The English can be quite vague!

I saw something on Facebook recently which prompted me to write about how we, 'The English', can be quite relaxed, vague or approximate when it comes to giving information.

We do love an .......-ish!

It's just another 'suffix', like, -ful (forgetful), -ment (argument) or -ion (creation)

But with -ish, we also use when we're not sure or can't totally commit. Think of it like 'around' or 'fairly'.

For example:-

"Would you like to go out tonight? I can pick you up sevenish?"

"No, that's too early, eightish would be better".

You have to then ask yourself, what are your expectations about when you're exactly meeting. Is it a little before or after 8 o'clock. Does arriving at 8.20pm mean you're late???

For example:-

'What colour do you think this is?" "A kind of reddish cream?"

"No, I think it's more like a brownish cream".

For example:-

"Describe your boss".

"He's tall, small and fiftyish".

Another way that English people can use '-ish' is on its own.

For example:-

"Are you happy with your new car?"

"Ish".

So in this situation, is the person happy or not? The answer would be 'fairly'. Not really happy and not unhappy.

In general, the rules regarding when to use '-ish' are a little relaxed and you can argue it's quite informal, so be careful.

It's also important to highlight there are some words that have 'ish' on the end which don't mean ' similar to' or 'around' or 'fairly'. An example of this would be the word 'sheepish'. It doesn't mean 'similar to a sheep'. Translated it's 'zakłopotany'.

My advice would be to listen out for this ending. See how it's used. It's common with British English speakers particularly.

So good luck.

#nativespeaker, #newvocabulary, #brzegdolnynativespeaker