‘Like’ is an infix now, which is un-like-believably innovative

Like has undergone radical developments in modern English. It can function as a hedge (‘I’ll be there in like an hour’), a discourse particle (‘This like serves a pragmatic function’), and a sentence adverb (‘It’s common in Ireland, like’). These and other non-standard usages are frequently criticised, but they’re probably older than critics think.

More recent is the so-called quotative like (‘I’m like, Whoa!’), also often disparaged. This became widely established impressively fast and is leading to some remarkable usages in younger generations: children saying things like ‘What’s Ernie like?’ to mean ‘What’s Ernie saying?’

So some uses of like are emerging right now, spreading through younger speech communities. In episode 278 of Australia’s Talk the Talk podcast, guest Alexandra D’Arcy – a linguistics professor who literally wrote the book on like – says that while she might say ‘at like the same time’, her son can say ‘at the like same time’, which is not in her grammar at all. It’s a subtle but striking difference.

It gets better. The latest novel use to which like is being put is as an infix. Infixes are a pretty small set in English, so a new one is a genuine surprise, linguistically. In some ways it is unlikeprecedented.

What will the future of ‘like’ bilaik?

The rise of quotative like (I was like, What?) has been swift and striking since it emerged a few decades ago. No word stays exactly the same, but the changes and extensions to like have been more noticeable than most on account of its versatility, popularity, and prominence.

So what will happen to like in the future? More change, if these tweets are anything to go by:

@LangMaverick friend's 4yo just asked "what's Ernie like?" After some offers of attributes etc we realized she meant "what's he saying"

— Sarah Shulist (@sarahshulist) September 7, 2015

@sarahshulist Brilliant! My son did this too. Plus, one day it could stick & be used widely this way. #lovelike #acquisition

— Alexandra D'Arcy (@LangMaverick) September 7, 2015

@LangMaverick @wgi_la11ur her frustration when we couldn't understand – "No, what's Ernie like ON THIS PAGE?" suggests adults don't get it

— Sarah Shulist (@sarahshulist) September 7, 2015

If you click on Sarah’s first tweet (or its date, in some browsers) you can read more follow-up discussion.

I would have been confused by what the child meant, and I’d probably have exhausted her patience long before figuring it out. The fact that Sarah Shulist is a linguistic anthropologist and Alexandra D’Arcy is a sociolinguist (who has done research on like) may have helped them infer the child’s intent more quickly in each case.

Hypercorrect ‘as’ for ‘like’

I tweeted about this a couple of months ago and have been meaning to follow up ever since. The item that interests me is a usage in the subhead of an article from Brussels-based news service Politico. Here’s the relevant portion:

And I’m like, Quotative ‘like’ isn’t just for quoting

A few tweets from earlier today, to introduce and summarise the topic:

Critics of quotative "like" ("I was like" ≈ "I said") aren't looking closely enough at the phenomenon. It's not a lazy or trivial usage.

— Stan Carey (@StanCarey) August 1, 2013

Often, "I'm like" isn't followed by a quotation at all, but sets up a miniature performance of facial expression, body language, attitude.

— Stan Carey (@StanCarey) August 1, 2013

A striking use of quotative "like" – people following "[And] I'm like" with an image or image macro. Look at these: https://t.co/M63C7fDR6I

— Stan Carey (@StanCarey) August 1, 2013

[An interesting discussion ensued that I’ll assemble on Storify later. Update: Here’s the Storify chat.]

Redundancy in the prime of ‘like’

From Muriel Spark’s novel The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1961):

Meanwhile Miss Brodie said:
  ‘And Mrs Lloyd — is she a woman, would you say, in her prime?’
  ‘Perhaps not yet,’ said Sandy.
  ‘Well, Mrs Lloyd may be past it,’ Jenny said. ‘It’s difficult to say with her hair being long on her shoulders. It makes her look young although she may not be.’
  ‘She looks really like as if she won’t have any prime,’ Sandy said.
  ‘The word “like” is redundant in that sentence. What is Mrs Lloyd’s Christian name?’
  ‘Deirdre,’ said Jenny, and Miss Brodie considered the name as if it were new to her . . .

Like is indeed redundant in that sentence, and you could equally say as if is. There’s nothing inherently wrong with like as if, but it has too colloquial a feel for the formal register Miss Brodie encourages in her students — more “proper” speech being advantageous in conservative society. COHA shows like as if used mostly in casual language.

Note also the recurrent use of said to report dialogue. Some writers are suspicious of its ordinariness, readily replacing it with such words as replied, spoke, enquired and exclaimed, but these draw more attention to themselves and hence away from the story.

Related links:
Omit needless criticisms of redundancy
Jessica Love on quotative like