Subject: re : summary : ' no ' and ' man '

thanks for all the responses . it was really something to get the number and quality of ideas . 1 . ' no ' my initial query was : south african english use of ' no ' - does this occur in contexts such as : a . how are you ? b . no , i ' m fine . in other english varieties / other languages ? confronted with such examples , vistors to the country often comment that in sa english , ' no ' means ' yes ' . this , of course , is not true . ' no ' would be the response to the question ' do you have the time ? ' if the speaker did n't have the time . * generally : a couple of people commented that ' no ' definitely does not mean ' yes ' in these contexts . what it does is rather to negate the possibility of a negative belief concerning the answer to the question . in the example above , for instance , b . is negating a . 's possible belief that b . is not well . why south africans hold that the possibility of such negative beliefs is so strong they have to be denied remains to be seen . * ' no ' in other varieties of english the use of ' no ' in the types of examples cited anyway is not recorded according to the responses in : - australian english - american english - english english it is recorded in : - nigerian and ghanaian english there do appear to be related ( but not identical ) discourse uses of ' no ' and similar particles in other varieties of english . few english responses actually dealt with this usage at all . by far the majority were on ' man ' * ' no ' in other languages ' no ' does seem to be used in a variety of other languages in the same way as in sa english . similar uses are recorded in : - the scandinavian languages - german ( 'd och ' - similar but not identical ) - cameroon french - bangkok thai ( ' plaw ' - lit . ' empty ' ) - spanish ? it also occurs , incidentally , in afrikaans . 2 . ' man ' my question here related to the use of ' man ' to express a negative emotional involvement of the speaker of some sort - irritation , impatience or annoyance . examples given were : man it 's hot today hurry up mom , man man , i can't this right * english a huge response that showed that ' man ' is used similarly in : - american english ( both ' black ' and ' white ' ) - scottish english - tyneside english ( in north east of england ) - jamaican english - welsh english - an ' americanism ' found in other varieties of english . the american english usage at least does not necessary carry negative sentiment and is ' a more general tag . . . over which any kind of emotional intonation can be laid ' . example b . above , an example which typifies sa usage , was found to be odd ( ' wierd ' ) by american respondants . the reason for this is that ' man ' although an interjection still appears to ' have the flavour of a term of address so that ' mom , man ' sounds like two forms of direct address in a row ' . it seems , then , that ' man ' in sae does not bare the feature ' term of address ' at all in such contexts . the only instance in which similar usages were given was in tyneside english . ( ' shut up man geoff ' ' those kegs are too tight man mary ' . here though , the actual term of address occurs finally as opposed to the use of ' man ' finally in sae . this needs to be explored further , but of further interest : - there is a distinctly ' american ' use of ' man ' in sae that is not like the south african use of man ( ' cool man ' type of utterances ) . - other sa examples of man : - daddy , man ! ( 5 year old daughter after i stood on her toe ) - man , david , i do n't mean that ( wife and self in ' altercation ' ) - no man , that 's not right . - man ! this bloody computer is giving problems . - saenglish ' man ' alternates between shwa and full vowel in all contexts . ( in sae shwa occurs as a vowel in stressed contexts - 's it ' can have shwa for eg ) : related usage in currant american english is the use of 'd ude ' . * other languages related uses of ' man ' include : - dutch - swedish ( ' boy ' is used in a similar way ) - norwegian - ? german use of ' etwa ' may have similar function - german ( ' usually to indicate weariness ' ) - spanish - ? lhasa tibetan ( ' mi ' - ' person ' ) interestingly in dutch the 'd ouble address form [ as in ' hurry up mom , man ' ] is impossible ( just " schiet op , man " must do ) . ' some interesting stuff came out as you can see . just for your interest , on further sa english item : - ' sorry ' for ' i beg your pardon ' e . g . a drops something without knowing . b picks it up and calls out to a ' sorry , you dropped something ' anyway thanks to : helen adamson geoffrey sampson elin haf gruffyd jones celso alvarez caccamo mai kuha mark donohue marek przezdziecki scott delancey mats eeg-olofsson dom watt hilde hasselgard nicole nelson jane a . edwards sren harder charlie rowe nobue mori adiego lajara bruce connell krisadawan hongladarom frank bramlett deborah milam berkley douglas s oliver larry trask kristine hasund paul boersma m . lynne roecklein judy l . delin benji wald stephen p . spackman john verhaar randall major + the person who wished to be anonymous for the references .
