Etymology

you think what

Today it means: What do you think this is?; do you think this is some kind of […] ?; said in response to an impractical or naïve suggestion. Full definition →

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The story

A colloquial interpretation of the phrase what do you think? with reorganized syntax, demonstrating optional wh-fronting in Singlish. Analogous to certain sentence structures in Chinese, e.g., Hokkien 汝儂咧講什物? /汝侬咧讲什物? (lír-lâng leh kóng sím-mih?, “what are you all talking about?”), in which the interrogative word 什物 (sím-mih, “what”) remains where it is and does not move to the front of the sentence.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.