| Functions | Examples |
| expressing gratitude (also when accepting presents, invitations) | Great dinner, thanks. |
| Grand dinner! You’re a genius'. Thanks for most splendid meal! | |
| Thank you for your gift. | |
| Thank you for your splendid gift. I love it! But that’s too much. You shouldn’t have gone to that much expense. | |
| Thanks. I’d love to come. | |
| Sounds great. Thanks for asking. I’d love to come. | |
| complimenting | Your new haircut looks nice. |
| Your new haircut is fantastic. You look simply incredible. | |
| expressing a positive opinion (praising) | I enjoyed the show. |
| The show was terrific! I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was lovely, really. | |
| Well done. | |
| You’ve done a fabulous job! You work miracles. | |
| expressing emphatic agreement | That’s what I was going to say. |
| You took the words out of my mouth. I can’t agree more. | |
| expressing self-criticism | How silly of me to forget the most obvious! |
| What a fool I am! How stupid of me to forget the most obvious! | |
| Maths is not my strong point. | |
| I’m completely pants at maths! It’s just totally doing my head in... |
Task 15. Make the following sentences more polite (indirect). (Choose any 5 sentences).
1. I don’t mean to be nosy, but can you tell me who sang that piece?
2. Oh, it was Jill! She was nice, wasn’t she?
3. That’s what I was thinking. I like her voice.
4. She says she can’t do without singing.
5. Well, she was good in Carmen last spring.
6. I enjoyed the opera.
7. I remember you also sang there. I like your voice. You can sing nicely.
8. No, I’m a bad singer. Besides, singing classics is not my strong point.
9. I was very surprised when they offered me that part.
Task 16. Use overstatement to
a) express your positive opinion on smb’s presentation / a film you’ve seen,
b) compliment your friend praising the way s/he looks / does smth.
EXPANDING MONOSYLLABIC REPLIES
The strategy of keeping the conversation going is aimed at constantly reacting politely to what you are being said so that the talk would not unexpectedly end. Most “dangerous” in this respect are short answers which - incautiously used - might put a full stop to all the previous efforts, and the ensuing silence might cause embarrassment. Monosyllabic yes/no answers should be made more polite by expanding devices based on different ways of emphasising and softening.
Expanding devices
| Emphasising with: | Softening with: | |
| a) degree adverbs | a) verbs of thinking | c) conditional and subjunctive phrases |
| b) verbs of thinking | b) hedges and phrases of reservation |
The tactics is quite common for the following functions:
accepting, explaining, (dis)agreeing, refusing, apologising, expressing an opinion etc.
Emphasising positive replies
Expanding devices could mainly be reduced to set formulae for emphatic agreement with adverbs and phrases with verbs of thinking. Consider the examples below illustrating different ways of expanding short answers. Think of more examples possible for some other functions of English.
| Functions | Examples | ||
| agreeing | It’s all so very amusing, isn’t it? - Yes, very. / Quite so. | ||
| It must be the best of his novels. — Yes, it certainly is. | |||
| She must be Ann’s daughter? — Right / You ’re quite right. | |||
| Shall I see you in the evening? - Yes, I expect so. | |||
| emphatic disagreement | I m getting old, aren’t I? — No, of course not. | ||
| granting permission | Can I use your printer? - Yes, alright. | ||
| accepting an invitation | Would you join us at the party? - Yes, most willingly. (Thank you.) | ||
| complying | Could you please fax that for me? - Why, yes, of course. | ||
| with a request | Would you mind speaking up a little? - Yes, sure. | ||
| Would you mind my closing the door? - No, not at all. | |||
| apologising | So you’re going to be late again? - Yes, I’m afraid so (= I’m sorry, but...) | ||
| expressing | Do you think that’s enough? - Yes, definitely. | ||
| an opinion | Will he cope with the new job? - Yes, I hope so. | ||
