sort of

UK/ˈsɔːt‿əv/US/ˈsɔɹt‿əv/

phraseB1informal · an editor’s judgementNot compared — the two pools are counted one word at a time, so a phrase has no score

Sort of means partly, but not completely. A hedge, dropped into a sentence to soften it.

It is one of the most used phrases in spoken English and one of the least used in writing, since it weakens whatever it touches. It can soften an adjective, so sort of interested means not very, or an entire admission, so I sort of forgot is a confession made smaller. It is interchangeable with kind of. The literal use survives, as in a sort of hammer, meaning something like one.

Definitions of sort of

1phrasesort ofPartly or to some degree, but not entirely.B1
“I sort of understood what he meant.”

Where it comes from

From sort + of. The use is derived from the use of the term as an in phrases such as “a sort of [something]”.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove, Small Talk & Everyday Phrases

First appears in chapter 1 of A Man Called Ove.

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