Small talk

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Is anyone here doing AS English Language? How are they finding it? So far I've missed a lot of classes mainly due to anxiety issues, but in two of the classes I have been in, autism was mentioned which I found odd, since I don't think it comes up in classroom banter often. On the first occasion the teacher was explaining how there are rules to how people interact with each other; for example if you asked a stranger directions to the post office and the stranger said 'you walk past the Next and then the video shop and the Boots and the Spar...' instead of something more straightforward that doesn't include unnecessary detail then you would violating a social rule of saying the appropriate amount for the given situation. And my teacher was like it'd be autistic, actually (or something like that) if the stranger talked like that. And then people laughed, which I found a bit awkward because everyone in my class is neurotypical as far as I know and it seemed as if they thought that autism is a joke. ANYWAY, I'm writing an essay analyzing a transcript and one of the things I have to talk about is phatic talk AKA small talk, and I think most people with AS hate small talk? So this is a thread where you can talk about small talk, either in the context of your life or academically and/or about people making random off remarks about autism and/or English Language.

I am dreadful at my trying to do the small talk. If somebody mentions an interesting topic, I might hook in it and I will summarize something, but when I am supposed to do the trash talk with which every dialogue starts, I am just staring at the other person and expect them to say something first. If they don´t, I usually start with the stuff like: "It´s hot, huh?", which is even more pathetic and I feel like an ass.

I don't think you're pathetic for saying 'It's hot, huh?'. Plenty of NT people say 'isn't it windy?' or something like that as small talk.

Yeah, many NTs do the exact same thing: they want to talk, but they don't know what to say, so they make some comment about the weather. It's certainly not unique to ASDs.

Still, small talk isn't one of my strengths, either. Sometimes I just go blank, and I can't think of anything meaningful to add to the conversation, which leads to an awkward silence...(thankfully, this is also not unique to ASDs).

Somehow even if I say the exact same things NT's say in small talk when I say it I sound like an idiot and when they say it they don't. I think ppl can sense my awkwardness from a mile away. I also suck at and hate small talk.

As long as you don't say something that makes the other people think you're extremely strange or suddenly become afraid of you, then you have no need to feel like an ass. "It's hot, huh?" is better than randomly talking about bizarre things. An example would be, I once tried to begin with the small talk and started talking about a random STD. I'm sure the other person thought I was really strange and might have thought, "Does he randomly research weird stuff like that?"

This is how I sound/feel when I'm NOT going blank.

Small talk is definitely not something I'm good at. I have a hard time feigning interest when I'm not interested in the topic, like asking another person what they like, if it's something I don't like.

I'm pretty much incapable of small talk, unless it's "returning" a question.

For example: