AEE 2701: Us Neither or We Neither? Would you Believe… Neither!

This is an All Ears English Podcast, episode 2701. Us neither or we neither? Would you believe neither? 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, Aubrey Carter, the IELTS whiz, and Lindsay McMahon, the English adventurer. coming to you from Arizona and Colorado, 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. Can you say us neither in English? What about we neither? Find out today and learn how to connect about what you have in common and what you agree about.

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Go to allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. That's allearsenglish.com slash F-L-U-E-N-C-Y-S-C-O-R-E. Hello, Lindsay. How are you? Hey, Aubrey. How's it going?

How's everything? Excellent. I'm curious, do you and your family go camping often? Ah, no, we don't actually. We don't go camping. Yeah, we don't really either.

I did growing up. I went a lot with my family. But here in Arizona, my in-laws have a little cabin up north. So if ever we're in the woods, we'll stay there.

It's like a typical cabin in the woods from every horror movie ever. Oh, I know. That's how they all start. Yeah, I know. Right. But this is interesting.

Notice I said, we don't either. Yeah. Would you – would it have sounded strange to you if I said we neither or us neither? It would have sounded really strange if you said we neither or us neither.

I would have said what? Me too. What are you saying? I don't know. We got a great question about this in our weekly Q&A where someone asked, should I be saying us neither or we neither?

Yeah. And this is really interesting because technically us neither is grammatically correct, but no one says it, right? Neither option sounds natural. You really don't hear native speakers saying that in everyday conversation.

So today we're going to share better options like the one I said, right? I said, we don't either. Yeah, we don't either. I also might say neither do we, right?

Do you say that? Neither do we, right? Neither do we. We don't either. There are a few options. We really avoid, even if it's grammatically correct, we just don't say us neither.

Yes. This is – yeah, like you said, this is going to be great for connection because you like to – well, this can apply to any topic, right? It's not really about the topic, but it's about the construction, knowing how to say whether you disagree or agree or share something in common with someone else. Exactly.

Oh, this is a huge connection skill. You want to be able to agree like that conversation. If I'm asking you a camp, you know, something about camping, I want to be able to say, if we do too. And this is tricky.

I could totally see someone being like, why have I never heard we neither us neither as one of them wrong. Sometimes, even though it's grammatically correct, it's just not how people speak. Yeah. And I did lie in that role play.

I definitely do go camping. Um, and this summer we're going to be trying, this comes out in October. So I'll give you, I'll tell you how it went, but this summer we're going to try to go camping with our three month old baby and our dog all in one tent. How is that going to work?

I don't know. I'm sure it will be fine. It sounds like a recipe for success. You're like, it sounds horrible. Don't do it. Good luck, Lindsay. I have gone camping with a new baby and it was fine.

Just fine, right? Just fine. All right. Well, we'll get into that another day, I'm sure. Guys, hit the follow button right now to make sure you get as much owner's English as you need and want.

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All right. Let's dive in here because, you know, what does this mean, right? Of course, us neither means that you and other people, maybe you're speaking for a group of friends, family, work colleagues, don't do something. And it's usually used to agree with someone else who's already said they don't do it.

But we're going to share how we can say this more naturally, since that's not really used commonly in English, not in the States anyway, maybe in the UK, but I don't hear it on TV or podcasts either. It's just not common. No, I never hear it. So what can we say?

That's so strange. So let's give our listeners at least two options today. First option is we don't either, like we said at the top of the episode. When should we use this, Aubrey?

Yeah. So you use this after something that you also don't do, don't like, or don't believe, right? So for example, if I said, my partner and I don't go to the movies anymore.

Oh, we don't either. Oh, that's horrible. No. I love going to the movies. Go to the movies. Or we don't really like spicy food. Yeah. Oh, we don't either.

Yeah. And let's throw in this neither do we, which is also really, really common, right? So it means the same thing. It's just another chunk that's interchangeable, synonymous, right?

So if I said, oh, we rarely stay up past midnight. Oh, yeah. Neither do we. Right? Exactly. So it's just a way to agree about something negative, something someone has already said that they don't do.

Yeah. I don't know if we may get to this later in the episode, but pronunciation, Aubrey, we have two options here, don't we? Either, either, either, neither. Yeah.

And it's really interesting. At least Americans often go back and forth. I do. I say both, right? I might say we don't either, but then I might say neither do I, right?

So there's no right or wrong answer. Both are correct. Whatever feels right in the moment. Just go with it. Yes. Yeah. You're going to hear people go back and forth.

What's the other option? All right. Now, this is more when you're talking about something about you rather than something you do. You might say, we're not either.

So, right? This is after something about maybe identity, personality, future plans. So, for example, if I say, we're not late night people. We're not either.

Or we're not planning to travel this year. We're not either. right? Exactly. And you can also flip this just like the other one and say, neither are we, right?

Oh, we're not planning to travel. Neither are we. Yes. Love that. Love that. Really good. Have you ever listened to native speakers and thought, I understand the words, but I still feel slightly lost.

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Find out your exact level with our quick, free fluency quiz. Go to allearsenglish.com slash fluency score. That's allearsenglish.com slash F-L-U-E-N-C-Y-S-C-O-R-E.

All right, Aubrey. So what about when we're talking about the first person? Like it's just me, right? That's responding. So in this case, yes, we don't say us neither, but we do say me either or neither, right?

So this is a common mistake in English to say me either. You'll hear it everywhere. It really should be me neither. Me neither. Yeah, exactly. I hear native speakers say this all the time.

Me either. But if you think about it, it doesn't make sense. It doesn't make sense. You need the negatives, right? If you're saying, I also don't. I don't either.

Me neither. Yeah. Should we do some examples then? Sure. You want to start us out? Yeah. Hey, I'm not ready quite yet. Oh, me neither. Yeah, go ahead.

I was just gonna say this is one way I probably wouldn't say neither. For me, it might be the rhyming is I would always say me neither. Neither is and but see there I said neither. Neither is incorrect.

It kind of depends on the chunk. Yeah. Saying me neither, just there's something not right. Like the way that sounds just feels awkward, but it is grammatically correct.

Maybe it sounds pretentious. Yeah. Yeah. Both pronunciations are correct. It was probably more about just what we're used to hearing, right? Yeah. Yeah.

Totally. But I'm totally in agreement. I would say me neither there. How about this? I don't want to go out tonight. I want to stay in. Me neither. Yeah.

And again, I probably wouldn't say me neither, but it's not wrong. It's just about my regional dialect, what I'm used to hearing and saying. Yeah, it's kind of interesting. I added on, I don't want to go out tonight.

I want to stay in. But your me, me neither is responding to I don't want to go out tonight. Right? So that's kind of interesting. And we do that sometimes, right?

If someone is saying something they don't want to do, they might even tack on something they do. And we could still say me neither. Yeah. And they know what we mean.

Yeah, you're responding to the core idea, right? The first thing they said, really. Good. All right. Role play time. Aubrey here. We're friends talking about upcoming summertime plans.

Awesome. So are you guys taking a big trip this summer? No, we're not actually. Flights are just too expensive right now. Yeah, we're not either. We're trying to save money this year.

Same here. We don't really want crowded airports either. We don't either. We're either going camping for a few days or just staying close to home. That honestly sounds perfect.

We're not big resort people anyway. We're not either. I also don't want to spend the whole summer sitting inside working. Well, me neither. I need to get outside.

Nice. Yeah, this is definitely not me. I am a huge resort person. Oh, you are. We always when we go to Rocky Point, we stay in like a beachside resort.

And we do not leave. We go to the restaurant there. There's a dance club right outside the parking lot. No need to go anywhere. That's so funny. I'm not a resort person.

I'm the opposite of you. I'm not a fan. And I love both. I love camping and hiking as well. But an all inclusive resort. Stay here a week. Yes, please.

Sign me up. Yeah. Well, I guess to be fair, I don't think I've ever really done a proper full resort situation before. It might make sense if you're with a family.

If you have young kids, it might make sense. You know, there are reasons to do it. I think you would change your tune if you went with five families you were friends with, five couples to like a resort in Cancun that was all inclusive. Oh, you just can't beat it.

But I mean, you'll do excursions. You might go out on a boat for a day, but like... There are five restaurants there at the resort and they're all amazing. Why would you go anywhere?

But I know it's not for everyone. For sure. All right. Let's go through our role play here, Aubrey. So you said, I asked you, are you taking a trip this summer?

You said, we're not. Flights are too expensive. And I said, yeah, we're not either. Right. So I'm agreeing with you. Same situation. Instead of saying us neither, that really wouldn't naturally come out of us.

Instead, we'll say this. We're not either or neither are we. Exactly. And then you said, when I said, we don't really want to deal with crowded airports, you said, yeah, we don't either.

And then you use this either or we're either going camping for a few days or just staying close to home, which, yeah, this we actually recently talked about either or neither nor. So we'll share that episode at the end. Good. Yes.

Yeah. Definitely check out that episode, guys, if you're confused about either or. Kind of a slightly different teaching point for today, but go check out that episode. And then you said, we're not big resort people anyway.

And I said, we're not either. It sounds like we see eye to eye. Here, Aubrey. Exactly. Right. And then when I said, I don't want to spend the whole summer working, you said me neither.

And yeah, this is, um, I definitely agree with that, right? We got to get outside. You got to get out and enjoy the summer. Now we're moving into fall.

You got to get out and enjoy the fall leaves or the brisk chill in the air. Exactly. I think it feels good to be outside. Make sure you don't let your life pass you by.

Get outside, right? Exactly. Get some fresh air. Yeah. Something that's important to emphasize is with both of these constructions, me neither or yeah, we're not either.

The sentence stops there, right? We don't continue with additional details in that sentence. It's kind of a showstopper. It just ends right there. Wouldn't you say, Aubrey?

Good point, right? These are short answers of agreement, right? What you're doing is someone else has already shared something they don't like or they're not doing and you're agreeing with these short chunks. Me neither.

We don't either. Yes. Nice and short and sweet. Aubrey, is there another episode we should check out? Yes, we want to make sure you don't miss our episode about either or and neither nor.

This is tricky. You can find that. It's episode 2095, How to Avoid This Common English Grammar Trap. The best way to find that is on our app. You can search episode numbers there to find any episode.

Yeah, really good stuff. Guys, go over to the app, allersenglish.com slash app and you will find it. It's a free download. The app is free to listen to.

So go and check it out. Final connection takeaway, Aubrey. What is it? Yeah, I think it's so interesting how we think about connecting more about things we agree with, the positives.

But also if you think about it, if you say we don't either, you're still agreeing. You're still finding something you have in common that you both either don't like or don't do. What a great connection skill. Yeah.

And you still get kind of the, I guess, like the dopamine hit or the brain reward that comes from like our, you know, our evolutionary minds of wanting to kind of be in the same boat as that person we're talking with, wanting to agree in a sense, right? Exactly. We want to find commonalities to connect about. Yep.

It's still going to connect you. So this is super important for connection, guys. Absolutely. Awesome. Thanks for joining me today. I really don't want to jump off the mic.

Oh, me neither, Aubrey. I want to keep going. I was hoping you'd catch that. I laid it up for you. You did. That was a nice layup and I did dunk it. Yeah, there we go.

Awesome. We'll see you guys next time. All right, Aubrey, 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.