Tidbit #12 - April 7, 2011

Like, what's up with, like, people's speech nowadays? Like, it's like, like, all of their, like, sentences are, like, supplemented with, like, the word like. Like, why do you think that is?

Question: Where did the pause in speech, "like", come from?


Answer: There could be a few reasons:

Shaggy and Scooby:
Like, enthusiasts of the word like.
(And quintuple-decker sandwiches)

1. Someone in Yahoo! Answers was so kind to give us a nice, detailed answer: "'Like' is a 'filler' word that has kind of crept into the English language over the past decade or so. There isn't really anything you can say instead of like; hence the 'filler' term. A 'filler' word is just something you use out of habit, really. Same with 'umm' and 'uhhh' etc, they have no meaning and no real substitutes, they are just there for the sake of being there." (Re: Yahoo! Answers)
2. Another great Yahoo! Answer: "The word 'like' has been used as a postponed filler ('going really fast, like') from 1778; as a presumed emphatic ('going, like, really fast') from 1950, originally in counterculture slang and bop talk." (Re: Yahoo! Answers) The rest of this article seemed too long and tedious to read, so I summarized it and made it answer #3:
3. The word "like" might also have originated from some famous media. For example, it might be a fad following Frank Zappa's hit song "Valley Girl", from 1982. The TV character Maynard G. Krebs from the series "Dobie Gills" (1959-1963), who used the expression a lot, might have brought it to prominence. Shaggy and Scooby from "The Adventures of Scooby Doo!" might have had something to do with it as well: "ZOINKS! LET'S, LIKE, GET OUTTA HERE, SCOOB!" Anthony Burgess' 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange had the narrator using his teenage slang: "I, like, didn't say anything." 
4. Finally, it could have originated in Scotland in R.L. Stevenson's 1886 novel Kidnapped: "What's like wrong with him?" (p.193)

Well, what have we got here as a final answer?

It could have originated from lots of famous media, such as the TV show "Dobie Gills", Frank Zappa's song "Valley Girl", Shaggy and Scooby from "The Adventures of Scooby Doo!", Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange, or R.L. Stevenson's 1886 novel Kidnapped.

Want it more condensed than that?

It most likely originated from a type of famous media.