Being polite in English: Useful expressions

- Being polite in English is not that easy to do

unless you watch this video.

Ha ha, let's do it.

(upbeat music)

Some people think the British are very polite.

(graphics whoosh)

"Could I possibly dare to ask you to be so kind

as to pass the salt?

Thank you.

Seriously?"

(graphics whoosh)

Now that's a bit over the top.

A bit over the top means too much, right?

But if you're meeting foreign friends

or you're gonna travel abroad or even immigrate

and work and study in an English-speaking country,

it is important to be polite in English.

I've noticed on my travels around the world,

many countries are actually much more direct

than in England, for example...

(graphics whoosh)

(speaks Spanish)

So you see in England, we would probably say,

"Can I have a beer?" rather than, "Give me a beer."

We tend not to use the imperative,

but maybe switch to a question.

That's one example.

So being less direct is an important skill

even for native speakers.

Now in this video, I'll show you some ways

of being less direct and how to be polite in English,

and also kind of show you when it's appropriate

to be less direct, and just to note, right,

I'm from Britain, so the examples I'm giving

are based on British English, but I would say, by and large,

these can be applied across the board

in many English-speaking countries.

All right.

Let's get stuck in. (chuckles)

Right, first of all, probably one of the most common ways

of being less direct and polite is by using questions

like "can", "could", or "would" instead of imperatives.

So the imperative, by the way, is when you say,

"Do this," "Do that," "Stand up," "Sit down," right?

That's not normally how we talk in social situations.

We normally ask questions, so instead of saying,

for example, let's take the scenario in the office

or in the classroom, instead of saying, "Give me your pen,"

I would say, "Can I have your pen?

Thanks."

Right?

(with upward inflexion) "Can I have your pen?"

Notice the intonation.

"Can I" becomes (words run together) "Can-I".

"Can-I have your pen?"

Can you say that?

"Can I, can I have your pen?"

That's it, perfect.

Or even, "Could I have your pen?"

Listen again.

(with upward inflexion) "Could I, could I,

could I have your pen?"

Repeat the whole thing.

"Could I have your pen?"

Yeah, fantastic, right?

That's a much more polite way of doing it

or even, "Excuse me, can I have your pen?"

In Britain, we love to say, "Excuse me."

"Excuse me, (chuckles) can I borrow your pen?"

Even "borrow" maybe, okay?

Great.

And in addition, maybe for example, in a hotel

or a restaurant or a bar, we would also say that,

so when the waiter comes, I might say,

"Yes, can I have the club sandwich please?"

Now sometimes foreign friends say,

"Well, what on earth are you doing?

Why are you asking the waiter?

Surely you're just telling him, "I want the club sandwich."

It's true, and I'm not really asking him.

It's just a way of being polite, right?

When your boss in the international company says,

"Can I have the report for tomorrow?"

he's not really asking.

He's telling you, but just being polite.

What you don't say is, "Em, can you, can you?

Well, mm, I'm not sure.

I'm a bit busy.

How about the day after?"

No, we don't do that.

He's not asking.

It's just a way of being polite.

Great, so we've got questions about, "can I", or "could I".

It also works the other way around.

We often say, "could you", "would you", right?

So again, let's imagine the window's open,

it's freezing cold, right?

We don't normally say, "Oi!

Close the window."

In a social situation, in order to be more polite,

we would say, "Excuse me, could you close the window?

Could you close the window?"

Or, "Would you mind closing the window?

Would you mind closing?"

So after mind, it's I-N-G.

"Would you mind opening?

Would you mind closing the window?"

Can you say that after me?

"Would you mind closing the window?"

Great.

(with upward inflexion) "The window."

That's it, nice.

(graphics whoosh)

To add a bit more indirectness, nice word, indirectness,

sometimes we add "a moment" and it doesn't mean

just a moment, it's just being polite, right?

"Would you mind closing the window a moment?"

"Would you mind opening the door a moment?"

That's another way of adding extra politeness

as well as, "excuse me", "please", "thank you", "a moment".

All of these, great ways to be a bit more polite

and I guess the last one, thinking about it,

we often say, "Can you do me a favour?"

"Could you close the window?"

"Can you do me a favour?"

"Can you do me a favour?" and then you ask politely,

"Could you close the window, please?

Thank you."

Let's move on.

Now, moving on to the word "just",

"just" is such a common word that we use to be polite

and to be a bit softer, to make the things we say

less direct and softer.

We use it all the time, right?

For example, imagine you're in a house or a room

and the television is really noisy, and you want to say,

"Turn down the TV!"

"Turn down the TV!"

I mean, reduce the volume, right?

Now, we don't say, "Turn down the TV".

We would say, "Can you, can you turn down the TV?"

Remember?

But we would often add "just".

"Can you just turn down the TV?"

"Can you just turn down the TV?"

Great.

You use it all the time.

Another example, we're in a meeting

and I want to say something, so I want to say something.

I think dah, dah, dah, dah, dah.

I would probably say, "Can I just say something?

I think that..."

"Can I just say something?"

It's a lovely, polite way to interrupt people, right?

"Can I just say something?

"I think dah, dah, dah, dah, dah."

Remember, it's not a question.

You're not asking.

You're just being polite.

So you can use "just" all over the place, right?

Let's move on to the next one.

Right, let's continue with that situation

of being in a meeting at work, right?

And the use of "would" as a conditional,

not as a question, right?

It's another great way of softening what you're doing.

So for example, instead of saying,

"I think that's a good idea," you might say,

"I would think that's a good idea."

"I would think that's a good idea."

It's just being less direct or even,

"Yeah, I would say that's a good idea."

"I would say that's a good idea,"

or, "I'd say, I'd say that's a good idea."

Can you say that?

"I'd say that's a good idea."

So what's happening here, the conditional is exactly that.

It's making it a bit hypothetical, like it's not real.

This is a way of protecting yourself,

as well as softening what you say.

We call it hedging.

Hedging is being less direct, so one way to hedge

is to use a conditional.

It's really useful because

you're not sticking your neck out.

So imagine you're in a meeting and maybe some of the bosses

say, "Well, I think we should do that.

And what do you think, Keith?"

Now you don't wanna stick your neck out and go,

"Well, yeah, I think it's a good idea,"

or, "I think it's a bad idea," because what if

the opinions change and you're left pmm,

you get your head chopped off.

The conditional is like,

"Well, yeah, I would say it's a good idea, you know,

if we go ahead," right?

I'm not saying it's a good idea.

Just hypothetically, I would say it's a good idea.

So you can see, you're kind of protecting yourself

by hedging.

It's a great technique.

We use it all the time.

It's kind of just being polite,

but it's also not sticking your neck out

and getting it cut off in politically-charged meetings.

Now, let's carry on in the context of meetings.

Another way we are polite is to use "sort of", or "kind of".

Okay, for example, if you want to say, "I disagree,"

the most polite way is to say, "I sort of agree,

but..." and it's clear you disagree, but it's very unusual

to say, "Well, no, I disagree,"

especially if you don't know the people in the room.

"I sort of agree, but..." and people understand

what you're saying.

"I kind of agree, but I think this might be better."

"I kind of agree, but this might be better."

Or even, "Maybe that's true, but I actually think this."

"Maybe that's true, but this might be a better idea," okay?

So these are all ways of hedging and being polite,

especially in the workplace where you don't know everybody

and often politics is going on.

You have to be a little bit careful, sometimes.

Great, let's move on.

Now, the next one is "at all", "at all", "at all",

and this is used quite a lot, especially in situations

where somebody may be reluctant to give you something,

but you want to be really polite so you can get it, right?

Let's imagine you're ringing up somebody

and you want to say, "I need to speak to Tom.

Do you have his phone number?"

Now that person may not want

to give you the phone number, right?

You know, people are often reluctant

to give out other people's phone numbers,

so what you could say is, "I need to teak...

(chuckles) I need to teak?

I need to speak to Tom.

Do you have his phone number at all?"

(with upward inflexion) Do you have his phone number

at all?" with that rising intonation.

Can you say that?

"Do you have his phone number at all?"

Yeah, that's it, and that just makes it

much, much softer and hopefully the person

will give it to you, hopefully.

For example, right, "I'm a bit short of money.

Could you lend me £10 at all?"

"Yeah, sure."

"Thank you so much."

Great, so "at all", really good to be polite

when you want to get something.

Next...

Next, do you remember earlier I talked about using questions

to be polite, but they're not really questions?

Well, also to be polite, we can use the past tense,

but it's not really the past tense.

Well, it is grammatically.

(chuckles) Confused?

You should be.

English can be confusing.

All it is, we use the past tense to be a bit less direct.

It's a very strange thing, but listen to the examples

and I'll try and explain, right?

Let's imagine I'm having a party and I want you to come.

I might say, "Do you want to come to the party?"

and that's fine, absolutely fine.

However, if I want to be less direct,

maybe because I don't know you so well,

or I think you don't really want to go,

I might use the past tense, right?

For example, "I was wondering if you wanted to come

to the party."

"I was wondering," past continuous, "if you wanted,"

simple past, "to come to the party."

"I was wondering if you wanted to come to the party."

"I was wondering if you wanted to go for a beer later."

"I was wondering if you wanted to go out

for dinner at all."

Right?

Making it very soft and hopefully getting the person

to agree.

Lovely ways of doing it, right?

So that's quite common.

Also, we might say, "I was going to ask you

if you wanted to come to the party,"

which is bizarre, right?

"I was going to ask you if you wanted to come

to the party," and you're like, "Well, just ask me!"

(laughs) "I was going to," but that's what we do

to be really soft, hedging, right?

Being less direct.

As I said, you may use that if you don't know the person

very well, or if you feel they don't really want to go,

but you want them to come, right?

Yeah.

"I was going to ask you if you wanted to go

for a beer later at all.

What do you think?"

Right?

That's what you might say.

Another example, similar thing.

If I say...

Hello, dust.

If I say, "I want to invite you to the party,"

"I want to invite you to the..."

"I want to invite you to my party," perfectly fine.

Less direct, "I wanted to invite you to my party."

"I wanted," simple past, "to invite you to my party."

Can you say that?

"I wanted to invite you to my party."

Okay, it's just polite.

It's not the past.

It's not, "I wanted to, but now I don't."

No, no, no, no, no.

It's, "I wanted to invite you to my party.

Can you come?"

It's just being polite.

Curious, right?

Funny things about English language.

Right, move on.

Let's move on.

"Oi, move on." (chuckles)

(graphics whoosh)

So there you have it.

Lots of ways of being polite and less direct in English.

Of course, it depends on the situation,

and it depends on who you're speaking to,

on how polite you're going to be, right?

And please, don't think, please,

don't think that British people are always polite, right?

It's not true.

It depends.

Don't think we spend all our days queuing going,

"Thank you, please, thank you, thank you, sorry, thank you."

(chuckles)

It's only partly true, right?

So that's it, ideas for you, and by the way,

if you're taking the IELTS speaking test,

it's perfectly okay to disagree with the examiner

and you could say, "Well, I disagree,"

but if you use hedging, then you can just show off

more language.

You could say, "Well, that might be true,

but I would say..." right?

Show off a bit of the, that you know how to hedge

and be polite in English.

There you go.

That's my tip for all the IELTS students.

For the rest of the world, good luck in being polite.

Can't wait to see you again soon.

Listen, if you've enjoyed this video

and you've learned something new,

please do subscribe to the channel,

turn on the notifications and leave me a comment down below.

Let me know which is your favourite expression

or way of being polite.

Great, thank you so much.

I'll see you in the next video, just around the corner.

Take care, my friend.

Bye bye.

(upbeat music)