CHAT: vocatives (was: Re: ...y'know)

Ray (28 June):
> Basically, man, like, I encounter these, um, sort of space fillers -
know
> what I mean? - when, um, basically, one of my students is sort of
trying to
> explain, like, why he sort of arrived late, man, like, this morning
or,
> kind of, y'know, didn't meet this, er, sort o' deadline thing, right,
know
> what I mean, man.
>
> PS - in SW London, this use of 'man' has become epicene among the
younger
> generation; female students even use this mode of address when
speaking
> among themselves.  Does this occur elsewhere?
Also in NW London at least among those of nursery school age. My son
calls both his parents "man".

More precisely, "man" is used as a vocative once the discourse is
already
established; it is not used for hailing (i.e. attracting the intention
of the intended
addressee). In this respect it is like "son", "mate" and "wack", but
unlike "mum",
"dad", "signora" and "jimmy".

Livagian has a series of vocative interjections that are specifically
for hailing,
and another set (belonging to the same paradigm as deictics) for
vocatives
like "man"/"mate" used once the discourse is begun.

[To preempt anyone having to ask: "mate" is SE English and its cousin,
antipodean English, "wack" ([wax]) was Liverpudlian when I was a child
in
that city but is unknown by my scouse students of today, "jimmy" is
Glaswegian (I
think).]

 --And.

p.s. I will not alas be in London on Saturday, else I would certainly
have been at
the top of the Euston tube escalators at 2:45 meeting Irina et al.