If you visit my classroom, you’ll see a sticker on my front podium. It has the word Like encompassed by what I call the Ghostbusters slash, indicating that my classroom is a like-free zone. In my mind, like can be used to indicate that you enjoy something (I really like Spider-Man!) or that one item is similar to another (Miles Morales is like Peter Parker in his spider powers.).
I’m reminded of Sweet Valley High girls when people intersperse their language with the word like. It feels like a filler, put into speech until the speaker can come up with the next word or phrase they want to use. It’s only mildly better than using um or uh in that spot.
When students give speeches and presentations, I grade down on the use of those
words. A well-prepared speech will include no more than one of those words per minute. My kids are quick to point out if I use um or uh as I’m giving directions in class, and I remind them that I’m doing improv at that point. Still, I can always do better.
And then I listened to the audiobook Like, Literally, Dude by Valerie Fridland. The tagline says it’s arguing for the good in bad English. The author tries to argue that using words such as “like” and “literally” constantly can be okay. The biggest reason for this? English is constantly evolving, and perhaps this is the next step in that process.
My first reaction to that theory while listening was to shake my head. But I kept listening
and should have remembered my classes from college on Middle English and Old English and how our language has changed.
Well, duh.
How often do you use the pronouns thee and thou (outside of church or a reading of the Bible)? Instead, we use the words “you” and “your.” There used to be pronouns like “you” that were specifically male or female, though those faded over the decades. When was the last time you said “henceforth”? Never?
Do you feel like the word “cool” is overused? Even that has evolved. In Old English, it was spelled col and had a slightly different pronunciation. Of course, it always meant that something was cold in nature, not that it was something to be enjoyed.
The word “dude” was highlighted in this book. (The funny thing is that I had no sooner finished that chapter than I heard a young lady call a UPS driver dude!) Now this is a word that has changed dramatically over the years. It actually started as a word to identify a man who was NOT very masculine. Those of us who enjoyed the 80s think of it as linked to surfers and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
And now it is basically ubiquitous. Some people call just about anyone dude. I hear it constantly. It has even adjusted to include women, a gender that once might have cringed at that word being attributed to them.
I had a student last year that would incessantly call me “bro” or “brah.” I insisted I was not this kid’s brother or their bra. They started catching themself when talking to me, but I realize in retrospect, this was their way of addressing just about everyone.
So we’re watching this evolution in real-time. In fifty years, the idea of dude being related to everyone might be so common, we’ll wonder about a time it wasn’t. We’ll accept the word “like” as that filler in normal, and perhaps even formal, conversation. And the nurse helping me in the care center might call me brah and I won’t bat an eyelash.
Maybe. English changes glacially when it comes to something being accepted by those of us who are grammar snobs. But when it gets to the point where usage is so overwhelming that most people use a word or phrase, we have no choice but to give in. After all, what many of us think of as the pound sign on our phones is called a hashtag more these days. (I keep waiting for the instructions on a phone menu to tell me to hit the hashtag sign after I enter a number!)
We might find ourselves giving in to the new forms of dialect unwittingly. You hear your children or grandchildren use something over and over, and it becomes ingrained in your head. Studies find that new words and usages are driven mainly by females and teenagers. They have power!
If I’m standing by my podium when a student launches into a like-filled dialogue, I’ll keep pointing at it. Many of them have a hard time getting through a sentence without it! But maybe they’ll have the last laugh.
Though I’ll still dock them for using like, um, or uh in their speeches!
Word of the Week: This week’s word is callipygous, a word I learned from another audiobook called Butts: A Backstory, which means having beautifully shaped buttocks, as in, “They thought by using the word callipygous to someone they liked that they wouldn’t get in trouble since nobody outside those who read a small weekly column knew what it meant.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!