[Magdalen] Like I Was Puzzled.

[Sally Davies]

Oh my gosh, Grace. That reminds me of a classmate in our Psych Masters
group who made up an all-purpose therapy response. Went something like:

So, as I understand you there, you're saying that in some way, at some
level, you feel.....

AARGH!! Thank goodness for narrative therapy and goodbye to All That.

I quite like the use of "go" for "say" or "said". As a habit  it can be
most annoying, but I enjoy the way it captures the game-like aspects of
verbal communication. I think of it as "having a go" (as in a board game)
or "fair go" as the Australians say.

Sally

On Thursday, 4 December 2014, Grace Cangialosi <gracecan at gmail.com> wrote:

> LOL, Sally!
>
> What I find somewhat puzzling is the way it gets used to describe a
> conversation. I mean, I kind of get its use to place the speaker somewhere,
> as in "I was, like, going to the store."
>
> But I don't get
> "Well, I was like, 'How was your date last night?' And she was like, 'He's
> cute, but really boring," and I was like...    Well you get it.
>
> The other usage that intrigues me is the use of "go" instead of "say."
>
> "So I go 'Did you watch the game?' and he goes, 'No, I had to go shopping
> with my dad.' and I go....
>
> Then there's beginning every question and response with "so."  I hear that
> all the time in NPR interviews.
>
> Grace, sometime curmudgeon when it comes to language, grammar and
> punctuation
>
> > On Dec 3, 2014, at 3:56 PM, Sally Davies <sally.davies at gmail.com
> <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >
> > Pervasive here, too. This habit started, I guess, with kids and teenagers
> > but has spread to older generations and from wherever it originated
> > (California? London?) to a wide variety of English speaking contexts.
> >
> > The usual form here is "I was like...".
> >
> > I think that people have taken to this expression because it is somewhat
> > distancing and seems not to commit one to a truth position. I was "like
> > that" - but I wasn't "that".  Maybe it's too much of a stretch to
> conclude
> > something about the culture in which such tentative self-positioning
> seems
> > to thrive...?
> >
> > "After that, I replied...", or "and then, I did X"  sounds not only more
> > formal but more documentary! The "I was like" OTOH, avoids the bother of
> > finding the right verb. It sets up a sentence (if one could call it that)
> > which could go anywhere. I could be, like, saying something, or it's
> like I
> > could have done something, or maybe I could even be, like so wasted I
> can't
> > actually recall what I was like.
> >
> > And sad/denialist as it may be, when you hang around with kids enough of
> > the time, you do, like, start borrowing their expressions in
> self-defence...
> >
> > Language evolves...or maybe unravels...
> >
> > Sally D
> >
> > On Wednesday, 3 December 2014, Cantor03--- via Magdalen <
> > magdalen at herberthouse.org <javascript:;>> wrote:
> >
> >>
> >> I've had several people visiting my home recently whose every other
> >> sentence
> >> begins with "Like I was...." of some such.  These were not teenagers,
> but
> >> adults in their 40's and 50's.
> >>
> >> I've been aware of this rage for describing usually something in the
> past
> >> with descriptions beginning with "Like", but I wasn't aware such  usage
> >> has crept so far into the general USA population.  I have no clue  about
> >> this
> >> phenomenon in other English speaking areas of the world.
> >>
> >> This "like" business has become chronic and pervasive in the USA, and
> >> my question is about whether this is a fad, or marks  a chronic change
> >> in spoken English.  If it is long term, it demonstrates a
> trivialization
> >> of
> >> the language IMHO.
> >>
> >> Anyone have any thoughts about this "like" usage and predictions  about
> >> its continued usage?
> >>
> >>
> >> David S.
> >>
>