Learn these “non-words” to communicate everywhere in the world

There are some words that are, well, not words. Linguists have a lot of names for them, none especially clear-cut: interjections, exclamations, non-lexical conversational sounds. (For native speakers of American English, think “hmm,” “uh-huh,” et al.)

Interjection is the favored umbrella term. In English, they’re utterances like “shhh!” or “wow!” or that throat-clearing, cough-like sound we make when scoffing.

If you’re learning another language, an interjection is often the last thing you learn, but it often the most vital. After all, it’s the tiniest aspects of conversance—the filler words, the language-specific onomatopoeia—that demonstrate real fluency.

http://qz.com/465971/grunts-sighs-an...und-the-world/