I have a friend who is half Japanese (we both grew up in an English speaking country, however) and whenever we have conversations in English, he’ll interject at random points going “mm!” or “hm!”.
I’ve always found this slightly annoying as it seemed like he wasn’t really listening but was trying to seem as if he was. When I asked him about this he explained that he couldn’t help it because he’s half Japanese and that’s what Japanese people do to show they’re paying attention.
The thing is, I’ve heard of aizuchi before and I actually thought it made sense. However, I assumed interjections were generally made after an at least somewhat significant piece of information was conveyed, but with my friend the interjections are just made randomly as I’m speaking. Sometimes I’ll have barely started talking and will have said nothing of significance and he’ll go “oh!” or “mm!” and it just makes me feel like he’s not listening at all or is trying to get me to stop talking.
An example of the kind of conversation that we have (this example is completely made up, though. I’m just trying to give an idea of what it’s like):
Me: “Yesterday when I was walk-
Him: “Mm!”
Me: “-ing home I saw a couple get into a massive fight”
….
Me: “and then the ma-
Him “ahh”
I hope you get the idea
If this is actually how aizuchi works then it's quite surprising as that seems like something an English speaker would do only if they weren't listening to someone.
Is this actually how aizuchi is done and am I just overreacting?
by Kronkodil