English Greetings and Introductions - Spoken English Englische Begrüßungen und Einführungen - Gesprochenes Englisch English Greetings and Introductions - Spoken English Saludos y presentaciones en inglés - Spoken English Salutations et présentations en anglais - Parler anglais 英語の挨拶と自己紹介 - 話す英語 Engelse begroetingen en introducties - Gesproken Engels Angielskie powitania i przedstawianie się - angielski mówiony Saudações e apresentações em inglês - Inglês falado Английские приветствия и знакомства - Разговорный английский İngilizce Selamlaşma ve Tanışma - Konuşulan İngilizce Англійські привітання та знайомства - розмовна англійська

Hello.

Hi.

What's your name?

My name's Kasia, and you are?

My name's Olivier.

Nice to meet you.

And you.

What are we doing in this lesson?

We're going to talk about greetings and introductions in English.

Hi.

I'm Olivier.

Welcome to Oxford Online English.

What's the first word you learned in English?

Probably 'hello', right?

'Hello' is the most basic way to greet someone in English.

There are many different ways to greet people and introduce yourself in English.

In different situations, you'll need to use different words and phrases to greet people

or make introductions.

In this lesson, you can learn about greetings and introductions in English and see which

language you should use in different situations.

Imagine that you're on a business trip, and you're meeting some important clients

for the first time.

Or maybe you work in service, for example in a hotel, and you need to talk to guests

and customers.

In these situations, you'll want to use more formal language.

Good morning!

You must be Olivier.

Yes, good morning!

I'm sorry, and your name is…?

My name's Kasia.

Very nice to meet you.

Welcome to Madrid!

Thank you.

How are you today?

Very well, thank you, and yourself?

I'm good, thanks for asking.

This dialogue uses more formal language.

Can you see what makes it formal?

First, I started by saying good morning.

The greetings good morning, good afternoon and good evening are quite formal and are

generally only used in formal situations.

There's one exception: you can sometimes use good morning informally with people you

know.

However, it's common in this situation to simply say 'morning'.

Can you see any other examples of formal language in this dialogue?

There are many.

Firstly, I asked Kasia's name by saying, and your name is…?

This is more formal than asking what's your name?

After she introduced herself, Kasia said very nice to meet you. Nachdem sie sich vorgestellt hatte, sagte Kasia sehr nett, Sie kennenzulernen.

Saying nice to meet you is neutral—neither formal nor informal.

However, adding very makes it sound much more formal.

One word can make a big difference!

I introduced myself with a full sentence: My name's Kasia.

When speaking less formally, you'd use a shorter introduction, like I'm Kasia or

just Kasia.

After I introduced myself, I said Welcome to Madrid.

Does this sound formal or informal to you?

It's quite formal.

Do you know why it's formal?

Again, it's a small change which makes a big difference.

Saying welcome by itself is neutral—it's not formal. Willkommen zu sagen an sich ist neutral – es ist nicht formell.

However, adding to and a place makes it sound much more formal.

So, if you say, Welcome to our office! that sounds formal, while if you just say, Welcome!

it doesn't sound so formal.

It's common when greeting someone in English to ask some kind of how are you question. Es ist üblich, jemanden auf Englisch zu begrüßen, um eine Art „Wie geht es dir“-Frage zu stellen.

Do you remember what Kasia asked me?

She asked How are you today? Sie fragte: Wie geht es dir heute?

Again, one word makes the difference—do you know which one?

It's today.

Asking how are you is neutral.

Adding today makes it sound more formal.

My answer, Very well, thank you, also sounds quite formal.

If I was speaking more neutrally, I'd say something like, Well, thanks. Wenn ich neutraler sprechen würde, würde ich so etwas sagen wie: „Nun, danke.

Adding very and saying thank you instead of thanks makes it sound more formal.

Finally, Olivier asked me how are you back. Schließlich fragte mich Olivier, wie es dir geht.

Do you remember how he did it?

He asked, and yourself?

This is more formal than asking and you? Das ist formeller als zu fragen, und Sie?

I replied and said thanks for asking. Ich antwortete und bedankte mich für die Nachfrage.

You wouldn't say thanks for asking in a more informal situation. In einer informelleren Situation würden Sie sich nicht für die Frage bedanken.

So, you've seen here how small changes can make a big difference to how formal your language

sounds.

Remember that formality doesn't just depend on the words you use; other things like tone Denken Sie daran, dass Formalität nicht nur von den Wörtern abhängt, die Sie verwenden; andere Dinge wie Ton

of voice and body language are also important.

Next, let's look at how to handle greetings and introductions in a neutral way.

‘Neutral' means neither formal nor informal.

For example, imagine you're at work, and you meet a new colleague.

You're the same age and you're in the same department.

This is an example of a neutral situation.

You don't need to be very formal, but you also wouldn't want to sound too casual. Sie müssen nicht sehr förmlich sein, aber Sie sollten auch nicht zu lässig klingen.

Hello!

Hello!

Are you Olivier?

Yes, that's right.

What's your name?

Kasia.

Nice to meet you.

And you.

How are you?

Fine, thanks, and you?

I'm good, thanks.

First, compare this dialogue to the formal one from part one.

They follow the same pattern, but this dialogue is much less formal.

Can you see the differences?

First, we started with a neutral greeting, hello.

You can use hello in any situation.

Then, I asked Olivier his name with a simple question, What's your name?

Hello, what's your name… pretty easy, right? Hallo, wie ist dein Name… ganz einfach, oder?

That's because neutral language is generally the simplest language.

If you compare the two dialogues, you can see that this neutral dialogue is shorter

than the formal dialogue you saw in part one.

This is very common: formal language is often longer and more complex.

Neutral language is short and simple.

You can see this throughout the dialogue: we use the basic words and phrases that you

probably learned in lesson one of your English classes at school: nice to meet you; how are

you; fine, thanks; and so on.

Okay, so now you've learned about the differences between formal and neutral greetings and introductions.

What about informal greetings and introductions? Was ist mit informellen Begrüßungen und Vorstellungen?

Informal greetings and introductions are useful if you know someone well, or if you're meeting

someone in a casual situation.

For example, if you're hanging out with some friends, and your friends introduce you

to one of their friends, you would probably use informal language.

Let's see how this works:

Hi!

Hey!

Olivier?

Yeah.

Your name?

Kasia.

Good to meet you.

You too. Du auch.

How you doing?

Yeah, not bad.

You?

Pretty good!

So, what do you notice here? Also, was fällt dir hier auf?

The first thing you can see is that the dialogue is even shorter than the neutral dialogue

you saw in part two. Sie haben in Teil zwei gesehen.

We both used a lot of short questions and sentences. Wir haben beide viele kurze Fragen und Sätze verwendet.

For example:

Olivier?

Your name?

How you doing? Wie geht's?

You? Du?

These are fine in informal speech, and native speakers often shorten sentences and questions Diese sind in der informellen Sprache in Ordnung, und Muttersprachler kürzen Sätze und Fragen oft ab

like this.

However, you wouldn't do this in a more formal situation.

There are also several phrases which you wouldn't use in a more formal setting, such as:

Hi/Hey Yeah

Not bad Pretty good Nicht schlecht Ziemlich gut

These are all good words and phrases to use in an informal situation.

At this point, you could go back and review the three dialogues.

Each dialogue has exactly the same structure—only the language is different.

See how you can use different words and phrases to greet people and introduce yourself with

different levels of formality.

Okay?

Let's look at one more thing.

When you're making introductions, you might also need to introduce another person.

Let's see how you can do that in formal, neutral, or informal ways.

Here's a very formal introduction.

Let me introduce my colleague, Kasia.

Here's another very formal way to introduce someone:

May I introduce my colleague, Olivier?

What about neutral introductions?

This is Kasia.

Here's another way to make in introduction using neutral language.

Have you met Olivier?

Finally, what about informal introductions?

In informal situations, you might not introduce people at all. In informellen Situationen stellst du die Leute vielleicht überhaupt nicht vor.

You might just let them introduce themselves, or you might prompt them to introduce themselves

by asking something like:

Have you guys met? Habt ihr euch getroffen?

Do you two know each other?

If you want to make an informal introduction, the most common way is just to say the two

people's names, then say them again in reverse. die Namen der Personen, und sagen Sie sie dann noch einmal in umgekehrter Reihenfolge.

For example, imagine you're introducing two people called John and Emma to each other.

You could say:

John, Emma.

Emma, John.

So now, you should understand how to greet people and introduce yourself or someone else

in different situations.

Do you want more practice with this topic?

Check out the full version of this lesson on our website: Oxford Online English.com.

See you next time!

Thanks for watching!