"That's a great deal to make one word mean," Alice said in a thoughtful tone. "When I make a word do a lot of work like that," said Humpty Dumpty, "I always pay it extra."

Tuesday 20 August 2013

Phatic

  In linguistics, a phatic expression is one whose only function is to perform a social task, as opposed to conveying information. An example might be the use of 'Eh' at the end of a sentence - "What do think, eh?"

3 comments:

  1. Does the ubiquitous and annoying "you know" at the end of every phrase also count? If so, is there a way to have it struck from the language?

    Whether it counts as a phatic or not, i'd vote to remove that one.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It certainly does count and I couldn't agree more. It is particularly popular in parts of Liverpool and it makes me cringe.

      Delete
  2. Scriptor,
    That's pretty Canadian, eh.
    Well done!
    McG

    ReplyDelete