"Uh... like... um... err... yeah... you know..."

[Aragorn]

The one I notice the most is "you know," when athletes are being interviewed and often say it several times in one sentence.

I've also heard a lot of people who are trying to make a statement and don't know where they're going with it and just end with "yeah."

And the overuse of "like" was a popular way in media to portray the "valley girl" stereotype back in the '80s and '90s.

Granted, most people aren't professional speakers, but is this something we're wired to do? Perhaps because we talk faster than we think? Or do we end up saying these "filler words" because we're so used to hearing other people say them for as long as we can remember?

 

[Rii]

I like 'like' as it can, like, create a rhythm, y'know?

 

[RoJoHen]

Ugh, sports interviews are the absolute worst, especially since they never really say anything anyway. other than "We tried our best." It just takes them about 2 extra minutes to say it.

I admit I say "um" more than I would like, but I'm pretty good about the rest.

Once, my freshman year of high school, we were giving oral reports. This girl Anne said "like" 89 times. My teacher didn't pay any attention to her actual report. Rather, he spent her whole speech tallying the number of "likes" that came out of her mouth.

 

[The Boy Who Cried Worf]

I don't consider myself a good speaker at all. I don't think I use "like" or "you know" a lot, but I do have a lot of awkward pauses. My problem I think comes from my anxiety. There are times when my mind blanks out on me. I'll be trying to recall something and can't or will literally just run out of what I was saying and haven't thought yet what I am going to say next.

 

[Lindley]

My biggest problem is when I start speaking just to fill dead air without any real notion of what I'm going to say. Sometimes I come up with something.....sometimes I don't. That's a bit awkward....

 

[Rii]

My biggest problem is when I start speaking just to fill dead air without any real notion of what I'm going to say. Sometimes I come up with something.....sometimes I don't. That's a bit awkward....

"I post on a Star Trek forum. Wait, that didn't come out right..."

 

[Gryffindorian]

Why does it have to be, like, you know, I mean, celebrities? And, you know, back in the Woodstock days, said my old college professor, you know, people always said "you know," like, when they were high or something.

 

[Kestra]

This thread is making me uncomfortable.

 

[Gryffindorian]

Like, I can totally relate. I think I write better than I talk. It's not that I use "like, uh, er, um," all the time. My voice has a tendency to trail off, pausing in mid-sentence, thinking of what to say next. Sometimes I just mumble the rest of my sentence. Sometimes the person I'm talking to fills in the words. "If you want something, then ... maybe--" I hate that; I'd like to be a little bit more articulate.

 

[Middle Earther]

Ummm...yeah...what he said.

 

[Danny99]

I don't pretend to be a great public speaker, but every athlete does suffer from this unfortunate affliction and it bothers me to no end.

 

[Canadave]

I don't pretend to be a great public speaker, but every athlete does suffer from this unfortunate affliction and it bothers me to no end.

Just try mining athletes for quotes for newspaper articles. If it bothers you now, imagine what it's like trying to extract a useable quote from three minutes worth of nothingness.

 

[Geckothan]

Like you know whatever.

 

[Zulu Romeo]

Well, basically, it all boils down to having nothing much to say, and at the end of the day we end up randomly emitting clichéd nonentities to keep the conversation on a level playing field. [Mike Dickin must be rolling in his grave - everyone]

 

[backstept]

know what I'm saying?
nowutmsayin?
nomsayn?

know what I mean?
nowutimean?
notimean?

yeah yeah I feel you

 

[Zulu Romeo]

know what I'm saying?
nowutmsayin?
nomsayn?

know what I mean?
nowutimean?
notimean?

yeah yeah I feel you

Isn't it?

[Isn't it, though? - someone]

Standard.

 

[Geckothan]

Like oh my god

 

[trekkiedane]

I wouldn't trust a politician that doesn't use umm's and err's (and a lot of them actually) to be anything but a well programmed robot.

It's those little thought-pauses that states that whomever uses them are actually thinking about what they're saying.

Like's and you know's, however, have a tendency to show that the person using them don't actually think a lot about what they're saying... you know...

 

[Sakrysta]

Vocal clutter is a natural occurrence that can be eliminated from one's conversation with effort and attention. Most people don't care enough to try. In speech and public speaking classes, one of the things you're taught is to be comfortable with pausing to gather the right words without feeling the need to fill the silence with clutter. If you can train yourself to do this, eventually, your pauses get shorter, not because you're not still thinking about what to say, but because you learn to think faster and more steadily. You less often run away with vocalizing a thought without having determined where you intend to take that thought.

Our culture has become uncomfortable with silence. If someone stops to compose an answer, it's almost considered rude. "Dude, I asked you a question - are you ignoring me or something?" It's an auditory phenomenon - you'll notice that we don't keep typing random words to fill the time between sentences or thoughts. Occasionally we'll throw a clutter word in there, but that's usually an attempt to make our posts sound conversational, not because we feel a compulsion to fill space.

 

[Squiggy]

Does my voice please you?