LINGUIST List 2.676

Thu 17 Oct 1991

Disc: Like Goes All...

Editor for this issue: <>

Directory

1. Stephen P Spackman, Re: 2.672 (S)he goes
2. "R.Hudson", `he goes'
3. Condon Sherri L, Re: 2.667 'He goes'
4. Claudia Brugman, Re: 2.667 'He goes'
5. Erik Carvalhal Miller, like, 'round and 'round she goes
6. "R.Hudson", `he goes'
7. Ellen Prince, Re: 2.668 Queries

Message 1: Re: 2.672 (S)he goes

tshannongarnet.berkeley.edu notes that we hear not only "(s)he's
like, <quotation>" but "(s)he's all <quotation>". I have the
impression from my sister's speech (Gaspe', anglophone community in
eastern quebec) that there's a scale, something like this:
says 	<	 goes	<	is like	<	is all
fairly staid	"doing		dramatic	full-body
quotation	voices"		impression	caricature
But that looks so logical and literal I wonder if I'm not imagining
it. (The literal reading I have for "go" is turn-taking, not motion).

The changes involving GO and the other expressions like BE LIKE that have
been documented here are fascinating. But even more fascinating is the
earlier version of GO which now seems to be on the way out, having been
subsumed by the GO which allows quoted speech. For people like me (British,
age circa 50) this GO only allows one kind of complement: some kind of
noise or action initiated by the speaker but which is *not* linguistic - i.e.
not made up of words. E.g. `He went [wolf-whistle]' or `The train went
[train-like noise]'. This is fascinating because the subcateorisation
restrictions on GO have to refer explicitly to things other than
language - very clear grist for the non-modular view of language. I wrote
about this in Linguistic Analysis Vol 15.4, 1985, pp 233-55 - actually just
four pages about this pattern. I think I later discovered that the new
use of GO, in which it can be followed by reported speech, was noted
(in California, of course) by Barbara Partee in 1973 (see Schourupp in
 American Speech 57 148-9.) I have another brief discussion in my `English Word
 Grammar' (1991), pp 67-9. What I don't know is whether the new
use still allows non-linguistic complements.
So in 20 years time British kids are going to say `My friends all `Let's
Have a party!'', are they? Something to look forward to. Does this have
to have a plural subject, or could you (I mean, they) say `He all `Let's
have a party''?
Dick Hudson
Dept of Phonetics and Linguistics,
University College London,
Gower Street,
London WC1E 6BT
(071) 387 7050 ext 3152
home: (081) 340 1253

Message 3: Re: 2.667 'He goes'

To the methods of reporting discourse in young people's stories, we can
also add a favorite from California: "I'm all". This is typically
followed by an exaggerated nonverbal gesture and/or facial expression,
then the reported discourse. For example, "I'm all" followed by an
exaggerated expression of disgust followed by "This is so gross!" I've
also heard this in the D.C. area of Maryland.
Sherri Condon

Message 4: Re: 2.667 'He goes'

what about "and he's all, `well, i dunno, whaddayou wanna do?', and
i'm all, `gee, i dunno. . .' "?
--claudia brugman

>Date: Wed, 16 Oct 1991 09:15 EST
>From: Fan mail from some flounder? <SDFNCRritvax.isc.rit.edu>
>Subject: Re: 2.667 'He goes'
>
>I've done a little data collection and analysis of "I'm like," and "He's
>like." I think it's different from "go" in that "go" is really a verb of
>quotation, whereas "like" involves at best paraphrase, and in the case
>of "I'm like" can simply reveal the person's thoughts rather than words
>(these observations are of people 18-30 -- "like" may have evolved further
>in the younger generation). So you get sentences like (1)
>
>(1) I'm like "Give me a break."
I'm twenty-one years old, and the above observations fit my intuitions exactly.
I lost one of the messages in which "go" was first mentioned as a synonym for
"say" (okay, I admit it--I *deleted* it), but I believe someone said that "say"
was used as such only in the narrative present, that "went" cannot be synonymous
with "said." Not true. My peers and I (I am from northwest Indiana) have used
"went" for "said," as in:
 And then he went, "Oh, yeah?" And I went, "Yeah!"
(Storytelling at its finest.) However, I believe this use is still restricted
to narration. My apologies if I misremembered (doublespeak?) the aforementioned
deleted message.
Erik Carvalhal Miller
Indiana University (Bloomington)

My fourteen-year old daughter (London born and bred) tells me that she
often hears things like
	He was like `Let's have a party'
and even
	They were all like `Let's have a party'.
So it's already reached us.
Who knows; maybe it started here and has now reached California?
Dick Hudson
Dept of Phonetics and Linguistics,
University College London,
Gower Street,
London WC1E 6BT
(071) 387 7050 ext 3152
home: (081) 340 1253

Message 7: Re: 2.668 Queries

>Date: Wed, 16 Oct 91 12:11:08 MDT
>From: Jeff Turley <HRCJSTBYUVM.bitnet>
>Subject: Re: 2.667 'He goes'
>
>Does anyone know of equivalents to the verbum dicendi "he goes",
>that is where a verb of motion has been thus grammaticalized?
>A friend from Madrid gives the peninsular Spanish "se pone" 'he
>puts himself', as in "se pone: no quiero!" 'he goes: I don't want to!"
>(This periphrasis also means 'become', as in "se puso triste" 'he got
>sad.')
in yiddish, the verb makhn 'make' is used, as in:
1. fregt er vayter: 'kale, ir hot a bruder?'
 asks he further: 'bride, you have a brother?'
 makht zi: 'neyn, keyn bruder hob ikh nit.'
 makes she: 'no, no brother have i not.'
2. der shnorer hot zikh arayngeleygt dem hunderter in keshene
 the beggar has self in-put the $100 in pocket
 un makht tsu roytshildn: 'der gesheft iz azoy...'
 and makes to Rothschild, 'the affair is such...'
 'the beggar put the $100 bill in his pocket and says to rothschild, "the
 deal is this...'
in my data (Olsvanger, Royte pomerantsn, 1947, Schocken Press), makhn is used
as a verbum dicendi only with following direct discourse. also, it's always
used in the present tense, even when conjoined with a past tense, as in 2.