Goodbye is a term that can be used as a greeting.
Goodbye is a term that derives from the expression “to God.” The concept is used as a greeting , when one person says goodbye to another. For example: “Bye, mom, I'll be back at dinner time,” “Are you leaving now, Carlos? Bye bye! May it go very well for you” , “Give me a second because I forgot to say goodbye to Marta” .
As a greeting, goodbye is part of a communication act . If a subject says “goodbye” to another, he or she is ending a meeting or a talk. The expression can be used when the communication takes place face to face, or if the people in question maintain contact through some technological means (telephone, computer, etc.).
Example of use of the term goodbye
Suppose a young man is participating in a dinner with friends. After a while after dinner, the boy stands up and says: “Well, goodbye: I'm leaving because tomorrow I have to wake up early.”
As you can see, “goodbye” works as a greeting and as a kind of announcement that the individual makes to let them know that they are leaving the meeting .
Different types of greetings
Greetings come in a wide variety of terms and expressions , and serve both to begin a communication and to end it; There are even those that two people use when meeting on the street simply to show each other that they have noticed the other's presence. Already within the limits of the same country it is possible to notice many ways of greeting and saying goodbye, and this increases even more when observing the regionalisms of all Spanish-speaking countries.
As with other words and expressions, it is not easy to delimit the use of goodbye , or specify the parts of the world in which it appears most frequently: for example, we could say that in Argentina we say "bye" and that in Spain, " goodbye”, but this could not be further from the truth, in that in both countries there are many other ways to say goodbye.
The same thing happens when we try to define the degree of formality of the term: stating that goodbye is only used in formal situations is not correct, since in some parts of the world it appears in the daily lives of people from all walks of life. This does not mean that there are no less serious expressions to use as a farewell, such as see you later , see you or even well (used, for example, on the island of Gran Canaria). In written language, on the other hand, it is also possible to use a greeting , greetings or a hug , among many other ways.
The idea of goodbye can refer to something that is ending.
Goodbye as something that ended or as the imminence of damage
Goodbye can also be used to mention that some damage is inevitable or that something is over : “If the boss finds out that we broke the machine, goodbye: he leaves us all on the street,” “Pray that your father won't. ” find out what you have done, otherwise... goodbye to your monthly payment" , "Goodbye to the World Cup dream: the team lost 5 to 0 and was left with no chance of qualifying for the next World Cup" .
It is important to note that the use of this term in a worrying situation, in which the sender anticipates a series of problems, can also have a certain comic or bittersweet nuance, in an attempt to soften the seriousness of the events that are approaching. This does not mean that it also appears in contexts of real tension, in which there is no room for humor.
The dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy ( RAE ) also mentions that goodbye can be used as an interjection to express disappointment, disenchantment or surprise. While the first two cases can be seen in the previous examples, let's look at a sentence in which goodbye denotes surprise: "Goodbye, what an afternoon awaits us today!" .