Vague language is words and phrases that aren’t very exact or precise.
You might want to use these phrases if you aren’t sure of all the details of something, to speak informally in a friendly way, or perhaps just to save time in a conversation!
TRANSCRIPT
William
Hello, and welcome to another exciting edition of How To. My name is William Kremer. Coming up today:
EXAMPLES
He’s about fifty, greyish hair, beard – looks a bit like a politician.
Well, he’s kind of scary when you first meet him, but he’s a really nice guy.
William
We’re going to be talking about vague language. That is language that isn’t very exact: it isn’t very precise. Now in the past, some people have thought vagueness to be a bad thing but actually it’s very useful. But it’s important to note that vagueness in written English is quite different from vagueness in spoken English, and it’s spoken English that we’re looking at today.
Let’s start by listening to this clip:
EXAMPLE
Woman
Have you had a chance to read the new contract?
Man
Yeah. I mean, it’s more or less the same as the last one, but there are one or two bits we should look at.
William
The man said that the new contract was more or less the same as the old one. In practice, we use more or less to mean almost. The contracts are more or less the same – they’re almost the same. Perhaps more interesting than this is what he says afterwards:
EXAMPLE
Man
Yeah. I mean, it’s more or less the same as the last one, but there are one or two bits we should look at.
William
There are one or two bits we should look at. He’s saying that there are one or two things in the new contract that need attention. And these words – bit, thing, also the word stuff – they’re very vague. We don’t know exactly what it is he’s talking about; that’s a discussion for another time.
EXAMPLE
Man
Yeah. I mean, it’s more or less the same as the last one, but there are one or two bits we should look at.
William
That phrase he uses – one or two bits – is also vague. There might actually be three or four bits, but by saying one or two, the man shows that there are a few things that we need to talk about.
Let’s now look at another way that we can be vague when we’re using numbers.
EXAMPLE
Woman 1
Have we got all the pencils?
Woman 2
Yeah. There’s about a hundred in that box and about thirty in that one.
William
There’s about a hundred in that box and about thirty in that one. In fact, there might be slightly more or fewer pencils than this number. Now, as well as saying about we can also say around. And we can use these words – about, around – for counting pencils, or to talk about someone’s age:
EXAMPLE
He’s around twenty.
William
Or to give an idea of the time:
EXAMPLE
Man
I leave work at about 5 most days.
Woman
Shall we meet at around four?
William
I’m sure a lot of you will already know those words: about and around. But you might not know this next phrase. Listen carefully. How many people work in the man’s office?
EXAMPLE
Woman
How many people are there, where you work?
Man
About fifty-odd, I think.
William
How many people work in his office? About fifty-odd.
EXAMPLE
About fifty-odd, I think.
William
Now, this doesn’t mean that he works with 49 strange people! Odd is being used here to mean about. He works with fifty-odd people – about fifty people. Notice how the emphasis falls on the number, not the word odd.
EXAMPLE
About fifty-odd, I think.
William
Now this word odd is perhaps not as useful as around or about because we only use it for counting: we can’t use it to talk about someone’s age or to give an idea of the time. So, if you don’t know exactly what the time is, you can say, It’s about two o’clock. Or, you could use the following phrase:
EXAMPLE
Man
What time do you think you’ll be finished tonight?
Woman
I dunno. Seven-ish maybe.
William
The woman will be finished at seven-ish – at about seven o’clock. ‘Seven-ish‘.
EXAMPLE
I dunno. Seven-ish maybe.
William
So, to be vague we can add ish to numbers: five-ish, six-ish, seven-ish. But we can also add it to some adjectives, and this makes it a very useful way to describe someone or something in a vague way. Listen to this description of a person:
EXAMPLE
He’s about fifty, greyish hair, beard – looks a bit like a politician.
William
The man being described has greyish hair – hair that is slightly grey – perhaps he’s going grey! Now listen to this person describe someone else:
EXAMPLE
Erm, she’s quite tall and she’s got sort of reddish-brown hair.
William
She’s got sort of reddish-brown hair. So we can use sort of to describe someone in a vague way. And we can also use kind of in this way:
EXAMPLE
Well, he’s kind of scary when you first meet him, but he’s a really nice guy.
William
He’s kind of scary when you first meet him. Now we don’t know why he’s scary but in some way he’s scary when you meet him.
EXAMPLE
Well, he’s kind of scary when you first meet him, but he’s a really nice guy.
William
So, there you have it. If you want to be, sort of, vague you have a number of ways of doing it. There must be ten different ways – no – twenty-odd ways to be kind of vague, more or less.
Language from the programme
The following notes are about vagueness in spoken English. Vagueness in written English is quite different!
Vague nouns
Thing
The word thing refers to objects which aren’t described – we don’t know what the objects are, only that they exist! So in this sentence:
- There are a few things I’m not happy about.
We don’t know what the speaker is unhappy about.
Bit
Bit often refers to a part or section of something. Both bit and thing can be used if we don’t know the English word for something or if we’ve forgotten it:
- I’ve broken my stapler. I dropped it and the bit which holds the paper in place snapped.
Stuff
The word stuff refers to more than one object. It is a non-count noun.
- There’s loads of stuff in the attic. Can you have a look and see if any of it’s yours?
It can also be used to talk about ideas or words:
- All this stuff in his speech about workers’ rights: do you think he actually meant any of that?
Quantifiers
Most quantifiers are quite vague. In this programme we looked at how the words one or two can refer to three, four or five things.
- I expect the meeting will be quite short. We only have one or two things to discuss.
Other quantifiers include:
- a few
- a couple of
- a lot of
- plenty of
- loads of
Vagueness and numbers
Around, about
Some words allow you to give more detail than a quantifier but are still vague. You can use around and about to give a vague idea of a number.
They can be used to give an idea of time or age too.
- There are about two hundred people outside.
- It must be around three o’clock now.
- He’s about fifty, fifty-five maybe.
Odd
You can use the word odd to give an idea of a number (but not to indicate age or time). This is informal English.
- Did you know there are loads of people outside? Must be 200-odd out there.
Or so
Slightly more formal, you can use or so in the same way.
- There are thirty or so leaflets there. Do you think you could fold them for me?
More or less
Note that the phrase more or less is not usually used with numbers. It means almost and we often use it to indicate if something is finished.
- I’m more or less done here. I just need to double-check these sums before I print it off.
-ish
You can add -ish to give a vague indication of the time:
- I usually get home about sixish, maybe half-six, depending on traffic.
You can also add -ish to some adjectives. Used like this, it means a little or slightly.
- She has reddish hair.
- He’s a tallish guy – maybe 6 foot?
-ish is informal English and you can use it creatively. It can even be used on its own to mean a little bit.
- A: Are you hungry yet?
- B: Ish. I could eat, if you’re hungry.
Sort of, kind of
These are useful phrases for giving a description of someone. They qualify a statement slightly, so if someone says:
- She has sort of reddish hair.
It is understood that this person’s hair is not completely red: it might be a little bit brown. It is not the description that is vague here, but the colour itself!
In some contexts, the phrase means in some ways:
- It’s kind of crazy how they advertise jobs you can’t actually apply for.
And stuff, and everything, and so on
These phrases can save you from giving a long list of things. If someone says:
- She’s a typical little girl really – into dolls and pretty dresses and stuff.
The speaker is saying that the girl is interested in dolls, pretty dresses and things similar to dolls and pretty dresses.
The speaker has used two examples of her interests with and stuff to give us a vague idea of her personality.
- They sell loads of really cool stuff – all vintage dresses and everything.
In this example, the shop sells vintage dresses and other related things – possibly: antique jewellery, shoes and hats.