AEE 2436: The Audacity! Have the Nerve to Connect in English

This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 2436. The audacity have the nerve to connect in English. Welcome to the All Ears English podcast downloaded more than 200 million times. Are you feeling stuck with your English? We'll show you how to become fearless and fluent by focusing on... Connection, not perfection with your American host, Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl and Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz. coming to you from Arizona and New York City, USA.

And to get your transcripts delivered by email every week go to allearsenglish.com forward slash subscribe. Do you have audacity? Do you know someone who has a lot of nerve? Today we answer a listener question about this impressive adjective. Listen in to learn how to connect about confidence in English.

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Hey, Michelle. How are you doing? Hey, Aubrey. I'm good. I'm good. I'm happy to record with you today. Guys, Lindsay is out of town, so she is not here. But don't worry, she will be back. And we're looking forward to having her back. But Aubrey, we're having some fun over here, right? Yes, I love recording with you, Michelle. I'm excited for this episode today. Tell me what is the name of the recording software that you use to record things like ads and titles?

Oh, it's Audacity. Yeah, that's the software that we record on. Which is a fun name for software because it has a very... It's an interesting meaning in English, right? It's not just the brand of some computer recording software. Yes, exactly. So today we have a great question from our listener, Bita, about this word. Would you like me to read the question? This is from YouTube.

All right. So Bita says, Hey guys, the other day I came across the term audacity on an Instagram reel. And I've been hearing it all the time, but I didn't know the exact meaning or whether it is used in a positive or negative way. I would appreciate it if you could make an episode about it. You're a longtime fan, Bita. Okay.

Great question. And thank you for being our longtime fan. We're so appreciative. Thank you. And great question. And we use it both ways. So this is really interesting. This might be super positive to say someone has audacity. it might be negative. So yeah, the audacity. So I'm going to dive into all of these. Exactly. So yeah, this is a super good question. I mean, when I hear the word audacity, I think of, well,

first of all, our software. But I also, one of the first things I think of is Barack Obama, because he had a book called The Audacity of Hope. I don't know if I told you this, Michelle, or listeners out here, you may have heard this, that my son recently had to memorize a speech at school. And he memorized Obama's Yes, We Can speech. And it was all about hope and unity.

selections of it because it had to be three to five minutes but he did such a great job it was so amazing yeah it's just such an amazing message of hope yeah you sent me the video i remember and he's right what an incredible boy right that's you must have been just beaming, right? Absolutely. But it is interesting to use it this way to say the audacity of hope. So yeah, that's interesting. Yeah. So we're going to talk about more what this means. I mean,

All right, let's get into it. So it basically means this confidence, this boldness, you don't have fear, right? And it can be used in either a positive or a negative way, don't you think? Exactly. So here, this is very positive. The audacity of hope, meaning like we are willing to hope even in spite of challenges, in spite of fears, right? We're lacking fear. We have confidence that we can have hope in spite of.

any reason that we wouldn't. Yes, exactly. Let's give some examples of how it can be used in a positive way. Here we go. Here's the first one. It's amazing that he had the audacity to move to New York.

all by himself. I wouldn't be that brave. Yeah. And this is really interesting to think about describing someone as having audacity. You don't always know for sure how positive someone is being right if you say this there could be an implication that you think it's sort of foolish or foolhardy right that someone maybe is just moving with no funds no plan be like he's got a lot of audacity to just move to new york

York by himself, right? That might be almost criticism, but someone else might mean it as really a compliment, like, I'm impressed that they're that brave. I don't know if I could do it. And there's no implied criticism. So that's interesting about this word. Sometimes you won't really be sure.

Yeah, that's true. You would have to listen to the intonation. You would have to maybe know something, a little something about the person who's saying it. Or you might even have to ask a follow-up question, right? Like you could say like, I think it's so impressive. You know, what about you? think yep yep or here's another example his fashion choices show his audacity he really stands out on the red carpet

Yeah. And again, right? Is there an implied criticism here or is it only a compliment? You might see this word audacity in news media and the author may have intended one or the other and you won't be sure. True. So let's talk about more of the negative side.

Yeah. I mean, Aubrey, you've made a really good point that even the positive ones could be negative. It could be like a veiled criticism. This is where it's very subtle. It's very slight. It's not obvious because it could be taken positively. Right. But these ones are a little bit more obvious that they're negative, right? It's almost in this way, audacity means almost too brave.

And Aubrey, you want to read some of those examples? Sure. So you might say, I can't believe she has the audacity to think she didn't need to audition for the part. This is definitely a criticism, a judgment, right? It's not a kind thing to say. You probably would not say to... someone's face. I can't believe you have the audacity to think you could get the part without auditioning. This is really harsh. Right, right, right, right.

Or if he has the audacity to argue with his boss, who knows what he will do next? Right. This definitely means like they're overly bold to the point that it might be causing problems for them. Right. This is definitely a negative characteristic sometimes to have audacity. Right. Yep. It really depends.

Okay, so Aubrey, yeah, to me, when I hear audacity, I do think that I... i do think more of the negative side right somebody has the audacity to do something like it's shocking yeah you too i don't i think yeah i think that is how i hear it used more and how i i use it more but

It can be positive. So that's why it's really tricky. If someone's saying, I really admire her audacity, that's positive, right? Because if someone is very shy and timid and has no audacity, they might really admire that enough. other people. And they see themselves, maybe they're getting steamrolled a lot. They're like, I wish I had more audacity. Right? Yeah, exactly. So I mean, and

It can be positive, like that New York example, but that could also be negative. So it's really... you have to think about the context but i also wanted to point out the grammar we often say the audacity to do something the audacity to blank right um so

Aubrey, I thought we could play a tiny little game. I'm going to give some examples and we'll talk about if we think it's more positive. Oh, you know I love a game. I'm excited. Oh, God. All right. I'm shocked that she has the audacity to start her own fashion company. She always seemed so timid. to me. So what do you think? Is this more of like, I'm shocked in a good way?

This definitely seems more positive, right? If you are seeing someone as normally being timid and they have overcome that and they have the audacity to create a business, where's the negative there, right? I think this is definitely positive. What do you think?

Yeah, I think so too. Now let's do this one. I'm shocked that she has the audacity to start her own fashion company after the way she behaved at that conference. Ooh, this is negative. I didn't see the behavior at the conference, but it sounds... both in your intonation and some context here. I am shocked that she has the audacity. You can hear in your voice that this is negative.

Right, right, right. And sometimes, Aubrey, you were saying at the beginning when we were talking about the episode that you often say it like this. You want to do it for us? Yeah, I will. After someone says something sort of shocking, I'll just say the audacity.

And this isn't just me. I hear it used this way. This is very common, but this is definitely how I most often use this word. Let's do a little role play to see how that might look, Michelle. Okay. All right. She's always late. The audacity. And so all that means is I'm saying sort of like, how dare she? Like, think that it's okay to always be late. But it is a little bit playful, right? Because if I actually said that outright, how dare she always be late? It's so rude. All of that is so mean.

Right. Whereas to just be like the audacity. I'm sort of poking fun at us for caring so much. Right. I'm making it lighter. Yeah, exactly. Some similar words you might hear are the gall or the nerve, right? So she had the gall to fire two employees who just earned her a lot of money. Yes, we hear this a lot, right? She has some gall. I can't believe she has the gall to do that. It's very similar, very interchangeable. Yep. Yep. Or what's another one?

Or the nerve. I use this even more. I can't believe she has the nerve to do that. This is negative. I don't think I would ever say like, I was so impressed she had the nerve to start that business. I feel like. I mostly hear this used negatively. What do you think, Michelle? Hmm.

Could be positive. It could be okay. I'm imagining somebody right standing up to somebody right I I can't I'm so glad that one of us had the nerve to stand up to blah blah blah Right a good point because then you're you're using it to mean courage

Right. You had the nerve to do that. You had the courage to do that. That's a good point. And even this other example that was so positive, if I put in nerve, I am shocked that she has the nerve to start her own fashion company. She always seems so timid to me. Right. Very interchangeable.

um interesting because gall i would say i wouldn't say gall that way i can't believe she has the gall to do this i feel like that's always negative ah very interesting and then of course you could use more basic ones like fearless or fearlessness Her fearlessness is exactly what got her to where she is in life.

And this is much more positive, right? If someone is fearless, that's really usually, there's no negative implication there. They're just brave. They're courageous. They're fearless. You'd have to really add a lot of context to make that negative. yeah be like yeah she really doesn't think before she acts she's always been but even then i wouldn't say fearless i would say maybe foolhardy

Yeah, I don't know. I put foolhardy down as a keyword for today because I really like it, but I don't use it that much, but I like it. So maybe I'll start. Maybe I should start using it. It is a little less common, but yeah, I like it. I like it better than... foolish. I feel like the word foolish is so much kind of meaner and critical. Foolhardy just sounds a little more lighthearted. So I say that usually instead of foolish. I like that. I like it. All right.

Let's do a role play. So here we are, friends, thinking about opening a boutique together. All right, here we go. I don't know. Do we have the audacity to actually do this? Let's make our dreams come true. We are fearless. Yes, no more working in bad situations where our bosses have the gall to call us in at 2am for no reason. You can say that again. Mine definitely had a lot of nerve. Oh, that's nice.

yeah these are good because this is really how we use it right you first said do we have the audacity to actually do this and this is where it is being used just positively right are we brave enough to take this risk yeah yeah there it's And then we're kind of getting ourselves amped up. We're all excited. So you said we are fearless. Yeah, I'm giving us a pep talk here. We can do it. We do have the nerve to do this.

And then you said our bosses had the gall to call us in at 2am for no reason. So this is very that negative use of like, how dare they? They had the gall of doing something unreasonable. Yep. And then you said... you can say that again mine definitely had a lot of nerve so negative way yeah meaning they

they were willing to do things that were disrespectful or inappropriate will often just be like, you got a lot of nerve doing that. That means you're just criticizing, judging the action. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Oh my gosh. Well, this was a lot of fun, Aubrey. What a good question. Really brought us around to a lot of different conversation topics and talking about the depth of this word and how it really depends on the context.

Head on over to one of our Saturday episodes that we did, which was, this isn't what I ordered, how to ask for the correct order in English. You might need a little bit of nerve to do that. Oh, that's a good point, right? It takes a lot of nerve to send back.

an order that was incorrect. I have the nerve to do that if it's really wrong or something's really bad. My partner does not. He would never. He's like, I'm just going to eat this silently. He doesn't have the nerve to send it back. I have the nerve.

I have the nerve. I'm paying. Anyway, takeaway for today is, you know, you really have to listen about whether audacity is used more in a positive or negative context. Aubrey and I kind of came to this conclusion that more frequently you might hear it in a negative context but there are

different situations. And we gave you lots of examples of that today. This is definitely a word to be a little bit careful with because you could intend to mean it positively and accidentally say it negatively. If the tone isn't just right or it's not.

Not clear by the context, right? Whoever you're talking to or about might misunderstand because it is often used negatively to say someone has audacity or I can't believe they have the audacity to do that. So definitely a pitfall to watch out for in English. Really good point, Aubrey. All right. Well, this was fun. Thanks for chatting with me today and I'll see you soon. That's awesome. See you next time. All right. Bye.

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