Some people do not know how to talk

V

Victor

Senior Member
Location
midwest USA
Have you noticed that some people, usually young, have not quite learned
how to talk, literally. Their speech is muffled, mumbled, incoherent.
They talk with their lips barely moving without opening their small mouth and
cannot seem to form words.
You are supposed to draw breath from the lungs
and sometimes diaphragm to articulate speech. These people, mostly girls,
then get jobs in services and stores and they mumble, whisper...as if the
price of something was a secret.
 

Funny you should post this. I've noticed it. My oldest grandson was talking to me one day on the phone and I swear, I thought I was having a stroke! :D I couldn't understand what the heck he said. He's improved now. He went to college, stayed on the Dean's and President's lists the entire time. He joined groups of young people who interned on business ventures. I think along the way he realized he better be able to be understood when he talked. Sometimes I have to tell my 14 year old granddaughter to slow down. She's another brilliant student BTW. Lately she was one of the speakers at an event that honor exceptional students. Her mother said she did very well. The worst thing about young people and language these days, and I hear it from young folks from all walks of life, is the amount of cursing they do. Even the young ladies...walking down the street and even on line at the movies, dropping the F bomb like it's nothing. It's a shame.
 
Diva, I think we can blame the media for that. The F word has become so commonplace on TV and in movies that we barely raise an eyebrow. Last week, when we had our few days of Scaramucci, the Washington Post quoted his speech at length. And in this respectable, family newspaper, the F word was repeated over and over again. (Of course, the media are at war with Trump, so every chance they get to embarrass this administration is jumped on, but still...)

About the mumbling, I've noticed that also, and sometimes wonder if I'm turning into one of these old geezers who are always complaining that everyone mumbles, or if maybe they really are just mumbling!

I think partly thanks to texting, tweeting, etc., young people think in short, simple sound bites. I really think those things have changed the way humans think and express themselves. Not necessarily for the better.
 

I notice that in many young girls, their speech is so fast that it's like someone is holding a gun to their head, and their articulation is slurred, not crisp.

The loveliest female voice I ever heard is from movie actress Lauren Bacall. She spoke with a slow, deep, voluptuous tone that you wish you could put in a bottle!

Bogart got a winner when he married her!

HDH
 
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A lot of people "talk", but they don't PROJECT; Their statements seem to disappear a few feet from their mouths.

I used to blame it on a hearing loss, but that's not the case when you're standing right next to them.
 
I was just talking to a neighbor about this. She has a young relative that is immersed in her online social media, but when the girl has to speak with people in real life face to face, she can't even make eye contact and has trouble engaging in a simple conversation. There's probably lots of things responsible for this lack of speaking ability.

I thought this was wild. :)

 
Victor said:
Have you noticed that some people, usually young, have not quite learned
how to talk, literally. Their speech is muffled, mumbled, incoherent.
They talk with their lips barely moving without opening their small mouth and
cannot seem to form words.
You are supposed to draw breath from the lungs
and sometimes diaphragm to articulate speech. These people, mostly girls,
then get jobs in services and stores and they mumble, whisper...as if the
price of something was a secret.
Click to expand...

t's a wide-spread problem, it goes back some years. My daughter is 38, but up until just a few years ago, it was almost impossible to understand her, over the phone.


She speaks more clearly now, but it's still hard to understand her because she likes to put on the speaker phone! :shrug:
I
 
It's those lousy kids. Or it could be that hearing decreases with age. And most of the hearing loss is in the higher frequencies, like female speech. I'm 71 and love watching that old B&W "Perry Mason" TV series. Ya know that damn Della Street mumbles all her lines.
 
When my youngest was in her teens she had a friend who whispered to my her whenever she was at our house, drove me nuts. Reminds me of Rog on Big Band Theory.
Later on down the road, found out her father 'loved' having her teenage girlfriends over. He was a pervert. Poor girl.
 
I agree that it's a problem with younger folks. It's not just the muffled speech, it's the lack of vocabulary, the filler words that intrude multiple times into any conversation. Riding on a train and listening to younger folks is eye opening. "I was like....and he was like, and I was all like....." It's a shame that communication has come to this level with so many. A former employee of mine told me a story recently about her son. He had a great professor who made speaking in front of the class a priority. Any "filler" words were called out in front of one's peers, then the student would have to say the same thing without extraneous verbiage. What a great way to teach folks to talk and prepare them for a future where communication skills can make all the difference in a career.

I learned early on how important it was to be able to speak to folks, starting out with sales jobs in college. In my career it was common for me to have to address large groups. Really helped having that early background. Everything today is so keyboard centric. Notice how people don't even tend to call anymore; it's far easier to text. Even emails are falling by the wayside for many folks.
 
Funny, my husband just ordered delivery from an Italian pizza place, and when I asked him how long they said it would take he said either 45 min. , or 1 hour, or 45 to an hour, or an hour and 45 minutes. :p He said it sounded like a young teenage girl and it was really hard to understand anything she was saying. It took a good hour to get here.
 
I find allot of the younger TV program presenters voices hard to,hear / understand
I try to avoid watching the gloom and doom show ( otherwise know as the news ) but I catch the last bit of the news / weather when I change channels , and the female who reads the weather voice is so screechy ( he voice even annoys hubs ) I mute it while waiting for the show to,come on that I prefer to watch
 
Sometimes the fast clipped speech is part of their neighborhood culture
as with some nonprofessional Latino girls, and they are unaware of this
because no one mentions it to them.

I'm not criticizing it--just an observation.
 

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