more dialectal t-shirts

this time on the website  TradeMe!

The enregisterment of NZ English continues. Speaking of which, the other day I used a common expression, one that I associated with hegemonic masculinity in this country, ‘you’re a legend’. Unfortunately, the person I was speaking with was not a New Zealander and I was completely misunderstood. My friend thought I was claiming he didn’t really exist!

The yeah nah phenomenon has been noted in a number of other Englishes, notably Australian, but it seems collocating with bro is strictly a local production. Like most pragmatic particles, its meaning is hard to pin down. It has been suggested to be a hedging device – buying more time for the speaker to construct their message, a device that shows solidarity with the ideas presented to the listener (yeah) and a signal (no) that more information is about to be provided by the speaker which elaborates or perhaps more likely innovates on the previous turn’s message.

Is that what it really does? Yeah nah, dunno.