Up Talking = Obnoxious!
 

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My daughter has picked up this HABIT? You KNOW? Where she ends all of her sentences as if she is asking a QUESTION? It is obnoxious. It is worse than "Valley Girl" talk.

Maybe I am just getting old. And grumpy. And mean.

Here is another. Enjoy! :)

http://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=up+talking+obnoxious&FORM=VIRE3#view=deta il&mid=ADB1FEEEBEFD9B48B4E1ADB1FEEEBEFD9B48B4E1

I feel your pain.

A reflection the speaker's lack of audience interaction and self centered nature. Something to be expected from a young person, really off putting in a so called "adult".

Bingo !!! :D

Disclaimer>>>>>>I grew up in a border town to Canada.

Many Canadians I have talked with over the years speak this way. Yes, they use "ay" at the the end of sentences but when they don't it still sounds like a question versus a statement.

I never found it obnoxious, just different. ;)

Yeah it gets on my nerves as well and for the most part it is a regional accent and I try to let is pass as such but when my daughter started doing it a few years ago I reminded her she was born and raised in Va not the UP of Mish and stayed on her about it until she quit

Ha, I did the same with my daughter. I asked her if she was making a statement or asking me a question. She gave me the deer in headlights stare for a moment.


I did not nor do we live in the UP.

You don't live in the UP, you simply exist

UP thing? I live in SE PA. It is all over here with the kids 14-28. My son is 27, thank God he doesn't talk like this.

So 74-911 is this how you speak? :)

I think discipline or correction is needed if your child's talk irritates you. A lot worse is no discipline where the parent thinks the child can do no wrong and goes through life uncorrected. Dennis and Rick you are doing it right.

The Canadian ay/eh thing does come up with some folks up here. I think it stems from a different approach to life. Americans I think generally are more independent minded. They don't need consensus to carry on. Some Canadians need that consensus or opinion from others because they feel the need for others input. To a certain extent I agree with that but I don't use the eh/ay? word but just simply ask "what do you think".

It's just a different culture here. Amazing differences between the two countries delineated by a border.

Guy

It's not just kids. It is adults as well. In adults, it imparts a message of insecurity in the topic. personally hear "I'm telling you this but have no confidence in what I am saying--effectively, I'm thinking aloud because organizing this stuff in my head before speaking is too much work and I need to be in this conversation because I need your attention more than you need this half-baked information"

No but my grandkids do sometimes....

the "bingo" also describes me. SmileWavy

Don't hang this on us buddy.....LOL. That "Valley girl" ending on a sentence is enough for "extreme prejudicial" comment when it is performed. I don't personally use "ay" but somehow (within our culture at least) doesn't seem to infer the same BS. ie "do you understand this very simple concept?" Perhaps "ay" has such a long and illustrious history it is accepted as a cultural oddity and no one notices....don't let the valley girl uptalk become a permanent and accepted part of yours ;) Cheers

Handwriting analysis is sometimes a predictor of a person's personality:
-Tight and square letters equals the same mentality.
-Ditto with sloppy.
-Starting large and ending small equals a lack of self esteem.
-Sentences ending with an upswing on the line equals a positive outlook.

I view the Canadian "aye" thing as positive and same as "am I right" or "what do you think".
It's more of an open ended statement instead of a bossy declaration of empirical fact.
It also imparts both a desire to connect with the other person and an ability to self-reflect and adapt to others.

The conversation is two-way.

So yaknow it's totally like yaknow like yaknow?

As if, like totally gag me with a spoon.....ay

Up talking is one of my most annoying pet peeves?

I really hate it?!

When I hear it on the radio in the car I start to mimick them?

And yell to myself STOP ASKING QUESTIONS!!!!?

Thanks for that John. It's like you opened the window and let the fresh air in.
Guy

Few people I know in person up-talk. My wife only does it when she's talking to Siri. She makes, "Siri, navigate to Someplace," sound like a question instead of a demand. I hear it more on reality TV shows than in person.

BTW John I liked your response.

Spot on.

Get her to stop by helping her understand what it infers. Yes, I'm serious.

My boss "up-talks", he sounds like an idiot and is unfortunately (bc he's actually very smart) viewed as one with most of our clients.

At least where I'm from (Northeast) up-talking/inflecting volume at the end of a phrase/sentence infers a question. Making the other party aware that you are talking about something but really don't have confidence in your message or are looking for their assistance to complete. So, you come across as a talking head instead of a knowledgeable resource...

I become more valuable as these diminishing social intelligence trends continue.SmileWavy

Our son did it for a while as a tween and several educators and others suggested speech therapy. It is a bad habit that should be curtailed ASAP. Fortunately our son "grew out of it" with just coaching from us and a caring teacher. I suspect many kids aren't even aware they are doing it until it's pointed-out to them.

A woman I know ends almost every written sentence with a question mark, and talks that way to some extent as well. It's irritating as all hell and as an educated professional she must know better but has chosen to communicate in this way. It's not my duty to "save her" from looking like a fool so I haven't brought it up, but it's hard to believe her close family or friends have not confronted her over the years.

"I know. Right?"

Makes my blood boil! It's even worse when people write it just like that.

Lord have mercy that one drives me insane.

:mad:

I don't know if I'm just intolerant or other people are just stupid lol.

Yeah that one makes me want to smack someone

This used to annoy me.

Now standard response is, "No, I don't know."

Stupid brainless stare insues

Kids are a product of their environment, dontcha know?

Someone comes up to you and says...."Ummmmm"....then silence. Like waiting on the other shoe to drop. Get yer thoughts together before you open yer piehole....

Ummmmm is a not a word.

And there's also an alarming trend of people in business settings beginning all answers with the word "so." It's an immediate credibility killer.

Oh yeah....."basically".........

It seems to me that that the English language is too tough for most people, too many words that folks don't understand. Dictionary?? That's the thing under the modem. Americans are a bunch of sheep when it comes to our language. If there is a NEW expression, people climb over one another to use the "Cool" redundant/ tired or new expression "Ya Think? When I hear that, to me, it means you are a dumb **** and the speaker is helping you understand. I guess DUH has lost traction/popularity. Maybe it is the spelling. if you can dig that? (Bonehead; left out but implied). Too many smart people out there for me. I'll just use Pidgin, the next "hot thing".

A lot of Delta FA's are up-talking while making announcements on the planes these days. Its catching on and growing pretty quickly. I HATE listening to it.

YES! I dig Shark Tank and hear this from the contestants ALOT.

"Ok, so what we did is......"

argh

They're all bad / weird / annoying / unnecessary but personally I'd rather listen to "up talk", silly Canadian "eh?" suffixes, valley girl speak, NYC / Brooklyn "macho" talk or even southern drawl over the northeast / Boston accent. Nasal, dry and a complete inability to pronounce the letter "r" (which if you study speech development in kids is one of the last sounds kids learn to make, suggesting most people here never advanced beyond a seven or eight year-old level speech-wise). If a stupider, more annoying or more credibility-destroying accent / dialect ever existed I have not come across it. It's hard to take anyone seriously who sounds like that. My $0.02.

That post was "Epic."

Seriously?

"So" - many people here start their posts with "so". I am sure they are nice people ANYWAY. :)

If you think "eh" is different you should listen to my Newfie friend talk.

Like "yes boy", which is actually "yes B'y". Depending on the inflection he's either agreeing with you, acknowledging what you said, his surprise or he's saying you're full of poop.
I've had to warn some of my black friends that it's nothing to do with race, he does it to everyone.

There are just too many newfie sayings to list, do a google search on newfie slang. ;)

BTW his wife is from Dildo. :D

I've always thought of upward inflection at the end of a sentence to be a passive-aggressive means of condescension, used by people with self perceived broad base of knowledge, but little confidence, and low self esteem.

It is annoying. I have to make a concerted effort to listen beyond just hearing the words when I'm being spoken to in that manner.

Where I grew up, they would have said, ''She comes from up Dildo.''.

Jeese, Bubs, was also a common expression, as was AYAH. Ayah, Bub.

It could always be worse.

What HAVE you come across, Mr O'phile ? ;) Ever come across anyone from up Dildo ?

I've even heard young TV and radio personalities doing that? I never knew what it was called?