Does it like bother you when people say 'like'? New book explores world's most hated word

It’s probably the most hated word in the world.

Megan C. Reynolds is the author of the new book "Like: A History of the World’s Most Hated (and Misunderstood) Word." She's also an editor at Dwell magazine and has written for a variety of national publications.

Reynolds joined The Show to talk more about “like” and how our use of it goes back, like, way further than you may think.

Chris Bernabeo

Full conversation

MEGAN C. REYNOLDS: When I started writing this book, I assumed that it was just the Valley Girls and maybe a little more than the Valley Girls, but that was it.

But there are court records stretching back to like the 1600s in the UK that show that the word like has been used very much in the same ways that we use it now today, so in like a contemporary way back in the day.

And part of the reason that the word has become so pervasive now is step one because of empire, like colonialism. British people were saying like in that way, British people ruled all over the world for a long time. So that's part of the reason why it's sort of so pervasive and almost universal.

But the other part is because of women, girls, young girls specifically.

LAUREN GILGER: Right, right. So there's a lot of gender that you're writing about in terms of how we kind of use language, police language. And it probably has to do with the fact that Valley Girls are, you know, very much related to the word like. Like we don't tend to really respect teenage girls a whole lot in this culture, right?

REYNOLDS: Yes, we don't respect teenage girls as much, and that is upsetting for many reasons, but for the purposes of this book, it's bad because teenage girls are women, but teenage girls especially are at the forefront of linguistic innovation and change, and it's because their speech is sort of less like we're not paying as close attention to it unless we're telling them it's bad.

But you know, because we're not really paying close attention to it, they're sort of learning different words and different ways of speaking from being in the world, from existing, and then it eventually becomes a part of the general vernacular of the general lexicon.

And part of that is also because we learn speech from our primary caregivers. I will not make any generalizations, but generally the primary caregiver is a woman, your mother. That's how you learn from the jump. And so that's why it's pervasive and, and that is also why it's tied to women.

GILGER: And also probably why it has such a bad rap.

REYNOLDS: Yes.

GILGER: But you're trying to free us from that a little bit in this book, right? Like you, you, your idea here is that this is a common word that is used in lots of kind of important ways and it goes back a long time.

Talk a little bit about the uses of the word like, like you, you even section the book into sections that have to do with the way we use this word. What's your favorite?

REYNOLDS: I think I have two. My first favorite is the quotative. So the quotative is when you say, I was like, the cat is going to kill me because she hasn't eaten dinner.

That's a bad example, but it's not a bad example. Basically, what I'm saying there is, first of all, my cat can't talk, which is fine. Second of all, what I am saying though is that the way she is behaving or whatever else makes me feel like she's going to kill me for not feeding her dinner. In truth, that did not happen.

When we use like instead of say, what it does is it gives us the ability to communicate to our conversational partner how we feel about a situation as opposed to what exactly happened, right?

GILGER: And everyone who was talking in that conversation would know, of course, that your cat wasn't actually telling you that she was going to kill you. But …

REYNOLDS: Yes, one assumes.

GILGER: But, but there's right, it's a real, that's a real important tool in language it sounds like.

REYNOLDS: Yeah, I mean, it's, the one thing that I found the word to be the most useful for is navigating complicated, any complicated sort of communication situation, interpersonal relationships, relationships that are emotional or feelings that are difficult to express.

And so if you're having a conversation with someone and you're saying, you know, my boss was like blah blah blah. You know, and the blah blah blah is like you're bad at your job or whatever. The likelihood again is that your boss did not tell you outright like that, that you are bad at your job, I hope, but whatever they did say made you feel that way.

And so you're communicating like the contours of a story and that sort of summary contains the most sort of like the most important bullet points. And those bullet points, in my opinion, are like how you feel about the thing that you're talking about. And that helps the other person in turn respond to you in a way that one hopes is emotionally intelligent or at the very least like fine.

GILGER: So like is more than a filler in conversation and it's, it's not indicative of being dumb, right, which is how so many people would interpret it.

REYNOLDS: That is true. It's not a sign of unintelligence. I, if anyone takes anything away from this book, I would like it to be that. It's not a sign of unintelligence. I think it's a sign of sort of emotional intelligence, which again I think is very important. It's a sign that you are a considerate person when you are speaking to someone else.

It's a sign that you are thinking about what you're saying because you want to be kind to yourself, because you want to communicate in the most effective way, you know, the, the way that is most effective for you, but you're also being kind to the person that you're speaking to.

So if you're having a very difficult conversation about emotions or whatever else, you know, it's probably not going to be really easy to just say whatever it is you need to say straight up. You're gonna be thinking about what you're saying, you're going to be probably making, you know, small course corrections in your brain as you are saying it, and any hesitation, you know, that hesitation can come off as like being unsure or insecure, and I would say it's not insecurity, but I do think It is a little bit about being unsure, but that's not a negative in this situation.

GILGER: Yeah, that's, that's really poignant actually.

Let me ask you about your own kind of history with the word like, like your own experience with it, like having this conversation, I'm noticing how many times I'm saying like I know it's OK. Have you become very conscious of this?

REYNOLDS: No, I have actually felt emboldened to continue to do exactly what I've been doing for the 42 years that I've been alive.

I do say the word a lot. I say it a lot speaking, I say it a lot in text messages. I say it a lot in work emails, which is an interesting, and there is a section about professionalism, cause that is, I think that's like the main concern for for the boomers is professionalism, like you're setting your kids up for failure if you are not getting them to wean this word out of their vocabulary.

I also think it communicates a kind of, I mean, I think part of it is like I'm striving for something, something close to authenticity.

GILGER: So do you think we should all be freed from judgment for this for the use of this word?

REYNOLDS: Yes, I think we should all, if at all possible and it is very difficult, everybody should just give themselves just a tiny bit of grace around this word specifically. Be confident in what you're saying. However that looks for you. That's the point. That's my point, at least.