AEE 2429: Don't Be a Snob When it Comes to English
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This is an All Ears English podcast, episode 2429. Don't be a snob when it comes to 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 hosts, Lindsay

McMahon, the English adventurer, and Michelle Kaplan, the New York radio girl, coming to you from Colorado and New York City, USA. To get real-time transcripts right on your phone and create your personalized vocabulary list, try the All Ears English app for iOS and Android. Start your seven-day free trial at allearsenglish.com forward slash app.

Do you know anyone who is a snob? Today, find out what this word means and when it can be used in a harmful or harmless way so that you can express your interests and bring more connection into your life.

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That's allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. Hey there, Michelle. How are you today? Hey, Lindsay. I'm good. How are you? Good. Glad to be back. Glad to be back. All good. Michelle, what are we talking about today on the show?

Well, I want to know, Lindsay, did you know anyone who was a snob when you were growing up? I did, actually. I had a friend. She was like, I guess, kind of a frenemy a little bit. A frenemy who lived right down the street. We were friends, but I also felt like she was kind of

at times or kind of bossy sometimes, which are two different words. They mean two different things. But yeah, I would say I felt that she was a little bit of a snob. What about you, Michelle? Did you know anyone? Of course. Yeah, no, there were, there were a few of them. Oh,

No, but not too bad. Not too bad. But yeah, definitely in school. I think everybody knows people who are snobby. Yeah, this is rampant. And this will be an interesting episode today because it's something that goes across cultures, right? It goes across the world. It's a personality characteristic. So we're going to get into it today. But this came from a YouTube question, right? Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. So the question is from Ardalan Bookart24, and it just says, can you talk about the exact meaning of snob and coffee snob? Thank you so much. That's fun. Yeah, this is going to be fun. So this is a great question. So coffee snob was discussed on episode 2391, which was how to connect over coffee habits in English. Yeah. Yeah. So

Yeah, definitely listen to that one to hear more about coffee. Yeah. Okay, we're not going so much into coffee snob. So very, they're, they're different, right? Coffee snob and snob are very different. Right? Okay, interesting. Yes. So that's what we're going to talk about. So they're, they're not the same thing to say you're a something snob or just a snob. So let's just start with regular old snob. Okay. So this is a pretty

a negative word, right? I would say so. I mean, it's someone generally who's not very nice and that's usually because he or she believes they're better than other people. Right. And it's so funny because it's something we recognize very young as kids. And then we, we are aware of it throughout life. Right.

We meet people. They give off this air of thinking they're amazing. They're too good for certain things. And it might be if they have money, they might have that attitude, but not necessarily. There are people who have money that are very humble, right?

True. Or because they're insecure themselves sometimes. Right. Yeah, that's true. Somebody can seem like a snob but not actually be a snob. Exactly. So we always want to make sure that we kind of give people the benefit of the doubt until we experience like don't judge it based on what they look like.

Because sometimes people, Lindsay, you were just saying somebody might be shy. Somebody might, there might actually be something else going on. Totally. Totally. All right. What else do we need to know here, Rochelle? All right. Well, but some, how does somebody show they're a snob? I mean, yeah,

well i guess some things you might do is you might criticize others taste right like talk down about what they've chosen if i don't know maybe well i don't want to go to the coffee stop to confuse it but what would be an example of that i don't know clothes like yeah sure sure they criticize what somebody's

wearing or they, you know, um, I mean, or again, I don't want to say some people might have this look that they don't like things, right. So they, they might just give off this look like when they see somebody come in, their face kind of changes and, um, but you know, again, we don't know really by a look completely, but they talk down to others, right. That could be a snob. They talk down to others.

they just have a vibe that somehow manipulatively can put people, make people feel bad about themselves a little bit if, if you let them, but you don't have to let them. Right. Of course. Um,

Let's give other examples, Michelle, of how this is used. So this comes up a lot in school when we're kids, right? Teenagers even, or even younger. I remember the popular girls in high school, they were such snobs. And I do remember that. Me too. Or you could say, I didn't hear what Angela said. And I thought I was being a snob. Oh, I...

I think she thought, sorry, I didn't hear what Angela said. And I think she thought I was being a snob, but I just didn't hear her. Oh yeah. That's too bad. You don't want to go through like years and years of an acquaintance thinking they're snobby, but they're actually just not hearing what you're saying or just, I don't know. They're just in another world in their minds, right? That can very well happen. And you miss out on a potential friendship.

True. But you can also use the word snobby, right? So snob or snobby. So you could say, don't be snobby or don't be a snob. That means the same thing. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Okay. Now let's flip over to coffee snob, Michelle, because it's pretty different. Right.

Is that so negative? Like if we go out for coffee and we're ordering and I order a pour over and you say, "Oh, what's that all about? A pour over?" And you say, I say, "Oh, I'm kind of a coffee snob. Don't worry about it." Is that okay or is that also negative? - I think it really depends on how you use it. I think generally speaking, it's not, right? I think it's okay. It just means that you have a certain special taste in something.

But you could use it in a self-deprecating way or someone could use it in a negative way. It just depends on the context, right? Like let's say you're a coffee snob. Well, let's say you're a wine snob, okay? And I say, oh, I'm going to invite Lindsay over for my wine tasting at my house. But I don't know. She's a wine snob. So maybe it's not going to be good enough for her, right? Right, right, right, right. Yeah. So that, yeah.

So, I think in general, our culture applauds when people have unique interests and things, right? When you know some, you love something so much that you know everything about it. But the difference is, do you kind of like judge other people's choices based on what you know or have learned? Right.

Right. That's the key. Or if or like or if let's say you're at someone's house and you're a wine snob and they serve it. And, you know, if you if you kind of show your judgment or you're just kind of vocal about it or you make others feel bad about it.

like not everybody is going to have the same interests that you do unless you're in a wine club you know that's why you join kind of maybe special special groups like that so that you can be with people who have those interests but not everybody is going to share yours yeah the hardest thing is gifting wine to a wine snob i have a friend and she's wonderful she's lovely i mean she's a little bit of a wine snob but the good thing about

about her she's not too judgy if we try to gift the best wine we can find but you still you know like how how much can you spend where does it end Michelle but she's sweet actually like she'll happily accept any gift and she'll also share wine like she'll buy expensive wine but then she'll invite people

over and let's enjoy it together. So it's the best kind of wine snob. Wait, so can you tell the difference when you have like a good wine versus a regular wine? Honestly, not really. I really can't. I mean, I can tell when a wine is kind of...

gone bad I guess vinegary and that kind of thing or when it's really low quality but the difference between you know like a hundred dollar cabernet versus a thousand I've never had a thousand dollar cabernet but I don't think I would be able to tell the difference I really don't yeah I don't know no what about you no I have no idea

No way. All right. So yeah, very interesting, Michelle, right? Yep. Yep. All right. Let's take a break. Okay. I have learned after so many years as an entrepreneur that speed matters when it comes to hiring, but so does quality. You need the most qualified person on your team fast. Stop struggling to get your job posts seen on other job sites.

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Okay. Yes, we are back. Michelle, what else do we need to know? So yeah, we were already talking about a blank snob. It doesn't have to be just coffee or wine. So coffee is very common, but let's talk about some other ones that you hear, some other common ones. So I hear city snob. I might say that about myself, right? That I, oh, I'm

I mean, now I live in a suburb, but I would say like I might say to somebody talking about my move, I might say, oh, man, I'm a city snob. So it was really hard for me to adjust to the suburbs. Right. That's not that's just saying I love the city. Sure. Sure, sure, sure. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. And that's OK. Again, usually it's OK to reveal this about yourself, because if you're saying it, you're probably already connecting with someone. Right. Sure.

Or a movie snob. There are a lot of people that are big time movie snobs. They'll read all the, all the critiques of the movie and very picky about what movie they'll go to. I'll kind of go to any movie. Cause I like to go to the theater, you know, that's good. Yeah. No, I'm not a movie snob. I, I,

I don't have a high taste. No, I don't know. I like my, give me my father of the bride and I'm set. That is high taste, Michelle. What are you saying? Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate that. Yeah. Um, or we already mentioned wine snob, beer snob. Now, Lindsay, I know you like craft beer. So are you a beer snob? I might fall into this category. Admittedly so. Yeah. You know, I just, hmm.

I struggle. Even certain breweries that I go to, if there are not enough dark beers, I'm really into Imperial Porters and Imperial Stouts. Okay, yeah. Right now, which are the barrel-aged, like real deep, deep, deep dark beers. If they don't have enough of those, I will get snobby, even about that brewery. Right?

Yeah, that's me. Beer snob. Yeah, that's funny. That's funny. Or music snob. That's another one. Do you ever have... Oh my God, it's so embarrassing when you can tell somebody kind of has really cool taste in music and then they ask you what kind of music you like and I'm like, I like the Backstreet Boys. Oh my God.

Totally, totally, totally. And there are a lot of music snobs walking around. There are a lot. And you don't even want to say what you like. Oh, no. Like, who can I think of as the coolest musician that I like? I get stuck with that too sometimes. And then it could go on and on. You could be a literature snob.

There's just so much. But it's fun because this means that you're just into a niche, right? A specific niche that you love something so much that you have become kind of a snob. But again, it comes back to you. Do you judge others, right? Right. Right. So like just to think of a couple other ones. So fancy hotels, right? You could say I'm a hotel snob or if you only fly first class, I'm an airplane snob, right? So many. Yep.

So sometimes it means you only like the highest quality of that certain thing, but sometimes it might just mean that you know a lot about it. You pay attention to it. So coffee snob could be either. It's just if you're talking about not liking something or being judgy about it, then you might say you don't like something because you're a snob about that particular topic, basically. Yeah, that's so true. Yeah. Yeah.

And I feel like probably most of our listeners are a snob about something, but again, the good kind of snob, right? Something that you really nerd out on, that you really love. You've developed a refined taste for something. Oh my God. Is it bad that I can't think about what kind of snob I am? Like, should I be...

i said city snob i said yeah you love new york i mean or the big cities and you have high standards for cities right sure yeah we'll go with that michelle it's okay yeah okay okay i feel better so in another episode

So we can talk about different ways to say these things. So hit follow because there are tons of other ways we can express this. Yeah, guys. Now, hit that follow button now. Now, just a reminder again, like we said to hit follow, if you love our style, remember everything we're teaching here is modern, real English, but it's also coming back to human connection. It all comes back to connection. So if that's what you want in your life, speaking English, hit the follow button and follow us. All right. Awesome. Let's do our role play. So

we are on a cruise together doing a wine tasting. Oh, who's the wine snob here? Let's see. All right. All right. Wow. All of these look amazing. Yeah, I don't know. They look fine. I'm just a wine snob. So I have very high expectations. Oh, boy, Michelle.

Oh, no. You can totally tell the sommelier is snobby. Yeah. Oh, yeah. That's kind of a bummer. So it's a bummer when someone is super excited about something and then someone else joins. They're like, oh, the choices aren't very good. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. You have to be careful of that, right? It's true. That's true. So let's go through it. So I said, I'm just a wine snob.

Right. Yeah. So I have very high expectations. And then the problem there for connection is I'm going to start to think, oh, maybe it's not that exciting. It's not that great. It's going to dampen my experience a little bit potentially. Or I'm just going to keep being very excited about the wine choices. Right. Right. Yeah.

And then I said, Oh, boy, Michelle, and what am I? Why? What am I saying here? I'm saying you're basically saying, Oh, gosh, you're gonna have a terrible experience. Exactly. I'm just saying, Oh, it's too bad that your wines not because, you know, and then you said, Oh, no, you can totally tell the smelly is snobby. So you're just saying the

the sommelier at this wine tasting is snobby, but the wines aren't good, which is weird because... Yeah, it's weird. Something's not matching up. It's not right. But anyways, so I think the point is connection right here. And we'll come back to the takeaway in just a minute. But Michelle, is there another episode we should check out?

check out 2419, which was how to connect over mutual interests. And that's really great to listen to with this one because in a way, when you call yourself a snob, it's a way to show what your interests are and you might end up connecting with someone. Totally, totally. And then you can go do a wine tasting with those people, right? I mean, that's how we can find friendships and deepen our connections. But I think

But I think this term is interesting, right? So in one way, if we're actually just a snob, it is kind of negative. But if we're more of a niche snob, like a movie snob, a coffee snob, that can be okay depending on how we present that fact, right? Yeah, that's true. So it really depends on the context if it's kind of a negative thing or not. But

Yeah, I think in any case, you're going to hear this out in your conversations. You can use it. Just be careful. You know, don't call someone a snob unless you're kind of, you know, joking around about a special interest or but I would I would more say it's safer to just use it about yourself when you're starting off.

Yeah, I love it. Good stuff, Michelle. Thanks for being on the show with me today. Guys, hit the follow button for more All Ears English. All right. All right. All right. Thanks, Lindsay. Have a great day. All right. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye.

Thanks for listening to All Ears English. Would you like to know your English level? Take our two-minute quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com forward slash fluency score. And if you believe in connection, not perfection, then hit subscribe now to make sure you don't miss anything. See you next time.

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