"Now, [was] 'So, about this message...'"

[James Smith]

I begin about half my spoken sentences with "well". Do
you have a problem with that?  Well, do you?





--- "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET> wrote:

> At 10/26/2006 10:04 AM, Charles Doyle wrote:
> >...
> >Only in the last year or two have I begun noticing
> on TV that nearly
> >every response to a question from an interviewer or
> anchorman
> >begins, "Well, . . ."  Has that always been
> happening?  Now, when an
> >answer DOESN'T begin with "well," it sounds abrupt,
> curt, blunt, or
> >unthoughtful.
>
> In the last two or three years I have begun noticing
> on TV that
> nearly every news reporter begins one or more
> sentences with "Now,
> ..."  (My recollection is that I first noticed it in
> one local news
> reporter, in Boston.  Then it spread, like the
> throat distemper, to
> the other reporters and the other local stations,;
> it has recently
> appeared on network news broadcasts, uttered by
> non-local
> reporters.)  Now, when a sentence DOES begins with
> "now", it sounds
> unthoughtful.
>
> Joel
>
>
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> The American Dialect Society -
> http://www.americandialect.org
>


James D. SMITH                 |If history teaches anything
South SLC, UT                  |it is that we will be sued
jsmithjamessmith at yahoo.com     |whether we act quickly and decisively
                               |or slowly and cautiously.



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The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org