Listen & Learn Blog

We use tag questions all the time without realising it – “you’re meeting me at the car right?” or “that was interesting, wasn’t it?”

An interesting article on Boston.com explores the usage of tag questions. The slight upward inflection on the final word of the sentence gives these sentences extra meaning. Linguists see these questions as having two different ‘flavours’:

the kind that ask for information or confirmation [as in the first example above], called “modal” tags, and the kind that try to connect with the hearer’s feelings, softening a statement or opening the door for more conversation, called “affective” tags [as in the second example]. (Source: Boston.com)

Unfortunately, tag questions have been labelled as ‘female’ and have not been studied closely by linguists. More recent studies, however, have found that men use tag questions as much (if not more than) women, and the usage can be more associated with power rather than gender. I know right??

Erin McKean goes on to say:

When you look at what people actually use as tag questions, it turns out to be a fascinating and delightful corner of the language. The modal tag questions, the practical ones, tend to be very straightforward: We’re going to be late, aren’t we?; I should close this, shouldn’t I?; He knows where we’re going, doesn’t he? The affective tags, on the other hand, have a huge range of variation across regions and cultures. Many of us use a simple right? or OK?, or a slightly less simple you with me so far? In the South, you’re likely to hear you hear? (especially in the stereotypical “y’all come back now, y’hear?”). There’s the jokey geddit?, the Brit-tinged savvy?, the goodfellaish capisce?, and the Spanglish comprendo? Some are redolent of old-hipsterism — catch my drift? — and some are associated with urban culture, such as nahmsayin? or aight? Different varieties of English (and other languages) use tag questions, too: Canadians have eh?, Brits have innit?, and in Singaporean English, there’s the borrowed lah.

How do you use tag questions?

Some people are more fastidious about correct spelling and grammar than others. Then there are those that take their passion for correction to a new level – like Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Herson.

Deck and Herson travelled around the perimeter of America, looking for typos and attempting to correct them. And now they’ve written a book about their adventures – The Great Typo Hunt – Two Friends Changing The World, One Correction At A Time.

Over at the NPR website you can listen to their story and also read an excerpt from their book. And perhaps leave a grammatically correct comment, if you like.

A study conducted at Northumbria University, England, has shown that many native English speakers are unable to understand elements of basic grammar.

The project used sample sentences and tested a wide range of adults, including some postgraduate students, asking the participants to identify the meaning of the sentences. Noam Chomsky’s theory of universal grammar assumes that grammar is innate, and everyone has the same core grammar – sort of ‘hardwired’ into the brain, like other skills such as learning to walk. However:

As the test progressed, the two groups performed very differently. A high proportion of those who had left school at 16 began to make mistakes. Some speakers were not able to perform any better than chance, scoring no better than if they had been guessing.

[Researcher Dr Dabrowska] adds: “Our results show that a proportion of people with low educational attainment make errors with understanding the passive, and it appears that this and other important areas of core grammar may not be fully mastered by some speakers, even by adulthood.

“These findings could have a number of implications. “If a significant proportion of the population does not understand passive sentences, then notices and other forms of written information may have to be rewritten and literacy strategies changed.

“What’s more, the existence of substantial individual differences in native language attainment is highly problematic for one of the most widely accepted arguments for an innate universal grammar: the assumed ‘fact’ that all native speakers of a language converge on essentially the same grammar. Our research shows that they don’t.” (Source: Science Daily)

Perhaps this could be part of the reason why some people find picking up the grammar of a new language so difficult?