How to De-emphasize (Soften) English Sentences

Have you ever noticed that English speakers

sometimes add an extra word or two

when they want to emphasize what they're talking about?

I could say right now, "It's really cold out here today."

I add the word really to emphasize the sentence,

and the meaning of the sentence.

But we also add words and phrases

to de-emphasize what we're talking about,

to kind of tone down what we're talking about.

What I should actually say is this,

"It's a little bit cold out here today."

So I wanna take a little bit of time today

to talk about words and phrases we use

to kind of tone down a sentence,

to kind of de-emphasize what we're talking about.

And I just used a couple words there twice,

did you notice that?

I said, "It's a little bit cold."

So that means it's not super cold,

it's not so cold that I need a toque,

but it's a little bit cold, so I'm wearing my gloves.

And I said I wanted to talk to you for a little bit,

which means I don't wanna talk for an hour about this,

but let's take a few minutes to talk about words and phrases

that you can use to kind of de-emphasize what you're saying.

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Sometimes when you're learning a language like English,

you might say, "I am confused."

But maybe you're not totally confused.

Maybe you don't want to communicate

that you're really confused

and don't understand at all what's going on,

maybe you're just a little bit confused.

And in that situation,

there's three ways you can describe that,

I just used one of them.

You could say, "I am a bit confused."

You could say, "I am a little confused."

And you could say, "I am a little bit confused."

You could use both words together.

And you probably recognize those words

from the introduction to this video,

where I used them to talk about

the fact that it was a little bit cold out here.

So sometimes you want to state something like,

"I am confused,"

but sometimes you want to soften it a little bit.

You want to de-emphasize what you're saying,

and you would say it using those three words.

"I am a bit confused, I am a little confused,"

or, "I am a little bit confused."

I'm pretty healthy, and most days I can walk,

but there are times where I exercise really hard

on a certain day.

And then the next day, instead of saying,

"I can walk," I would say, "I can hardly walk."

Do you ever have that, where you exercise so much

that your muscles are really sore,

and then instead of walking normally, you're like, "Oh."

Maybe your back is sore, maybe your legs are sore,

and it's difficult to walk.

So instead of saying, "I can walk,"

meaning that you can totally walk and everything's great,

you would modify the phrase a little bit

using the word hardly,

and you would say, "I can hardly walk."

Usually it takes me about one more day

and then I can walk again,

and then I started exercising again.

Sometimes my oldest son goes out

and he doesn't come home on time.

Instead of coming home at midnight,

he comes home at one or two in the morning.

As a parent, I am concerned when that happens,

but I should actually say this instead.

"I am slightly concerned."

I'm not as concerned as I used to be.

When my son was younger,

when he was 16 or 17 and he went out,

if he didn't come home on time,

I would say, "I am concerned."

I am worried about what he's doing.

But as he has gotten older,

he's a lot more responsible and I'm not as worried.

I'm not as concerned,

so I would modify the sentence by adding the word slightly,

and I would just say, "I am slightly concerned."

Actually, at this point in time,

I'm usually not concerned at all.

By the time a child is that old,

I guess he's not even really a child anymore.

Once someone is in their twenties,

I think parents should stop worrying about them.

But you know what?

I don't think parents ever stop worrying about their kids,

no matter how old they are.

Hey, Bob here. Who's this?

Ah, sorry, I can barely hear you.

You're in a, oh, you're in a tunnel.

Yeah, yeah, I can barely hear you.

I can just hear you a little bit.

You're almost out, okay.

Oh, there we go. Yep, I can hear you now, definitely.

Hey, I'm in the middle of making a video,

so I gotta go, okay?

Okay, bye.

Hey, (chuckles) sometimes when,

that was just a pretend phone call,

I didn't really hang up on a friend of mine,

that was just for demonstration purposes.

But sometimes when you're on the phone,

it's hard to hear the other person.

When you can hear them, you say, "I can hear you,"

but when you are having trouble,

you would say something like, "I can barely hear you."

When you add the word barely, it de-emphasizes the sentence.

It kind of tones down the meaning of the word to hear,

and it means that you're having trouble

hearing what they're saying.

Sometimes this happens when they're in a tunnel,

or when they're in an area with bad reception,

or maybe they're just not talking loud enough.

In that case, you would say, "I can barely hear you."

Sometimes in life, people give you good news,

and you say, "I am happy."

The news that you received makes you happy

and you say, "I am happy."

But sometimes you receive news

that makes you a little bit happy,

and doesn't make you 100% happy

because there's a few things you're concerned about.

In that case, you can use the word somewhat.

You could say, "I am somewhat happy."

So maybe something is happening

in the life of one of your relatives,

and it's sort of a good thing,

but it's not totally a good thing.

And if someone said, "How do you feel about that?"

you could say, "I am somewhat happy."

So that means that you're happy,

but you have a few concerns about it.

So you modify it with the word somewhat

and it kind of diminishes the meaning of the word happy.

So it still means you're a little bit happy,

like our first modifier from earlier,

but you're not 100% happy about it.

There are two phrases we use a lot

when we want to de-emphasize a sentence in English,

and those phrases are "kind of" and "sort of."

When I'm hungry, I say, "I am hungry."

When I'm tired, I say, "I am tired."

But if I wanted to say that I'm not super hungry

and I'm not super tired, I would probably say this,

"I am kind of hungry" or, "I am sort of hungry,"

or "I am kind of tired," or, "I am sort of tired."

It just means that you are tired, you are hungry,

but not in like an incredible way.

Like I'm not ravenous

where I just wanna eat six hamburgers

and then sleep for 12 hours.

Instead, it just means that, yeah, I could eat,

I'm kind of hungry, or yeah, I could have a nap,

I'm sort of tired.

So those are two phrases, you'll hear these a lot.

We use these all the time when we're speaking English,

and they definitely are used

when you want to de-emphasize the meaning of a sentence.

Well, thank you so much

for watching this little English lesson,

where I hope you learned a few new phrases

that you can use in your next English conversation.

Remember, if you're new here,

don't forget to click that red subscribe button over there

and give me a thumbs up

if this video helped you learn a bit more English.

And of course, if you have the time,

why don't you stick around and watch another English lesson?

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