Two things come to mind: my Anglo-Saxon prof telling us "Seamus Heaney translated 'hwæt,' which means..."hwæt"...as 'so,' and he got beat up for that;" and John McWhorter's discussion of the "meaningless do" in Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue.
Good article in The Telegraph. A marker, yes, but perhaps not entirely useless. It often indicates 'something is coming/has been said of import' ('So - we shall have to see what happens...') or as a preliminary to ending a conversation. 'So - great to see you, must be off now.'
Another word that is actually useless, and doesn't even sound very nice: got.
ReplyDeleteTwo things come to mind: my Anglo-Saxon prof telling us "Seamus Heaney translated 'hwæt,' which means..."hwæt"...as 'so,' and he got beat up for that;" and John McWhorter's discussion of the "meaningless do" in Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue.
ReplyDeleteGood article in The Telegraph. A marker, yes, but perhaps not entirely useless. It often indicates 'something is coming/has been said of import' ('So - we shall have to see what happens...') or as a preliminary to ending a conversation. 'So - great to see you, must be off now.'
ReplyDelete