It's, like, all right to like like


PHILADELPHIA - Like, don't get upset the next time your teenager, like, uses "like" in a sentence. A new scholarly study says the overused word is not just a space filler; it can impart real meaning.

The slang use of "like" has gone on for decades, but became more prominent in the 1980s when Southern California Valley Girl culture brought it into the mainstream.

Muffy E.A. Siegel, a Temple University linguist, says her research shows "like" can be used in many ways. A few:


As a hedging word, when the speaker isn't sure about his or her facts. ("She has, like, five brothers.")

As a substitute for the word "said." ("She's, like, 'I don't want to go.'")

As a way to introduce exaggerations. ("I've got, like, a million hours of homework.")


Siegel says her own daughters provided the inspiration for the study. She used 23 tape-recorded interviews her eldest daughter had done for a school project and analyzed the students' use of "like."

She says her discovery that the word changes meaning is a revelation to linguists, who generally assumed that meaning came from the other words in a sentence.


The study was published in the Journal of Semantics.



Written by CBC News Online staff