Can I ask you a question?

Hey everyone, today we're going to have a quick lesson about cultural miscommunications. These often occur when you use a sentence in a language that has an added meaning or connotation.

A few weeks ago I asked a class of students, "Does anyone have any questions?" and one of my students said "Can I ask you a question?". Now this sent up a red warning flag! Another sentence that does this is "We need to talk".

She didn't need to ask this question, I had just offered to answer any questions so she should have simply gone directly to her question.

For native English speakers when someone asks you "Can I ask you a question?" we take it as a WARNING that the next question will be something personal or it will be an uncomfortable question.

Usually we simply ask the question directly or we will see if the person has time to answer our question by saying "Do you have a minute?".

A: Does anyone have any questions?

B: Can I ask you a question?

A: Uh... yeah... ok, shoot.

B: What halloween party should I go to?

A: Umm...?

In this case A is confused because he offered to answer questions, so by asking "Can I ask you a question?" he expected a more serious question to be asked. She should have said:

A: Does anyone have any questions?

B: Can I ask you a question unrelated to English?

A: Sure.

B: What halloween party should I go to?

A: Umm... how about the one at Tadg's?

In this case, A is curious about the topic but it doesn't sound so serious. If you want to ask a question about a different topic than what is being discussed ask "Can I ask you an unrelated question?".

Here's the kind of usage we expect from "Can I ask you a question?":

Al: So how's it going?

Betty: Not bad, can I ask you a question?

Al: Uhm, ok. 

Betty: What would you do if I was pregnant?

Al: What!? You're pregnant?!?!

Betty: No, not yet but what would you do if I got pregnant?

Al: Uhh... well, I don't know... I guess I'd...

Have a nice cloudy day,

Phil