David,
No kidding.
I have a 16 year old daughter that text'es and speaks in "Like". (Its a language now)

Broaching important subjects about life is tricky.

Scott

Being closer to the age group you were observing, as well as having worked on an informal level on reducing the amount of verbal fillers I use, I have a similar theory that "like" use is not just about deflecting ownership but also about social negotiation. As you mention, "like" will be used more when ideas are being tested and the ground is less than firm. There is also a tension between being accepted or seeming cool and the risk of seeming too smart. Why "cool" should rule out eloquence is beyond me, but I didn't run with the cool set. I probably disqualified myself by using "cool".

These observations come from a relatively new reader of your blog, a 30-something librarian who's starting to apply GTD to the library world, where our inboxes are book trucks and shelves as well as boxes.

>>
They want to express themselves with freedom and style, but are unwilling to own what they mean.
>>

I agree with the observation -- especially here in Seattle -- lot's of acceptance on one hand, lots of criticism/indifference on another (for further exploration see "Seattle">http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/pacificnw/2005/0213/cover.html">Seattle Nice" story from the Seattle Times).

On a lighter note -- I'm looking forward to the seminar tomorrow. Just met Buzz Bruggerman at Mind">http://www.technoranti.com/seattle-mind-camp-10-highlights/">Mind Camp 1.0 last weekend and he was quite the hoot -- tracked him down because of seeing you mention him on this blog.

I would explain the phenomenon very differently. I think it's simple lack of ability to speak. I classify this in the same category as people who say "umm..." in between every phrase, or people who stutter because they can't figure out what they're trying to say (as opposed to people who stutter because they have a neurological short circuit between brain and voice).

The same phenomenon occurs in other languages. In Russian, people insert the phrase "eto samaya" where this group would use "like." It doesn't have anywhere near the same meaning, but it gets used the same way... to fill space while trying to decide what you really want to say.

People in general need to slow down and think about what they want to say BEFORE they say it, and they'll discover that they don't have try and fill space with words that mean nothing. Decide what you want to say before you say it, and you'll communicate much more easily.

I agree with Jacob. "Like," and words are placeholders for further speech while it's being composed in the speaker's head. Even more supposedly cultivated speakers will buffer phrases with null words like "say," (e.g. "We have, say, six months to fix this problem") or "basically" ("Basically, I think that...").



But it's more noticeable when the parlance belongs to a different generation.

I don't like the ubiquitous "like" any more than you do, but I think that the far bigger problem is the first issue you mentioned--the obsession with cell phones. Language evolves, and perhaps someday this generation will outgrow the language of "like" and their children will replace it with a word or a phrase as irritating to them as "like" is to us. What concerns me more is the direction in which our society (and many other societies around the world) seems to be heading. There is no sense of place anymore. With cell phones people are always someplace else, with someone else. And we've lost our sense of patience, our ability to live in the moment and to truly be with the people that we are physically with. Talking on a cell phone when you are in a restaurant with a "friend" or a member of your "family" says to them that you really aren't there, that you really would like to be somewhere else. Can anyone see this bad habit of ours getting any better? What will life be like 10 or 15 years from now if this trend continues? Is there something so overwhelmingly positive about cell phones as to forever outweigh their negative effects?

I'm halfway between your "grandchildren" and you. This is not a new problem. Like-speak has been around for a while in many different instantiations. As with other commenters, I think of it primarily as a way of socialization. People generally grow out of this as their peer groups and social norms change. It is very disconcerting to hear 30-somethings using the same breathless style as high schoolers. Just as it is disconcerting to hear 7-year-olds take on completely adult speaking patterns.

My 15 year old daughter has this mastered. We have a little running joke where I'll say, "So Ashleigh, like, ya know....well...yeah."

And then She says "OK dad, sounds good!"

(At least I THINK it's a joke!)

My guess is that is started more as Jacob surmised, and then was picked up by others.. when I was growing up we called it Valley Speak, (see
http://www.80s.com/Entertainment/ValleyURL/ )
the fact that we were starting to make fun of it then, probably hastend its adoption by those who don't notice.
I think we pick up part of our language usage from those around us. I know some birds do. I find my self occasionally picking up language varients from immigrants.. ie dropping the masculine/feminine distinctions or plural matching when speaking with ESL Asians.. (Learning that the chinese form of the verb "to go" remains the same even when modified with "yesterday" or "tomorrow" (this whole "will go" or "went" thing is nonsense to them) and plurals are similar.. the name of the object doesn't change just because there is more than one.. one car or five car.. just don't step off the curb until all car go by..

So, Like, what's the diff? If the sounds I use communicate the ideas to you, my language served its purpose, right?

The only way to change it is for a good number of us NOT to give in, and keep speaking the language the way we learned it should be.

Jonathan

I notice a lot of boomers use "sort of" in much the same way. It makes it sound as though they're qualifying everything they say so as not to be definitive.

By the way, people well into their 30s use "like" as filler. That and "he/she goes" instead of "says." For some reason the combination of "like" and "goes" really grates my nerves.

I wouldn't be too shocked about how the kids were talking. I'm somewhere close to your age and when I was a kid we used "you know" the way the use "like" now. I know phrase was annoying because my big sister tried to break me of it one time by responding "No, I don't know" every time I used "you know". It drove me nuts, especially because I found I couldn't form sentences anymore without adding the two words. Fortunately she didn't give me that lesson again and the phrase eventually drifted out of my vocabulary.

It's amazing what verbal crutches each of us use. I'm afraid it's not limited to the young. This is an unconscious habit for most of us. For those of us who have caught ourselves in the habit of saying these types of phrases and words and want to do something about it, I've found Toastmasters International to be an excellent place to begin. The "Ah Counter" is tasked with the job of tracking null words and phrases for everyone, bringing this from the unconscious to the conscious realm where I could deal with it.

I agree with Bert and those that view "like" and other fillers as verbal crutches. Toastmasters works wonders for helping us to become aware of when we are using crutches and fillers and teaches us to accept silence as we form our thoughts. Using text messaging and email decreases the amount of time people actually talk and contributes to increased use of verbal crutches "like", "um" and "you know".

I once read an article by a linguist who reached the same conclusion- "like" is used as a rhetorical cop-out and qualifier to avoid being held responsible for a statement. It's also used when you want to indicate you feel a certain way about someone, but it's only temporary- or you want to soften the blow. For instance, "He was like, totally crazy" could be interpreted as "He's not always crazy, but boy, he sure was yesterday."

If I ever dig up the article, I'll post a link. It was pre-del.icio.us.

I have to agree with Sam, above, that the cell phone usage is the bigger problem, as is the unwillingness to converse in complete sentences (in person or, for that matter, by email). "Like" has been around for a long time--when I was in high school 20 years ago (20, eek!) our teachers were scolding us for using it. As other people have pointed out, it's an interjection that kind of distances the speaker from his words and allows him to disown them if they evoke the wrong impression.

I wrote that last sentence and just realized that I added the phrase "kind of" almost automatically. It's a qualifier, a cop-out of my own. I'm betting that we're all guilty of this sort of linguistic sleight-of-hand in one way or another.

I've heard a similar linguistic theory that the reason the Australian accent often involves an upward inflection at the end of sentences is that it implies a kind of soliciting consent or approval from the person to whom you are speaking. Why that colony adpoted it and not the US could be related to demographics, history, and relationship to the motherland.

On the topic of US teenage constructions, my favorite is: "but, like, you know ... whatever." Full of sound and fury, that one.

That inflection is not limited to the Aussies. In Canada it is very common among teens to use both "like" and "upspeak" (at least I think that's what it is actually called). It's extremely annoying to listen to.

We usually speak like that while wearing our touques and sitting on our chesterfields, eh!

JC

I think it is a symptom of a fundamental issue that you got close to. Even the symptoms are much wider than just using "like" to hold your own opinions at arm's length. You see this everywhere in the use of the passive voice. "He's, like, an idiot", or "I feel that I'm doing the right thing." (or worse, "We feel we're doing the right thing"), or "The garbage needs to be taken out."

As opposed to "He is an idiot." or "I know (or even "think") that I am doing the right thing.", or "I want the garbage taken out."

The passive voice also manifests, as Robert mentions above, when statements are inflected so as to become questions.

It's a combination of a side-effect of political correctness, intellectual laziness, extremely low self-confidence, and a general social attitude that one person't thoughts, opinions, and desires are less important than what the group thinks or wants. And as Bo says above, it puts the responsibility for the meaning of the statement on the listener(s), leaving an out for the speaker if the meaning taken is not in line with the prevailing opinion.

Fundamentally, it's a way of subjugating the self to others. I don't know how or why so many people were trained to do this, but it's a bit frightening.

Chicken? I'm not sure that a vocal tick such as "like" is all that different from "you know" or "far out" or just plain "uhm". It's a way of stalling for time as you try to put your thoughts together and actually serves a very real purpose in conversation. It says "I am not done my sentence, please don't interrupt me yet".

I would argue that adult language, espcially the language of PR and business finds a whole lot more innovative and terrible ways of chickening out from saying things with double meanings, complex terms for simple ideas and so on.

In my experience as a teacher, a MUCH higher percentage of kids are willing to come out and tell you "that sucks" than adults.

I guess I'll toss my pedantic two cents in on this one. I think it is symbolic of two major problems, both of which could be solved by a return to the insistence upon a decent liberal education.

The first, and more architectonic, problem is one of clarity of thought. Logic is no longer taught in our schools or required in higher education. Their speech embodies their thought well, but their thought is all muddled and disjointed. They have been taught by the absence of clear, cogent discourese and the overwhelming affirmation of intellectual relativism that human thought and, therefore speech, is inherently tentative in nature. Further, I think it not so much the sheepish fear to set one's stated belief on A or B, but rather a underlying, unspoken belief that there is no real difference between A and B, or that we could never really know that there is. In short, they speak the way they think- poorly.

Secondly, there is not only a lack of clear ordered speech in their public square, but its opposite has become ubiquitous to the point of saturation. "Argument" has come to mean "fight" and "rhetoric" has become an insult to describe any speaker, similar in connotation to "proganda" or "spin." Tell that to Cicero. Regular involvement with clear speech, embodying clear thought, is the only antidote this malady. I think they should all be forced to read old books and give speeches at the local chapter of Toastmasters. I'm joking about Toastmasters, but they do need to have a venue in which their manner of speech and its underlying thought are judged as to clarity and orderliness.

As my friend Trent says, "Clarity is Charity." Look on the bright side David, can you imagine having to coach one of these young hipsters or set up their project list? Maybe you should do a translation of GTD for them. "Like, most people, like, don't even, like, determine their, like, next, like, action. Duh!" You've conquered the NYT best seller list, now go for Teen Beat or YM.

They can probably type faster than me and make less typos. If grammer is charity as well, mea culpa.

Thinking back on the cultural history, I'd have to say the first time I heard "like" used this way was dialogue for Shaggy in Scooby Doo (the cartoon). He was the token representative of that pseudo-hippy beach culture/beach bum persona a la Southern California, that evolved into the "slacker" of the 1990's. I think it started with Shaggy and moved to the Valley, which then crept into popular culture. It's been around at least 30 years. I teach undergrads at a local university, ... and my first impression is that I'd better get invested, deeply invested, in attaining sustained personal wealth, because I don't think I can count on these folks to take care of me in my twilight years. :-) But then I take a breath and try to slide into their shoes and see things from their perspective. In the end, ... in regards to that couple you mention, ...at least they are communicating, and by outward signs, effectively to each other, even as they text other people. If they remember to drop their cultural jargon when they attempt to speak outside of their circle, ... then things should be just fine. Last semester I had a girl in class wearing a shirt with "NICE RACK" stenciled on the front. Just another reminder that I'm getting older and out of touch, ... and yes, David, I'm shaking my head, too, sometimes. I think every generation does this looking back at the younger one that is following!

Oh, please. I'm 33 and my (linguistics major) mother's been harrassing me about using "like" in my casual speech since I was ten. (It's even more amusing, given that I was pretty much kept away from popular culture, so I'm one of the few kids who *didn't* get the habit from movies or the "Valley Girl" song. Apparently I picked it up purely from my less-sheltered friends' speech.)

However, in business speech and written communication my language is almost perfectly grammatical. I have to believe I do better than my new boss' boss, who's older than I am, and in whose introductory speech I counted more than sixty "um"s.

Finally, goodness gracious - you listened in on someone's conversation on Cap Hill? You're lucky ungrammatical speech was the worst you heard...

Though 'like' might be an expresssion of their virtual life or disconnect from nature, I'm more worried about the health effects of celphone use, 10/15 years down the line:
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/members/2003/6039/6039.html

I agree with those who asserted that "like" is this generation's answer to the "you know" of the previous generation.

Perhaps the event marking the cultural transition was the airing, on ABC, of the sitcom "It's Like, You Know ..." for a few years at the end of the 90s.

Yeah, that annoys me too. You know what I'm sayin'? Somethings are decorative, and superfluous . You know what I'm sayin'?

I seem to remember the usage of 'like' came into use, frequently as the first word in a sentence, and often followed by 'man' in the hippy/flower power drug-fuelled sub-culture of the '60's/70's.

as such, its origin probably lay in inability to use the brain in its correct way as a result of compromising memory and cognitive function usually temporarily, but frequently permanently as a matter of choice by ingesting or injecting substances whose euphoric effects can overcome intelligent understanding that all the effects are neither known, understood or in any way beneficial. and almost certainly destructive of the most valuable resource that man has - his brain.

one would hope that the widespread usage of the idiom is for the excellent reasons already suggested in the posts so far, but the fear must be that voluntary self-abuse by chemical means is now widespread.

in a world where success now depends more on merit and hard work, it can be helpful to think of those who advocate these dangerous substances as hoping to handicap and eliminate competitors for the rewards of success.

The scary thing is like that like we also have this like problem in the UK like and like it makes me so mad like.

But who are we in the blog arena to stiffle any form of communication it's a creative commnons after all.

I was all set to make a comment, but then coffeeboy unwittingly made it for me with the opening lines of his post. As a Brit now living in the US I was surprised at the use of the phrase 'I guess' in much the same way as 'like' is being described, only for an older generation. The basic idea is to put forward an opinion, but shield either yourself from the embarrasment of being wrong, or the other person from the shame of having their stupidity revealed. I guess.

David, there was a very funny segment on NPR about "the use of language to evade speaking directly" in which Robert Siegel speaks with Maggie Balistreri, who enumerates nine distinct uses of "like."

• the undercutting like (to compensate for knowing something)
• the vague like (the most forgivable)
• the self-effacing like ("virtue is shameful")
• the cowardly like ("I disagree—if it's okay")
• the filler like
• the betrayer like ("I lie")
• the apology like ("sorry, I'm inarticulate")
• the multimedia like ("visual aid to follow")
• the staller like ("think, brain, think!")

Re: 9 uses of like

Interesting. I don't see the use that I most frequently used as a teenager (and the one that drove my mom most nuts): A substitute for "said".

For instance, instead of saying, "She said 'foo' and then I said 'bar'" I used to say, "She was like 'foo' and then I was all, like, 'bar'".

Just echoing here that the phenomenon is not limited to English. In Finnish we (not me of course!) say "niinku" which is pretty much a slang translation of like. The same goes for our neighboring Sweden, who use "liksom", which also translates directly to like. So much for Valley Song then. ;)

Everyone above has said pretty much the same thing: "like" is bad. So although I don't much like it, let me speak a word or two in its defense: It is undeniably an expression of some form of sophistication or another.

Like it or not, it is generally urbane, or at least the suburbane, who use it. In Israel, where I have lived most of my life, hip young things use "ke'ilu" -- which translates most directly into "as if" and is used just like "like". The blue-collar folks who live away from the hipster areas cannot get it past their larynxes.

Yes, perhaps it does exonerate the speaker from a concise opinion, making things more tentative. But isn't that polite? Isn't the response to a sentence containing "like" typically one containing an affirmative "totally"? It seems that this type of speech is just as much about being nice to each other -- picking each others fleas if you will -- than it is about actually conveying an opinion.

Here in Italy they don't use it at all, at least in Rome -- I haven't been up north where the kids will end up working for a living and it's more likely that they do. Instead, they punctuate everything with "allora", which translates as far as I can tell into "alrighty then". Now that, surely, is a much drearier dead-end tic.

im 16 years old and type fast with hardly any typo's, sometimes use all these annoying inserts into my sentences, use my cellphone (although not as obsessivly as other kids in my school), and, as you can tell, am trained to type in bad grammer due to my AIM skills that i picked up. yes, i am ashamed of it, but i really do understand what everyone here on this board is talking about. i hate it when i can count about 15 "like"'s in just one paragraph of speaking all around me, and worst, i hate it when i use them myself. if i do say so myself, however, i am a lot better than the other kids in my school here in the eastern united states. and interesting enough, we had this discussion in my english class recently when this one girl behind me just couldnt stop saying like when she was trying to express her thoughts. noone took her seriously, just like none of you reading this now are taking me seriously enough becuase of this grammer nightmare i have created on such a proper website. i think what im trying to say is overall, its just the way i'v been taught, and although im so ashamed of it and do try to help myself, not many people my age care to stop this r-e-d-r-u-m of the english language. (also, i thought this comment of mine would humor you all and further your discussion because im actually the subject (in a sense) of this entire blog.) but i am serious in what i am saying, and i do agree with you all, because hey, it is REALLY annoying to hear even the little 5 year old's start to say it! i blame tv, for the most part.