Ordinary Gweilo

recent posts

about

Thanks

It’s a simple word, but what does it mean?  We should be happy when someone writes "thanks", shouldn’t we?  Except that it is often used in emails to mean that someone expects you to do something, rather than expressing gratitude for a job well done.

I suppose it has grown out of the weasel phrase "thanks in anticipation", which is supposed to look polite but really isn’t.  Shorten it and you have "thanks" as an instruction.  Yeuch.

An exclamation mark can help to convert it from an instruction back to its original meaning, but who uses punctuation these days?

Posted in

3 responses to “Thanks”

  1. Bill avatar
    Bill

    I never looked at the word “Thanks” that way before and you know what you are right! Most of the time these days, the word thanks is exactly as you wrote it to be. Its a thanks in anticipation of something that you will be doing for someone else. I will be looking at the word thanks much differently now.
    Bill
    http://billscott1974.blogspot.com/

    Like

    Reply
  2. fumier avatar
    fumier

    It’s about time for a cheese post, isn’t it? Thanks.

    Like

    Reply
  3. ken avatar
    ken

    I thought it was an English expression said in a Chinese way, as is so common here in Hong Kong. And now even “gweilos” are doing it? Hmmmmmm…..

    Like

    Reply

Leave a reply to fumier Cancel reply