Re: So, is there a new use of so?

[RonButters at AOL.COM]

In a message dated 1/2/06 8:44:36 PM, zwicky at CSLI.STANFORD.EDU writes:


> in the examples above it announces that some new discourse chunk is
> beginning; in both examples that chunk is a narrative (personal
> narrative in the first case, joke in the second).  it's also a kind
> of attention-getting device.
> 
> some people use it at the very beginning of a talk, where it says
> "i'm starting now".  jim mccawley used to use it this way, and he
> also used "ok" with the same function.  those uses were unfamiliar
> enough to me that they caught my attention.  but starting stories
> with "so" is entirely natural for me.
> 

1. ''So'' can also signal the RETURN to some previous topic after a 
substantial length of time in which the speaker and hearer may even have been separated 
spatially:

Speaker A: "I'll get back to you about your test results in a couple of 
weeks." 

---- [a month passes].

Speaker B: "So how about those test results that you promised to report to me 
about?"

Under these circumstances, "OK" would also be possible, but it sounds rather 
impatient to me.

2. I don't find "So" or "OK" unusual as the way to begin a class lecture, 
perhaps because "so" signals the continuation of a previous discussion. For me, 
"OK" is an informal way of getting down to business. The 1970s were an informal 
era for young college professors, and it didn't seem surprising to me to hear 
my youthful colleagues using either "So" or "OK" in this way. It would 
perhaps have seemed odd coming from Chomsky or McDavid or Hockett.