hmmmm.

n.  a polite, noncommittal response.

<I was too meek to do anything but listen politely and utter noncommittal “hmmmms” to their suggestions that Jesus could turn my life around.  —Bill Bryson, Neither Here Nor There: Travels in Europe.>

n.  a questioning sound.

<“How much longer?” I asked.  Sylvie said, “Hmmmm?”  “How much longer?”  Sylvie did not reply.  —Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping: A Novel.> <The corporal found the dirty picture of the woman and the body in Weary’s hip pocket.  “What a lucky pony, eh?” he said.  “Hmmmm?  Hmmmm?  Don’t you wish you were that pony?”  —Kurt Vonnegut, Slaughterhouse-Five.>

n.  a sound made while pondering, as in Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister: A Novel by Gregory Maguire.


n.  a sound which a “great conversationalist” makes while listening to keep people talking, as discussed in Think Like Your Customer: A Winning Strategy to Maximize Sales by Understanding and Influencing How and Why Your Customers Buy by Bill Stinnett; see also mmmmm, hmm.


n.  the relaxed sigh of someone falling to sleep, as in the novel The Fiery Cross by Diana Gabaldon.


n.  the sound of a brainstorm, as in the novel Let That Be the Reason by Vicki Stringer.


v.  to hum; see also hmmm.

<The floor “Hmmmm’d” several more times.  —R.A. Salvatore, Legacy of the Drow.>

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