“How Are You?” is Sometimes More Than a Question

Hi there, you have A Way with Words.

Hello, this is Ego from Northbrook, Illinois.

Hi Ego, welcome.

What can we do for you?

Having been born in Amsterdam and then moved to Japan and then coming to the States, I’ve always been curious about language.

And about 30 years ago when I first came to the U.S. for undergrad, I realized whenever people would ask me,

How are you? And I start to explain how my life has been or how that weekend has been.

People would start to just lose interest and walk away. I have heard from other people from

Different countries, similar experiences. And this is probably something natural of how a language

Evolves. And my question is, well, at some point at the beginning, was it actually meant

To ask how people are doing? As a proof of that, is there been something in any literature,

Old English, where a conversation is described and the person who answers that actually

Answers more than just, I am doing well or I’m doing fine.

Ego, I’m curious what your experience was with greetings before you came to the U.S.

Well, I don’t remember my days in Holland anymore. I was nine when I left. And in Japan,

There is not an equivalent, so to speak, for how are you expecting the answer to be just a short answer.

Yeah, there’s not the polite conversation.

Well, just a greeting would be, yes, of course, there will be a greeting, right?

Konnichiwa or ohayabuzaimasu.

Right.

But it’s not asking how you are doing.

But you have got to think a little further beyond that.

If you say konnichiwa and you mean good day, do you actually, do they mean to tell you that it is a good day?

Are they wishing you a good day?

I mean, it still is the same kind of speech.

And we have a name for that, for the how are you and the konnichiwa.

They’re all phatic speech, P-H-A-T-I-C.

Well, one of the best definitions I’ve seen calls it speech used as a social cement that relies heavily on stereotyped language.

But it’s not necessarily empty speech or hollow words.

This kind of speech communicates ideas or feelings rather than direct information.

So it’s got some use.

And so we don’t need to look to the historical record to say, well, did they originally once mean it?

When they say, how are you, did people used to actually reply with information?

Because it doesn’t matter.

Most languages have some kind of phatic speech to one degree or another, although some have more and some have less.

It has to do with about how they treat politeness and honorifics and respect in their language and in their culture.

So there’s so much happening with language like that.

When you go to the grocery store and you have a conversation with the clerk, how are you can say that you’re sociable?

And if you reply back, I’m fine, thank you, it communicates that you are sociable too.

And this is important information between two human animals.

That is so interesting because when somebody says, well, I’m doing fine, answers it in that way, I actually feel the opposite that, oh, that person is just going through the motions rather than being interested in a conversation.

And they may be just going through the motions, but the important thing here is you have given them an out.

So what’s happened here is you have allowed them not to answer the question because they didn’t want to.

And you’ve participated in a societal agreement where you have done the conventional thing of asking them how they are.

And they’ve done the conventional thing of replying, I’m fine.

And you didn’t demand a real explanation of them, which might make them uncomfortable or might make an awkward situation or might make them have to tell more than they want to.

And this is important that you give somebody, you make somebody comfortable.

You gave them an opportunity to be comfortable and they took it.

Interesting.

Well, I keep a list of things that make me realize when I notice I have been Americanized.

And one of them is when I just answer, I am doing fine or I’m good.

That sounds like an interesting list, Ego. You’ll have to call us back with more of those.

Yeah, it does sound like a really good list. I want to point out that there’s an English linguist

Named Walter Redfern. He’s the guy whose definition of phatic speech I kind of quoted earlier.

And he also talks about on those occasions when we don’t have this kind of

The social cement, the social conversational cement, we miss it. When we don’t have it,

We feel uncomfortable and we’re not quite sure why. And there are occasions where we expect it

And it can feel wrong or appropriate not to use it, like funerals or times of crisis or disaster,

Or when we’re writing letters of protest or letters of reference. So these are occasions where

The formulaic conventional speech is sometimes more appropriate than saying the original thing

Or the really trying to break free from the almost cliche of the situation.

Well, I got to say, it’s good to talk to you, Ego, and I really appreciate you taking the time.

And we’d love to hear from you again about your experience as a multilingual person in the U.S. and Japan and wherever.

Call us again sometime, all right?

Okay. Thank you so much.

All right. Take care.

Bye-bye.

All right. Bye.

Martha, you can sum it all up by saying that fatic speech is what Anatole Broyard called friendly noise.

Friendly noise. I love that. Friendly noise.

Well, if you’ve got a question about words and language or fatic expressions, give us a call, 877-929-9673.

Or we’d love to read about your experiences in email.

The address is words@waywordradio.org.