It speaks to a person that isn’t physically present and just an observer. “You” typically addresses someone directly, but can be used to break the 4th wall and talk to observers. “Chat” is exclusively for breaking the 4th wall.
Nah, “chat” is talking to a specific, present group of people, and is used in lieu of writing a text chat. It’s not like a film actor speaking to the audience, who has no way of responding. Even so, any terms used in breaking the fourth wall would still be second person, ability to respond and presence aren’t a requirement here (e.g. you’d use “you” in letters, and the reader is absolutely not present).
I don’t think it’s accurate to call the barrier between a streamer and their audience “the fourth wall”. The fourth wall is a concept that exists in theater, and then more largely in fiction, where characters exist in a world where they do not know that they’re characters in a story. And the fourth wall breaks when they realize that they are.
If “chat” breaks the fourth wall, then self-help books that use “you” are too, or news anchors addressing their viewers, or politicians saying “my fellow countrymen” in a broadcast address.
Now that is an interesting distinction to make. I suppose that the 4th wall didn’t exist throughout most of history (with the exception of theatre) and so there wasn’t much reason for this feature of language to develop
Why isn’t that just 2nd person plural, like “y’all”?
It speaks to a person that isn’t physically present and just an observer. “You” typically addresses someone directly, but can be used to break the 4th wall and talk to observers. “Chat” is exclusively for breaking the 4th wall.
Nah, “chat” is talking to a specific, present group of people, and is used in lieu of writing a text chat. It’s not like a film actor speaking to the audience, who has no way of responding. Even so, any terms used in breaking the fourth wall would still be second person, ability to respond and presence aren’t a requirement here (e.g. you’d use “you” in letters, and the reader is absolutely not present).
I don’t think it’s accurate to call the barrier between a streamer and their audience “the fourth wall”. The fourth wall is a concept that exists in theater, and then more largely in fiction, where characters exist in a world where they do not know that they’re characters in a story. And the fourth wall breaks when they realize that they are.
If “chat” breaks the fourth wall, then self-help books that use “you” are too, or news anchors addressing their viewers, or politicians saying “my fellow countrymen” in a broadcast address.
Now that is an interesting distinction to make. I suppose that the 4th wall didn’t exist throughout most of history (with the exception of theatre) and so there wasn’t much reason for this feature of language to develop
There used to also be “dear reader” in books, when the reader was being addressed.
In this regard that would rather be 2.5 plural, kind of present, but kind of not
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