Improve your Vocabulary: 29 ways to express anger in English

Welcome to www.engvid.com , I'm Adam.

In today's video, I want to talk to you about ways express anger.

We have many ways to show that you're angry or that someone is angry about whatever situation

or person.

And surprisingly, we have a lot of ways to show that we're angry.

A lot of words we can use, and expressions we can use to show anger.

We must be very angry people, because we have so many words, but that's what it is.

So, we're going to start with the every day, simple anger words, which are upset, angry,

and mad, okay?

Now, some people will say that "mad" shouldn't be used, because mad means more like, crazy.

But people use "mad" all the time to mean angry.

So, it's fine.

Notice also, we can use different prepositions.

At, with, or about.

Now, we can't use all of them with all of these words, right?

We can be upset about something.

We can be upset with someone.

We can be mad at someone or something, but usually just about a person.

We can be mad about something, but we can be angry at, with, or about.

Now, what's the difference between them?

Let's say we're going to go with angry.

If you're angry at something, it means you're basically directing your anger towards that

thing or that person, right?

So, I'm angry at the president for the bad choices he's made, for example.

You're angry with someone, it shows a little bit more of a personal relationship.

You know this person.

Maybe it's a friend who did something bad, or a coworker, so you're angry with this person.

It has a bit more of that close connection.

And if you're angry about something, then that something is just a cause for your anger.

You have no relationship with this thing.

So, you're angry about the government's decision to change their policy about whatever.

Nothing you can do about it.

Nobody you can be angry at, so you're just angry about the situation.

You're angry at the government.

You're angry about their decision, and you're angry with your local politician who you voted

for, okay?

Because maybe you have a bit more of a direct connection with that person.

So, these are the every day words that we use.

Now, if you want to show that you're very angry, you have lots of words and expressions

to use to do that, okay?

It's a very creative language when it comes to anger.

So, first of all, you can be pissed off, okay?

That just basically means you're very angry.

But some people think that "pissed off" is a bit of a rude word, almost like a swear

word, so they will use "ticked off".

Ticked off and pissed off mean the same thing.

Ticked off is a little bit more polite, a little bit more gentle than pissed off.

Now, you can be mad as hell, so this is more of a - gives you a bit of an imagery idea.

Hell is a very angry place, very hot and the devil lives there, so very angry.

So, you're mad as hell.

And people sometimes say "madder n' hell", madder than hell.

So mad as hell.

Hell, your anger, same.

If you're madder than hell, you're even more angry than hell itself, okay?

And we use the - reduce the "than" to just "n".

Madder n' hell, madder n' hell.

Now, and idiom we use is "seeing red".

If you're so angry you don't see anything except red, that's how angry you are, because

all the blood is rushing to your head.

You don't see anything but red, okay?

Now, we have other words, adjectives.

Furious, livid, incensed, and enraged.

Now, keep in mind, if you're going to use any of these words, these are very, very strong

emotions, okay?

If you're angry that your little brother took your ice cream, you're probably not going

to be livid, okay?

You're just going to be mad, you're going be angry, you're going to be upset.

If you're livid, it's like that's all that's occupying your mind.

You're like shaking almost, right?

Which will come to the next set of expressions, but very, very strong words.

Be very careful about using them, because you're expressing a very strong emotion and

some people might get the wrong meaning from that as well.

So, if you're livid, furious, or incensed, you might even have a fit.

When you have a fit, you're so angry that you're shaking.

So, that shaking is a fit, okay?

It's not fit like you go to the gym and you're fit and you have a good shaped body.

Fit means like, shaking.

It's a convulsion, if you want another word.

You can't control your body; it's just shaking from anger.

If you're throwing a tantrum, usually we say this about children.

Children throw a tantrum.

So, you go to the mall and you see like, a child, maybe four or five years old and he

says to his parents, "Oh, I want an ice cream."

And they say, "No, you can't have any."

And he starts screaming and he lies down on the ground and arms and legs kicking everyone.

That's throwing a tantrum, okay?

Again, usually for kids.

If you're saying it about an adult, that adult has some problems and maybe is acting very

childish.

So, go ballistic, and usually you go ballistic on someone.

So, some of you might recognize this word "ballistic" from ballistic missile, right?

So, a missile explodes.

So, if you go ballistic on someone, you just blow up, okay?

Same idea, you blow up on them, you lose control, you start yelling and shouting and sometimes

you can get a bit violent, but it happens.

Try not to do it.

But, that's a very good expression and saying "blow up" on someone.

So, the most common situation you'll hear that is in a company.

The boss went ballistic on his staff.

He started yelling at people, maybe he fired some people, maybe demoted some people.

He went a little bit crazy.

Now, similar to "seeing red" is to be in a blind rage.

Rage basically means anger.

It's a noun.

If you're in a blind rage, you're so angry that you can't see anything except the object

of your anger, okay?

If you're in a blind rage, there's that thing that's making you angry and nothing else exists.

You're blind to anything else except that thing.

You want, maybe, to blow up on that thing or that person.

Now, we can also say that something is an outrage or an action is an outrage.

So, notice that it's "an", so this is a noun.

Enraged, that's your emotion, that's an adjective, and outrage is a noun.

Now, usually you'll hear this on the news, you'll hear politicians using this word.

Somebody on the other - on the opposition did something that the other guys thought

was not correct, and this - oh, this is an outrage!

This is making us angry because this shouldn't happen, right?

There's something very, very bad.

But, all of these words are, again, you're going to hear them on a daily basis, okay?

Different ones.

You have your choice of which ones to use.

But you have to be very careful, especially in business.

Especially if you're in school.

If you have some sort of relationship with someone, you might not want to use any of

these words, because again, they might give the wrong impression to someone.

If you're telling someone, "Oh, what was his reaction to this situation?"

"Oh, he was livid."

But maybe you don't want to express such strong emotions.

You want to use a little bit more subdued, a little bit more gentle words, but still

give the idea that the person is angry, then you're going to use some diplomatic words.

Let's look at some of those.

Okay, so now, we're going to look at some softer ways to show, let's say, to talk about

someone being angry.

And here, I wrote "diplomatic".

Now, a lot of you think of diplomats or diplomatic being like, politicians from different countries

working together, trying to negotiate deals or whatnot.

But, being diplomatic basically means getting to a point where you can have - establish

a good relationship with other people, right?

And in this case, in language, we just basically mean it's polite, right?

Because you don't want to offend someone.

So, let's say I have two friends and they're very angry with each other and I'm the go-between.

One person, oh, tell her this, tell her that.

And I'm between, passing along messages.

So, if she says, "Yeah, I'm furious with her", and I want to make them friends again, I'm

not going to go tell this other person "Yeah, she's furious".

What I'm going to say is, "Well, you know, she's a little bit displeased with what you

did."

So, I'm softening it, but just enough so the other person knows there's anger, but it's

not crazy anger and doesn't make her angry even more, okay?

I hope that's a little bit clear.

So, instead of saying, "She's furious", I would say, "She's a little bit displeased".

Displeased means, again, not pleased.

You have the dis- here, and the dis- here.

Basically means not.

Not pleased means she's not happy about something you did.

It suggests angry without expressing anger and therefore making the situation worse.

And the same with disappointed.

If you're disappointed with someone, you're a little bit upset by what happened and you

expect better.

This is a word that parents often use with their kids.

So, for example, if my parents told me, "We're very disappointed with you."

That sometimes is actually worse than saying, "Oh, I'm angry with you".

I'd rather just be angry.

If you're disappointed, it means I've done something even worse than what I did, right?

But it's softer, but it gets the point across.

Now, you can say "somewhat".

You can say, "Oh, she's somewhat disappointed with you".

She's somewhat angry, she's somewhat upset.

This somewhat means a little bit, but not really.

If someone says, "She's somewhat angry", it means she's angry, or he's angry or whatever

the situation.

But you will hear this as a way to soften but still express the anger.

Okay?

Not very happy.

Not very pleased.

Not very thrilled, or not too happy.

So, the boss is not too happy with your performance this month.

It doesn't mean that he's - I'm happy.

It means he's a little bit angry.

He wants you to do better, right?

So again, without saying the boss is angry, it makes you feel bad, well, you know, the

boss is not too happy with this sales performance.

Could you try to pick it up a little bit?

So understand that the boss is upset, but giving you a chance to fix the situation.

So, not too happy, not too pleased, not too thrilled, or not very, etc.

We also have an idiom.

If somebody comes into the office and he or she is like, you know a little bit angry at

everybody and snapping and saying things like, a little bit not nicely, we could say that

he or she got up on the wrong side of the bed.

So, if somebody says to you, "Did you get up on the wrong side of the bed today?"

It means that you're acting a little bit angerly, a little bit not nicely, and they're just

saying you seem angry.

So, somebody got up on the wrong side of the bed, they're not having a very good day.

They're probably a little cranky.

So, for example.

I'll take myself as an example.

I like to eat.

If I don't eat for a long time, I get very cranky.

So, if you talk to me and I haven't eaten for a long time, I might be a little bit rude.

I might be a little bit angry with you.

I'm not angry with you, I'm angry at the fact that my stomach is empty, but I'm a little

bit cranky or a little bit grumpy, okay?

So, another thing about me, I'm not a morning person.

I'm a night person.

I go to sleep late; I don't like to wake up early in the morning.

So, if I have to wake up early in the morning, don't talk to me.

I'm very grumpy in the morning.

I'm not very nice in the morning, okay?

So, make sure you wait until like, 11:00.

By 11:00, I'm okay.

So, these are, you know, soft words, but they still convey the meaning of anger.

Now, it's very important to have an understanding of diplomatic language, okay?

And I'm going to make another video just about diplomatic language, because it's useful in

many situations, especially business, with your coworkers, with people you have relationships

with.

Sometimes, you have to be very careful with the words you use.

If you don't want to offend someone, if you don't want to make a situation worse than

it already is, you're going to soften your language, and I'll show you in that video

how to do that.

So, make sure you subscribe to my channel and check back once in awhile until you see

that video.

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See you then.

Bye!