Hi, everyone. No episódio de hoje do podcast Inglês Online, eu falo sobre algumas maneiras diferentes de pedir pra pessoa repetir o que disse (pois você não entendeu de primeira).
Transcrição
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So today's episode is about common ways to ask someone to repeat what they just said to you. You didn't hear it the first time, so you say, for example, "Come again?" There's obviously a literal meaning to that phrase, which is "Come again" or come back again some time, but if you say it more like a question, you're asking the speaker to repeat what they said. Now, it could be that you couldn't hear them, and it could also be that you're sort of questioning what they said. So "Come again?" can also be said when, let's say... You cannot believe what you just heard.

It's very simple to use. Let's say someone offers you chocolate. "Would you like some chocolate?" And you say "Come again?" "Chocolate. Would you like some chocolate?" That's it.

Here's a very similar term: Say what?  Same thing. Say what? It's like you were asking "What did you say?" or asking that person to repeat what they said. So you simply say "Say what?" We could use the same example: Would you like some chocolate? "Say what?" Chocolate. Would you like some chocolate?

Now here's another one, and this one's a bit longer. "I didn't catch that" and you can also say I didn't get that. That just means, again, I didn't hear you. Please repeat. So there you have it: come again, say what and I didn't catch that, I didn't get that.

If you watch lots of American movies and shows, you've no doubt come across the line "I didn't catch your name". That's very common and that just means that person's asking what your name is. Now, remember, it may be that you're talking to a native speaker on the phone and they're speaking a bit fast (as we often do when speaking our mother tongue) and you can't understand them very well - not just a couple of words, but overall.

In that case, you may want to ask that person to slow down, rather than saying "Come again? " or "Say what?" all the time. For most situations, just say "Could you speak slower, please?" That's the informal version, which uses the adjective "slower". The more formal version, which correctly uses the adverb, is "Could you speak more slowly, please?"

Sometimes it is necessary to explicitly ask someone to slow down, since some people will just keep repeating what they said without realising that the problem is that they're speaking too fast to be understood by someone whose native language isn't English.

Have you ever had to ask someone to slow down? Let me know in the comments, and talk to you next time!

 

Key expressions

come again?
say what?
I didn't catch that
I didn't catch your name
Could you speak slower?
Could you speak more slowly?

 

Vocabulário

slow down = desacelerar