Language is commonly and comfortably seen everywhere as a tool or vehicle for communication. We use it to get things done, to establish and maintain relationships, to conduct our daily business as much as to talk about the past and speculate about the future. Language brokers an infinite number of speech events, both commonplace and complex, through our lives. It allows us to be precise and technical as well as romantic and quixotic, if not all at the same time. What is less commonly realised is that language also affords us the possibility of being, if we so choose, vague, approximate, ambivalent, evasive and equivocal. Indeed, given that our major task in life is to coexist with others – from the household to the neighbourhood to the institution to the nation and beyond – arguably the most important function of language is to help us be social beings. To achieve this, language enables us to say what we need to say without necessarily saying what we mean while our meaning can be understood between the lines, as it were, of what we say.

Not inclined to say ‘no’

Question: What do Nancy Reagan, Moses and any 18-month-old toddler have in common? Answer: None of them has trouble with the negative.

Let's start with Mrs Reagan and her advice to young people faced with the ‘should I or shouldn't I?’ dilemma of drugs. Easy-peasy, says Nancy: ‘Just say “no”.’

How does this miss the mark? Let me count the ways.