 D's [Doc and Dopey], 2 S's [sleepy and Sneezy], a B, a G, and an H [bashful, Grumpy, and Happy]."

I asked: "Whatever happened to Sleazy?"

She hit me in the shoulder. It made my day.

 

Last story of the night:

 

My sister and I like to play when we travel. She'll talk to anyone, and he best pickup line was in England, when she went up to a 30's something barkeep (for he sixtieth birthday) and said "You look just like my son!" She pulled out a photo and yup, the barkeep agreed.

 

We were going on the Jungle cruise, which for you un-initiated, looks like The African Queen. This cute little cub was the "guide" on the cruise. We get on board, and my sister shrieks:

"Oh my God! It's the

African Queen!

You

be Humphrey Bogart, and I'll be Katharine Hepburn!"

"Oh, you

always

get to be Katharine Hepburn!

I

want to be be Katharine Hepburn!"

I thought the Cub guide was going to fall off the bow of his boat, he was laughing so hard ... or trying to keep himself from laughing.

 

Ladies and Gentlemen, Boys and Girls, Children of all ages: Enjoy Disney World!

 

Here endeth tonight's randomness.

[mike carey]

In the US, we think there are 3 kinds of tomatoes - big red ones, medium red ones, small red ones.

Don't forget the pear shaped red ones!

[liubit]

For example, the typical German greeting "Wie geht's?" translates as "How's it going?"

The same goes for the normal French greeting "Comment ça va?" or "Comment vas-tu?"

[actor61]

The same goes for the normal French greeting "Comment ça va?" or "Comment vas-tu?"

Which often get shortened to "Va bien?" or "Tu vas?" Kind of the French versions of "Ssup?"

[actor61]

Howard Cosell was announcing the location of the following week's broadcast of women's gymnastics, coming from Deh Plane, Illinois. [it's spelled Des Plaines and like so much bastardized Midwestern French, pronounced Des Plains. SImilarly, Joliet, not Jo-lee-ey.]

And Des Moins!

[gp0560]

Phatic expression

In linguistics, a phatic expression /ˈfætᵻk/ is communication which serves a social function such as small talk and social pleasantries that don't seek or offer any information of value. For example, greetings such as "hello" and "how are you?" are phatic expressions.

Understanding

The utterance of a phatic expression is a kind of speech act. According to Malinowski, even such apparently "purposeless" communication as polite small talk, like "how are you?" or "have a nice day," even though its content may be trivial or irrelevant to the situation, performs the important function of establishing, maintaining, and managing bonds of sociality between participants.

 

In speech communication the term means "small talk" (conversation for its own sake) and has also been called "grooming talking."

 

English

For example: "You're welcome" is not intended to convey the message that the hearer is welcome; it is a phatic response to being thanked, which in turn is a phatic whose function is to acknowledge the receipt of a benefit.

 

Similarly, the question "how are you?" is usually an automatic component of a social encounter. Although there are times when "how are you?" is asked in a sincere, concerned manner and does in fact anticipate a detailed response regarding the respondent's present state, this needs to be pragmatically inferred from context and intonation.

 

The following is a specific example of the former: a simple, basic exchange between two acquaintances in a non-formal environment.

 

Speaker one: "What's up? (US English. In UK English this means "is there something wrong?")

 

Speaker two: "Hey, how's it going?"

 

Conversely:

 

Speaker one: "Alright? (UK English. In US English this means "is there something wrong?")

 

Speaker two: "You alright."

 

Neither speaker expects an actual answer to the question. Much like a shared nod, it is an indication that each has recognized the other's presence and has therefore sufficiently performed that particular social duty.

 

 

Extracted from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phatic_expression.

[bostonman]

Great post gp. I took some linguistics courses in college and I don't remember covering phatic expression, but it reminds me a lot of similar things we did cover, like our use of "filler" words and sound (like "um") to avoid silence in speech and conversation. We say a lot of things and give off a lot of language-oriented cues to help a conversation along that are otherwise not meant to be understood literally.

[gp0560]

not meant to be understood literally.

 

Precisely.

Edited July 23, 2017 by gp0560

[actor61]

Great post gp. I took some linguistics courses in college and I don't remember covering phatic expression, but it reminds me a lot of similar things we did cover, like our use of "filler" words and sound (like "um") to avoid silence in speech and conversation. We say a lot of things and give off a lot of language-oriented cues to help a conversation along that are otherwise not meant to be understood literally.

The filler "um" has been replaced by the odious "like". I prefer um.

[gp0560]

The filler "um" has been replaced by the odious "like". I prefer um.

 

Mmmmmm, fer shur.

[+ poolboy48220]

Someone wrote into Miss Manners years ago, mortified that she'd used the term "See you later" to a blind acquaintance. Miss Manners reassured her, she didn't use the word "phatic" (I'm not sure if she knows the word any more than I did until just now), but explained that a great many phrases are meant as just greetings/closings, and not to be taken literally.

[bostonman]

Someone wrote into Miss Manners years ago, mortified that she'd used the term "See you later" to a blind acquaintance. Miss Manners reassured her, she didn't use the word "phatic" (I'm not sure if she knows the word any more than I did until just now), but explained that a great many phrases are meant as just greetings/closings, and not to be taken literally.

 

Some years back, I somehow settled on "take care" as an exit greeting - but the actual implication that I'm hoping the person to whom I'm saying goodbye actually takes care of themselves isn't the point. One also has to wonder how many people who avoid any undue talk of religion and/or who don't like to say "god" in casual conversation (taking the lord's name in vain) also have no problem saying "goodbye" (i.e. god be with you") either because they just don't think about it or that they know it doesn't really mean what it used to mean.

 

On a similar note, I remember a story from years ago where a woman (a receptionist, I think) was fired from her job because she would end conversations with "have a blessed day." But I do have to wonder how many of the people who complained about her "pushing religion on people" also automatically said "bless you" as a default when someone sneezed. The problem is that "bless you" has become benign and meaningless as a phrase, even though it is short for "GOD bless you" (which some people also say in that context).

 

Gesundheit - which literally means health ("to your health" is implied, of course) - is probably a safer way to go, lol.

 

Words can sometimes lose their meaning the more we use them in repetition. One of my goals in being a vocal coach with theatre students and professionals is to make sure that the words that are sung have actual meaning behind them. Often, people performing a song are doing it by rote repetition, and aren't truly thinking about communicating the lyric - but the mark of a good singing actor is to remember that expressing the words is crucial. (This, William, is why I notice when I hear great professionals sing wrong lyrics, lol.) I often make a comparison to things we've learned to recite in our youth, like the Pledge of Allegiance, or the Lord's Prayer, etc. Many of us grew up reciting such things almost every day. Do we ever really think about the meaning of those phrases, or do they just become a pattern? I think most of us would agree it's the latter.

 

(And a shout-out to my mother, though she doesn't read this board, lol - who told me that when she was a kid, she thought the "of thee I sing" lyric in "My Country 'Tis Of Thee," sung every morning when she was in school, was really "of T-I-C" - because that was one of the local radio/TV stations. )

[MikeBiDude]

"That's in (my/our/their) wheelhouse"

[BasketBaller]

One of my goals in being a vocal coach with theatre students and professionals is to make sure that the words that are sung have actual meaning behind them. Often, people performing a song are doing it by rote repetition, and aren't truly thinking about communicating the lyric - but the mark of a good singing actor is to remember that expressing the words is crucial.

 

Last year on a network talent show, a 12 year old girl came on and announced she would sing. The music started and it was the intro to Puccini's "Nessun Dorma," which has apparently become the thing for young girls who sing opera to perform, despite a) it being written for a tenor, and b) the absurdity of a 12 year old girl singing those lyrics. No matter, since when she began to sing (not badly but I believe unwisely to sing that way so young), it was a jumble, phrases out of order, and at least one line that was Italian-ish gibberish. All sung with a tragic, pained expression. There's no way she had any idea what she was singing.

 

The judges loved it.

[TruHart1]

Last year on a network talent show, a 12 year old girl came on and announced she would sing. The music started and it was the intro to Puccini's "Nessun Dorma," which has apparently become the thing for young girls who sing opera to perform, despite a) it being written for a tenor, and b) the absurdity of a 12 year old girl singing those lyrics. No matter, since when she began to sing (not badly but I believe unwisely to sing that way so young), it was a jumble, phrases out of order, and at least one line that was Italian-ish gibberish. All sung with a tragic, pained expression. There's no way she had any idea what she was singing.

 

The judges loved it.

It is kind of scary. I remember seeing Charlotte Church at the beginning of her career and thinking she would end up losing her voice if she continued singing with that technique. Same with Jackie Evancho. Church has gone on to work on her craft, improve her technique and prove me wrong. I feel the jury is still out on Evancho. Neither will ever sing opera as it is sung professionally in opera houses unless they allow singers to be miked such as Linda Ronstadt was in the run of La Bohème on Broadway back in the 1990's!

 

TruHart1