#4 – Non-literal meaning

Have someone ever said something to you, but you’ve completely misunderstood what they actually meant? 🫣

Well you’re not alone. There’s an entire branch of linguistics dedicated to figuring out what's going on when this happens. 😲

It’s called pragmatics, and it's the study of non-literal meaning.

Imagine someone said to you “It’s getting hot in here, isn’t it?”
(Well, the only correct response is “Calm down, Nelly! 🙄”)

In all seriousness though, there are many things they could be trying to communicate to you.

Here are a few examples:

- Would it be okay if I open a window? 🪟

- Please could you get me a cold drink? 🍹

- Let’s Marvin Gaye and get it on. 😏

- I’d like you to stand over me blowing cold air at my face like a fan. 🌬️

(I’ll admit the last one is a bit odd, but I could definitely see it being a forfeit to someone losing a bet!)

How and why we get these meanings often comes down to context and social clues, but sometimes there’s more going on than meets the eye. 👁️

Anyway, I think it's pretty cool, so I’ll be diving into this kind of thing in more depth in future posts. 🤓