transcript

Speaker 1:
[00:00] This is an All Ears English Podcast, episode 2605. It sounded like Prince himself, how to note prestige in English. Welcome to the All Ears English Podcast, downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on connection, not perfection. With your American hosts, Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, coming to you from Colorado and New York City, USA. To get real-time transcripts right on your phone and create your personalized vocabulary list, try the All Ears English app for iOS and Android. Start your 7-day free trial at allearsenglish.com/app.

Speaker 2:
[01:01] Maybe you feel surprised that a famous or prestigious person takes an action that you didn't expect. Find out what you can say in English to note this moment. Have you ever finished a conversation in English and thought, I know I can say that better? You understood everything that was said. You had ideas, opinions, maybe even a joke. But when it was your turn to speak, your answer came out shorter than you wanted, or more basic than how you would say it in your own language. This happens when your understanding is stronger than your speaking fluency. The good news? That gap is very common and very fixable once you know exactly where you are. Take our free two-minute fluency quiz to discover your current English level and what to work on next. Go to allearsenglish.com/fluencyscore. That's allearsenglish.com/f-l-u-e-n-c-y-s-c-o-r-e.

Speaker 1:
[02:18] Hey, Michelle, what's shaking? What's going on today?

Speaker 2:
[02:21] Not too much, Lindsay, but I have a question for you about musical taste.

Speaker 1:
[02:25] Okay.

Speaker 2:
[02:26] Are you a fan of the musician Prince?

Speaker 1:
[02:30] Oh, man. You know what? His songs are so iconic, so I like that. But I'm not a huge Prince person. Yeah, I'm not a huge Prince person. I don't think I would buy an album. But when the song comes on the radio, I know it, it's kind of fun. But yeah, but it sounds like you are, is that right?

Speaker 2:
[02:48] I mean, I'm not a huge Prince fan, but I do appreciate his music. And so actually the other day, I did a Peloton ride and it was all Prince songs. Wow.

Speaker 1:
[03:01] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[03:02] So I like to, when I do a Peloton, if I can, I like to do like specific artists. That's so fun.

Speaker 1:
[03:08] I didn't know they had that.

Speaker 2:
[03:09] Oh, yeah. That's like one of the best things about it is I like, yeah, that you can choose like a Backstreet Boys ride. And they really theme the ride to that artist and wear certain things. So it's fun. But after the ride, I had had his song stuck in my head and I was actually singing to them. Of course, Dan started to tease me. Of course. I said, don't you like my singing? And he said, yeah, for a second I thought I was listening to Prince himself.

Speaker 1:
[03:41] He was praising your singing.

Speaker 2:
[03:44] Yeah, right. Not so much. So but I stopped him and I said, wait a second, that's a good idea for an episode. So that's a good one. It must be funny being married to me because, yeah, right? Like I'm sure you have that too, where you're just talking and then you're like, wait a second.

Speaker 1:
[04:01] Oh, 100%. Even on vacations or on the weekend, I'm always sending myself emails. That's me too.

Speaker 2:
[04:07] You do it in your email too?

Speaker 1:
[04:09] Oh, I email myself all the time. Ideas will be like up in the mountains and we'll say something, you know, oh, that's it. That would make a great episode.

Speaker 2:
[04:17] That's really funny. That's exactly what I do. I'll just send myself an email so I don't forget. Yeah. So this is this is going to I'm excited for this episode because it to me was so unique. And I said and I actually said to Dan, I said, why do you think? Why did you add himself? Why did you say that? So he was actually able to kind of express it pretty well. And so I just said, we have to do an episode on this. So let's see. Do you hear this type of construction adding himself or herself in this way?

Speaker 1:
[04:52] Oh, for sure. For sure. And I'm excited to dive into exactly what it means, what it does, what you and Dan decided it means. And we can extrapolate that out for our audience because I feel like this is not in the textbooks, Michelle.

Speaker 2:
[05:04] No, no, no, no, no. This is definitely just like real life in the moment English. I mean, because so the question is, why didn't he just say, I thought I was listening to Prince Prince?

Speaker 1:
[05:16] Good question. And we're going to find that out in just a minute. But we have a request for our listeners first. Guys, go ahead and hit the follow button wherever you're listening. If you're listening on Apple Podcast or Spotify, hit follow. If you are listening on YouTube, which you might be because we do put five of these episodes a week on YouTube, then hit subscribe so that you make sure that we drop into your listening and learning queue almost every day. Almost every day, Michelle.

Speaker 2:
[05:41] Almost every day. Yes, exactly. So hit follow. So we were discussing what the difference is. I mean, Lindsay, do you have any inkling off the bat?

Speaker 1:
[05:51] Yeah. So I feel like it's certainly making it more emphatic, right? So I felt like I was listening to Prince himself.

Speaker 2:
[06:00] Right, right.

Speaker 1:
[06:02] And it makes it a little bit stronger. And it's a little bit teasing too. It might be a little sarcastic. I mean, depending on the quality of the singing, right? It could be, you're an actual singer, so I'm sure it wasn't exactly like that. But if I'm a terrible singer. So if someone's really a bad singer, it could be completely sarcastic, right? Right.

Speaker 2:
[06:24] Exactly. No, he was being sarcastic. But yeah, it was more emphatic. And more like we were saying Prince was actually in the room singing. Well, I mean, unfortunately, he's not alive anymore. But not just we heard his song out or on the radio, right? It's stronger by adding himself that it's actually Prince.

Speaker 1:
[06:49] The live experience, right?

Speaker 2:
[06:51] Exactly. So because without the himself, it's just kind of neutral, a little more bland. But Dan was joking around, used himself to add to what he was saying.

Speaker 1:
[07:02] Makes sense. It shows your personality. It shows a bit of playfulness, which makes sense. I think Dan's kind of a funny guy, right?

Speaker 2:
[07:08] It's a very funny guy.

Speaker 1:
[07:10] It makes total sense, you know?

Speaker 3:
[07:12] Yeah.

Speaker 2:
[07:13] So yeah, and then I looked into a little more, and I found that we were basically correct. So the construction here would be noun plus himself or herself or themselves. So there are other patterns, but we wanted to focus on this one today. I mean, so Lindsay, this sounds pretty common to you, right?

Speaker 1:
[07:35] Yeah. I think it's pretty common for sure. And again, I'm excited because our listeners will never find this in any textbook or any traditional B2 English class. This is not something they're going to teach you. So this is really cool. Michelle, let's look at some more examples here to see exactly how this is used, shall we?

Speaker 2:
[07:51] Exactly. All right. So the first one is, oh my gosh, I met Jennifer Aniston herself last weekend. She is even more beautiful in person. So it doesn't always have to be, oh, you're teasing someone, right? This is saying, I could have just said, oh my gosh, I met Jennifer Aniston last weekend. Right.

Speaker 1:
[08:10] And you're actually saying you met the actual Jennifer Aniston.

Speaker 2:
[08:12] Yes. Right. I mean, I wish that were true. I love her. So herself, here I'm saying, I'm being more emphatic, a little bit more dramatic, Jennifer Aniston herself, the actual Jennifer Aniston, she was actually in the room.

Speaker 1:
[08:30] Right. It wasn't her agent. It wasn't her representatives. It was her. Right?

Speaker 2:
[08:37] Yes. Exactly.

Speaker 1:
[08:38] Okay. Okay. Or the head of the company called me back herself. I was shocked. Okay. So this is different. So this is saying, well, it's not different. It's similar. It's saying, wow, I was surprised that she didn't have someone working for her calling me back. She called me back.

Speaker 2:
[08:54] Right. Exactly. Because otherwise, if you just said, the head of the company called me back. This is like adding an extra layer, a little bit more of what's going on in your mind and that that was surprising to you in some way.

Speaker 1:
[09:07] That's right. It's giving a hint into what your expectations were and what the reality was.

Speaker 2:
[09:13] Right. Or here's another one. The doctor himself called me to answer my question. I was so impressed. Now, same idea, right? I mean, I don't know how it is in other countries, but a lot of times you make a call and then maybe you'll hear from a nurse or someone else. So it's always like, oh.

Speaker 1:
[09:38] Right. Totally. When the person at the top does the action, it might be surprising because you're a customer. And normally, there's layers of other employees that could take care of that. Right?

Speaker 2:
[09:51] Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 1:
[09:53] Yes.

Speaker 4:
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Speaker 1:
[10:21] Go to your happy price, Priceline. Okay, great. So Michelle, there are other ways we could communicate this, like saying the real or the real one, right? Like Dan could have said, I thought I was listening to the real Prince, right?

Speaker 2:
[10:36] Yeah, exactly. Or you could also say the actual, right? The actual CEO called me to offer me the job.

Speaker 1:
[10:45] And you would have to really play some emphasis on actual there. The actual CEO called me to offer me the job.

Speaker 2:
[10:52] Exactly, right. And that's a really good point. I mean, if you're being, I mean, all of these are to showcase personality, show that there was an added layer to how you felt about something.

Speaker 1:
[11:03] Yes.

Speaker 2:
[11:04] And so we want to show that with our voice, right? We don't want to just say the doctor himself called me, right? The doctor himself.

Speaker 1:
[11:14] It matters how you deliver it, right, Michelle? It definitely matters. Love it. Yes. Any of these more natural than any others for you, Michelle?

Speaker 2:
[11:22] I mean, I like the himself, right? It's definitely very natural sounding. And it's just interesting because I'm sure I use this all the time, but it didn't stand out to me until that one situation.

Speaker 1:
[11:38] Yeah. And I also think that himself or herself or themselves has a bit more of a performative connotation to it for me, like performances on stage or actor. I don't know. It lends prestige to whoever you're dealing with. It prints himself in the room.

Speaker 2:
[11:56] That's a very good point. I mean, yeah, because it is also, yeah, the prestige. I mean, if you look at our examples, the head of the company, the doctor, you know, so yeah, that's a really good point. There's some sort of prestige to it.

Speaker 1:
[12:12] Prestige. Interesting. We haven't talked about prestige on the show before. I love that word. It's a good word.

Speaker 2:
[12:16] Yeah, that's a good one.

Speaker 1:
[12:18] All right, Michelle, let's go into a role play. So here you and me, we are at a Broadway show together. I wonder what show we're seeing.

Speaker 2:
[12:24] I wonder. All right. So we went to the show. Oh my gosh. I think I just saw the star of the show herself walk by.

Speaker 1:
[12:34] Are you serious? Wow.

Speaker 2:
[12:36] Yes. Last time I saw a show, I got an autograph from the actual composer of the musical.

Speaker 1:
[12:43] That's incredible. The real composer?

Speaker 2:
[12:45] The real one.

Speaker 1:
[12:47] Wow. Well, of course, it's going to open the question. I mean, we've both lived in New York for multiple years. I mean, I know you have a Conan story. No, no, no. You have a...

Speaker 2:
[12:59] No, I did. I met Conan, but that was actually in DC. I met Seth Meyers. I met... Who else? I mean, other people that for some reason I'm blanking on right now.

Speaker 1:
[13:13] What about you? Well, my biggest story is Julianne Moore, her kids took tennis lessons where I taught. So I taught her kid on the court. And she came to pick up her kid and I was like, whoa.

Speaker 2:
[13:28] Did she seem friendly?

Speaker 1:
[13:29] Yeah. I mean, she was talking to the other moms, just like a mom in there. Just no different than any other tennis mom, which is really cool. That's really cool. These are the cool things that happen when we live in New York.

Speaker 2:
[13:43] Yeah. Exactly. But yeah, I mean, one of the cool things with Broadway is there's the stage door after. And I used to do that a lot. Actually, before I moved to New York even, I met Hugh Jackman at the stage door.

Speaker 1:
[13:57] What is the stage door with Broadway?

Speaker 2:
[13:59] Yeah. So this is when after the show, there's a special door where the stars will just walk out to leave. So people sometimes, well, yeah, it depends on how big the stars are, but they will just wait. And just wait in line and just wait around to see them come out.

Speaker 1:
[14:21] That's so funny.

Speaker 2:
[14:22] And a lot of times, they'll come out and sign autographs. Sometimes you're waiting for a long time and they'll say, oh, they're not coming or they're already left, right? Yeah. And you're like, where were they? You know, they snuck out. But the last time I went to the stage door, I took my son to see Aladdin. This is before we moved. And there was, you know, he just wanted to, it wasn't any names I knew, but he wanted to meet the genie.

Speaker 1:
[14:48] So that's pretty cool. It's pretty cool. Good to know, stage door. I didn't even know that was a thing that people did on Broadway.

Speaker 2:
[14:55] I really didn't know. So you can meet the actual stars of the show.

Speaker 1:
[14:58] Very cool. I love it. So yeah, that's kind of, yeah, I think this would be really useful when talking about celebrities for sure. But that's not the only thing, right? As we mentioned, CEOs or people that just don't seem, that seem maybe above a certain task and they're doing something themselves, right?

Speaker 2:
[15:15] Yeah, very interesting. So all right, let's go through what we said. So I said, oh my gosh, I think I just saw the star of the show herself walk by. Now, I'm not saying that she walked by herself, right? I'm emphasizing that the actual, the real, oh my gosh, right? That's prestige.

Speaker 1:
[15:35] It's the star of the show herself and the intonation is important. So yeah, this might be a brand new skill for some of our listeners. I'm excited to see them try this out. Then you said, the last time I saw a show, I got an autograph from the actual composer of the musical. You're just saying that's a big deal to you, right? Because the actual composer signed your paper, right?

Speaker 2:
[15:57] Yes. Exactly. You said, the real composer and I said, the real one.

Speaker 1:
[16:04] Nice. I feel like this is pretty clear. It's about prestige. When someone is prestigious and they're right in front of you, they're interacting with you, they're doing something, that's a big deal, and you have to note that moment, right?

Speaker 2:
[16:19] Yeah. Very interesting. So yeah, guys, check out episode 2579. That was Don't Undermine Your English. Listen today.

Speaker 1:
[16:28] Any final thoughts on connection here, Michelle?

Speaker 2:
[16:31] These are just really good ways to show your personality, to show how you are reacting or not judging, but interpreting this person that you're experiencing, right? Is it that there, you know, it doesn't have to be that it's a Broadway star. It can still be some, it could just be someone who is like important in some way. You're surprised about something. So just, there's a lot to do with this. And we've given you some ideas today. And now you know that I'm not good at singing Prince songs.

Speaker 1:
[17:04] All right, good stuff. Thanks Michelle for bringing in your real life story. And we'll see you back on the show soon.

Speaker 2:
[17:09] All right. Bye Lindsay.

Speaker 1:
[17:11] Bye. Thanks for listening to All Ears English. Would you like to know your English level? Take our two-minute quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com/fluencyscore. And if you believe in connection, not perfection, then hit subscribe now to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time.

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