外教微课 | 072-外教教你学习英语中的礼貌用语
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Does your coworker have "a bun in the oven"? Has your boss "let himself go"? In this lesson, you will learn some expressions that people often use to say things indirectly in order to sound more polite or less rude. What can you do to avoid using words like "toilet", "dead", or "fat"? Watch this video to learn some interesting alternatives to these words and more.
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Transcript
Hi again. Welcome back to www.engvid.com. I'm Adam. Today's lesson is a little bit interesting. I'll give you a little bit of a background first of all. English speakers, and this is a very cultural part of English... And remember, culture plays a lot... Has a big role when it comes to language. A lot of speakers, in English, don't want to say certain words. For some reason, they think this word is dirty or heavy, or they just don't like this word, so we find soft expressions. We find other ways to say the same thing that everybody understands, everybody from the culture understands. It may be a little bit difficult for non-native English speakers to understand these expressions, so today we're going to look at a few. There are many, many such expressions. We're just going to look at a few for today.
Firstly, these soft expressions are also called euphemisms. You don't need to know this word. If you want to look up more expressions, type: "euphemisms" into your search box on the internet, and you'll see many more.
I'm just going to give you a few to give you an example of what a euphemism is. And when you watch Hollywood movies or TV shows, if you hear these expressions, now hopefully, you will understand what they mean.
So we're going to start with: "passed away" which is very common. I think many of you probably know this expression. Or: "did not make it". So if you go to the hospital, your friend was in a car accident, and you bring him to the hospital or the ambulance brings him to the hospital, and he's in there for a while, and then you see the doctor. And you go to the doctor: "How's my friend?" And the doctor says: "Oh, I'm sorry. He didn't make it." What does that mean? Or: "I'm sorry. He passed away." What does that mean? It means he died. Now, why people don't like to say the word "died", well, it's a very heavy word. Death, people don't like to talk about death, so they find other ways to say the same thing. Okay?
Now, all of these are not bad things, but you know, we just want to soften the language. We want to be a bit more polite sometimes. If you want, if you're in the washroom and you want... Sorry, if you're in the restaurant and you want the washroom, but you don't want to say the word "washroom" or you don't want to say the word "toilet", you say... If you're a boy, you say, or a man, you say: "Where's the little boys' room?" If you're a woman: "Where's the ladies' room?" Now, we understand all this to be toilet. But people think "toilet" is a dirty word. They don't like to say the word "toilet", so they say: "Little boys' room", or: "Ladies' room". Okay?
Now, sometimes you'll see people in a wheelchair. Maybe they had an accident, maybe they were born this way, but they can't walk. They're in a wheelchair. Or you see people who have a... Who were born with a disease, and they're not, you know, they're not fully functional like everyone else. We used to say: "handicapped". But people find this word to be a little bit offensive, and so it's not politically correct; it's not a nice thing to say. So now, we say: "They are mentally challenged." Or: "They are physically challenged." It used to be: "handicapped" or: "disabled". But people don't want to say "disabled" because they think or they know that these people are very able, they can do many things; they're just limited. Okay? They are challenged by their condition. So they are mentally challenged or they are physically challenged is a more polite way to say it.
Okay, so now, we're going to look at the next expressions. If you want to talk about a man or a woman, and the not polite way to talk about them is to say: "He or she is fat", big. So, people don't like the word "fat". So, for a more polite way or a softer way to say "fat" for a woman is: "She is full-figured." Full-figured means she's complete. She's full in all the places, and that's what we say. A man, we're a little bit less nice to men. A man has "let himself go". Means he stopped taking care of himself, and became fat. Okay? Again, not a nice word, but not necessarily a very nice expression either, but it's softer. It's not as direct, but everybody understands what this means.
Now, if you have a friend or you have a family member and he says that... Or you introduce him as being "laid off" or "between jobs", this is a more polite, a softer way to say he is unemployed. It means he doesn't have a job. He's looking for a job. He's being laid off. "Laid off" is a nicer way to say "fired". He lost his job. So, if somebody's between jobs, they are unemployed. People don't like to say they are unemployed; everybody has a certain judgment about that, so they say they're between jobs or they're looking for something. Same idea. Now we get into a little bit more fun expressions. So, for example: oh, I have a new iPad. Only $ . Brand new. And somebody says: -"Oh. How did you get it so cheap?" -"Oh", I said: "I got it off the back of a truck." or: "It fell off the back of a truck." In British English, they would say: "lorry". "Lorry" means truck. If somebody tells you they got something off the back of the truck... Sorry, it's also the back of the truck. It means it is stolen.
So you didn't buy it from the store; you bought it on the street. Somebody had a truck, you paid them cash, they give you the product. It was stolen somewhere. You don't care. You have a brand new product for less than half the price. So, "off the back of the truck", "fell off", it was stolen. If something... Oh, sorry. Let me make sure we understand that these are here. Now, when... It used to be a long time ago that when you bought a car, you could buy a brand new car or you could buy a used car. But then, eventually, people started not to like the word "used". "Used" means somebody else used it, had it for its good time, and then got rid of it. So marketing departments got smart, and they started using a different expression to mean used. "Previously enjoyed". Somebody else enjoyed this thing, now you can enjoy it too. It's still used. It still has , kilometers on it, it still has a cigarette hole in the seat, but it was previously enjoyed. Now it's your turn to enjoy it.
Okay, the next expression we have is, for example, if you see someone in your office, a co-worker, she comes to work and her stomach is a little bit bigger. Then the next week, it's a little bit bigger, a little bit bigger, but the rest of her is staying slim. So you say: "Oh, you know, I think she might have a bun in the oven." A "bun in the oven" means pregnant. Now, if you're in high school, for example, and one of your classmates, she's like or , and same thing, her stomach's getting bigger, then we say: "You know what? I think she's knocked up." "Knocked up" also means pregnant, but this is more slang, and it's a little bit more of a negative idea. Okay? So it's not necessarily softer. It's saying the same thing, pregnant, but it's a bit of a negative connotation to it. So be careful about using that one. But just so you know what it means. Now, again, like I said before, there are many, many, many such expressions in the English language. Look them up online. And if you want, you can always come and ask me a question in the comments section at www.engvid.com. You can also come test your knowledge of these ones with the quiz. Don't forget to subscribe to my YouTube channel, and come see us again very soon. Bye.
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