Re: CHAT: ...y'know

    While I agree with everyone about the excessive use of fillers in
speech
(excessive use of _anything_ is bad, no?),  I'd like to point out that
during
the course of my work, I have at times had to teach clients _precisely_
that, i.e. to put fillers such as "uh, er, um, y'know", etc. into their
speech!
    Sometimes people with a fluency problem are afraid to stop speaking
for fear that, should someone else take over the conversation while they
are collecting their thoughts, their speech might not be stable enough
to
enable them to forcibly take it back. The resulting anxiety is likely to
trigger a blockage of speech flow and so they get more anxious and even
less likely to speak fluently.
     Normally, fillers such as "uh, er, um, y'know", etc. are used to
signal
to others that, although you're not talking, you have not given up the
right to speak, and that your listeners should wait until you're ready
to
continue.
     Teaching clients that it's ok to not talk until they're ready and
that
there is a perfectly normal way to signal it to others, reduces anxiety
and can help achieve improved speech fluency.

Kristian Jensen wrote:

>  Any conlangs with such a marker?
>
     In rtemmu, in order to "hold the floor" during a conversation,
one would say  "auzuv"  ( au = IMPERATIVE , zuv = marker for
no noticible objective change ), i.e. "Don't change anything [especially
speakers]!
     (Or, in other words:  "Stop the world; I'm thinking!"   :-)   )

Dan Sulani


--
 likehsna  rtem  zuv  tikuhnuh  auag  inuvuz  vaka'a.

 A  word  is  an  awesome  thing.