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So, in light of the previous episode where we went over some tricks one can use in difficult
situation where you wanna point out somebody saying unfunny jokes or offensive comments
and you wanna let them know that that is not okay, whether it's you being offended or whether
it's somebody else, maybe your friend, colleague that's being offended, we were saying that just
simply asking them to repeat themselves. One, buys you time to think and kind of collect yourself,
two, may give them the opportunity to be like, oh, that was stupid, that was not good.
So, with our generous, generous benefit of that approach, that might be one of the few
non-confrontational ways to address the issue at hand. But that got me thinking, there are many
different ways to ask somebody to repeat themselves, not just in different wording
phrases, but depending on the tone you wanna convey and elicit a certain type of response,
what have you. And since the person who asked this question said that she's building a phrase
bank of some sort to fall back to, tier one is like a basic, maybe there was not even an offense,
this is just like a neutral situation where you just actually want them to repeat because you
genuinely didn't hear it or you were zoning out and just want them to repeat in a way that
is not rude. Yeah, just a casual request to please say that again. Yeah, could you say that
again? Can you say that again? Any of that variation works. I don't know what other
variation there is. So, this is something that I recommend any of my students, never mind anybody,
do, but especially for just certain phrases. If you look up in some of... For English, if you
go to the Cambridge websites and stuff, you'll find a lot of this as well, but even in general,
you'll find a billion websites of people trying to teach you English. Some of them are good, some are
03:00
bad, but you will find a ton of example phrases for asking someone to repeat something. They're
different from each other, but I think especially at this level, at the, I just need... The neutral,
I just want you to repeat. Yeah, I just need to hear that again, right? Or sometimes it will be
interpreted as, maybe could you say it a different way, right? I didn't understand the actual
information in some way, but to just do that, there are many, many, many options. You can be
kind of really formal about it or super nice and sort of non, I don't want to say aggressive,
but non-abrupt, non-rough. You can be very soft. That's sort of adding the... If we start with the
phrase, can you repeat that, right? That's the core phrase. Can you repeat that? Can you say
that again? Both of those are equivalent. They're the same, essentially. I would say so. And one
more thing that came to my mind was, I didn't catch that. Can you repeat it? Yeah. I'm glad
that you said that for two reasons. You actually started with one part and then asked the can you
not repeat it question. Yeah. Right? So I think what I'm seeing, and I hadn't thought about this
before, but there seems to be at minimum two parts. You can use both at the same time,
or you can just use one. Yeah, you can use one. And one would do the job. Yep. And so to clarify
it, it's like one part that acts as a lead in, a starting point for the question that's about to
come. That could be a sorry and excuse me, a pardon me. It could just be a sounds like that
thinking noise in some way. And then the question or the request could come after that. That's
one way of thinking about these. If you want it to be softer, gentler, to ask the question as
nicely as you can, just to generally be like, it's fine. I just really didn't hear you.
Right. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So those like, yeah, just to repeat ourselves. Could you say that again?
Could you repeat again? Or could you repeat? Or combining that with any number of sort of like,
almost like a preposition, like I didn't catch that. Yeah. Could you repeat? It's a little
prep phrase. Excuse me. Just like getting attention. Could you repeat that again? That
kind of thing also works. And I think that covers like a pretty neutral one. Maybe let's go to the
second tier where you like, want to let them know that you have a problem with what they've said,
06:06
but like still want to remain professional, cordial, what have you. What's the, what's your
go-to or what would be your go-to? Okay. I will share the first thought I had.
Second. So the actual thing I'll share first is all of the neutral ones can be used here.
Every neutral one can be used here. With attitude. Yeah. It's like, just the change is a little bit
of, of attitude and you, you don't even need to put the attitude in there. If that person is in a
position where they've said something that is upsetting, distressing, wrong, uh, uh, harassing,
like any of these levels and you just go, sorry, can you, can you repeat that? Like,
like at almost the same kind of deadpan, it doesn't have to be super nice sounding.
That will do the job, right? That would do. Yeah. Yeah. The, the cold, almost emotionless
delivery of, could you repeat that again? Yeah. Would do just as much. Just fine. Yeah. Like it
doesn't have to have any emotional weight behind it. Like it can have none to also have the same.
Okay. The first thought I had is maybe more like tier three. If we're going up to tier three
in terms of tier three is unhinged. But like tier three, there's some unhinged ones just before
that. Yeah. If you were to use like the sorry, the pardon me, you can still use those at tier two.
But I think if you're trying to impart a sense of, I need you to stop and think about what you said,
feeling, then it would be like, you know, like the, excuse me, isn't excuse me. It's
excuse me. Yeah. Which I don't know if anybody can hear that over the mic. The idea is it comes
with a lot more sort of like sucking in of air and perhaps pitching up at certain ones. A bit of
dramatized surprise. Just yeah. Just like shock, right? Like a shock that you just can't believe
what you just heard. And you, you want them to know that, yes, this is a shocking thing that
you just said. Yeah. And yeah, yeah. That's, that's one way to do it too. Yeah. Why don't
we go to tier three unhinged? Okay. I have an idea. And I think this, this phrase would have
the best effect if you have a British accent. Okay. I'm waiting. And that is just, you have to
look them in the eye, deadpan, right? With coldest eyes you can bring to your face and say,
09:03
I beg your pardon. Ah, yeah. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. That is, it's, it's a set of the facial
expression, the British accent and the phrase, I beg your pardon. And I feel like that that's
like a triple combo of like, oh, you're in trouble. Yeah. And it comes, I, I beg your pardon.
I feel like this, this gets included on like general lists for asking people to repeat.
Yes. This could be a normal phrase that anyone can use in a tier one situation as well.
But I admit it feels more stern. Like because of perhaps it's just a bias because of like
the common British intonation, the English intonation, don't come at me,
about like that phrasing and how it's maybe attached to like formality, you know,
beg and pardon are not words that are maybe commonly used outside of formal places. But if
you come at it with like a very strong, either, whether it be an accent or even if you were like,
I like, I beg your pardon. Like it's, I think in English or American, it would be more like,
I'm, I'm sorry. What? Yeah. It's like an American version. Yeah. That's,
and it's definitely less formal. Like it's not. And I think I'm sorry. What is also a good one
to go. Especially if you're not trying to hide that you are negatively surprised by what you
just heard. Yeah. Like, I'm sorry, what? Yeah. What did you just say? Clearly you are not happy
about what just got said. Yeah. Like you are not happy about what you just heard and you're not
trying to hide it. Another one of more British variation that I like is come again. Come again
is a good one. Yeah. Come again. It's a two word phrase. And again, you need to have a solid facial
expression going because as a phrase itself, it's pretty neutral. You can say it in any casual way,
but you have to say with like the coldest voice you can produce. That's the, the higher tiers do
sort of. It's more about the delivery, I think, than the phrase itself. It's a lot about delivery
at that point. Cause if you want, if I were, okay, we've given a lot of tier three delivery
intonation and I think the beg your pardon, come again, uh, I'm sorry. What are good starting
points for somebody to be like, I'm trying to express how upsetting what you just said was,
or just how absolutely insane that was. If you, if you wanted to really point it out,
12:01
I've been known to look at someone and say, hold on and just stop the situation. Like,
just hold on. And if I want to soften it, you can still do hold on. Maybe I misheard you,
right? I'm sorry. Maybe I didn't catch that. Um, but I didn't quite understand. Uh, and the way
to up that again is if you definitely heard them to basically simplify it and return it to them
and ask them, is this what you just said? Right? Like, because if it sounds as stupid coming out
of my mouth as it did yours, I'm giving you an option to fix that now. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I think,
I think that's like, that's like the, that's like the level S like a, like a very advanced
technique. Yeah. Yeah. You got to be aware of the conversation doesn't deserve a spot in this room.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. And be like, I need, you're going to have to now stand with that claim
with that position and argue it, or you're going to have to back down. I'm not playing this game.
So yeah, that's, I think so. I think, I think that's, that's a, that's a good one, but I think
all of these phrases are good because you can be a bystander or the one receiving the offense
either way and you can start injecting it. I think putting the hold on was a good sort of like a, uh,
bangai hand, like a little, little extra that you can add to any of these situations to just buy you
time. Right. Like if you immediately don't know what kind of attitude to put on, you can say,
hold on and then give yourself a couple of milliseconds to decide, do I want to comment
them or do I want to just be nice to them? Just, just another, it's, it's a bit more of a pausing
phrase than like the, the sort of sorries and excuse me's where it brings it directly towards
you. It's good because it gives you power to speak next. No one else can speak while you're holding
on. Right. Yeah. So that's a good one. Uh, so yeah, hopefully she finds these phrases useful.
I hope so. So please enjoy, uh, tweet us if you use them or maybe don't, I don't know.
We take zero responsibilities. Zero responsibility.
That's it for the show today. Thanks for listening and find us on x at Eigo de Science,
that is E I G O D E S C I E N C. See you next time.
