no (.) just just do the accent like (.

)
how they speak
Degrees of pragmaticalization in the speech of Cardiff teenagers

Sophie Vincent-Bour Labor atoire de ling uist ique

Université de Nantes <sofisouss@neuf.fr>

Université de N antes

Amina Mettouchi
Université de Nantes, et Institut Universitaire de France
<amina.mettouchi@univ-nantes.fr> "having the same characteristics or qualities" (as another), M.E. shortening of O.E. gelic
"like, similar," from P.Gmc. *galikaz "having the same form," lit. "with a corresponding body"
(cf. O.S. gilik, O.N. glikr, Du. gelijk, Ger. gleich, Goth. galeiks "equally, like"),
1382, "righteous in the eyes of God, upright and impartial," from O.Fr. just,
Pragmaticalization a compound of *ga- "with, together" + *likan "body" (cf. O.E. lic "body," Ger. Leiche "corpse,"
from L. justus "upright, equitable," from jus (gen. juris) "right," especially « lexical items on their way to becoming function words Dan. lig, Swed. lik, Du. lijk "body, corpse"). Analogous, etymologically, to L. conform.
The modern form (rather than *lich) may be from a northern descendant of the O.E. word's
"legal right, law," from O.Latin ious, perhaps lit. "sacred formula,"
a word peculiar to Latin (not general Italic) that originated in the religious cults, may follow two different paths, one of them O.N.cognate, likr. Formerly with comp. liker and superl. likest (still in use 17c.).
The prep. (c.1200) and the adv. (c1300) are both from the adjective. As a conjunction,
from PIE base *yewes- (cf. Avestan yaozda- "make ritually pure;" see jurist).
The more mundane L. law-word lex covered specific laws
resulting in the creation of grammatical markers, first attested c.1530. Plural likes (n.) "predilections, preferences" is from 1851;
as opposed to the body of laws. functioning mainly sentence-internally, the other resulting earlier used in sing. in this sense (1425). The word has been used as a postponed filler
("going really fast, like") from 1778; as a presumed emphatic ("going, like, really fast") from 1950,
http://www.etymonline.com
in discourse-markers mainly serving originally in counterculture slang and bop talk.
Phrase more like it "closer to what is desired" is from 1888.
as text-structuring devices at different levels of discourse » http://www.etymonline.com
(Erman & Kotsinas 1993:79)

Frequency Frequency
2nd most frequent PM 1st most frequent PM
The corpus : oral spontaneous speech, collected by
34 occurrences for girls, 33 for boys, 121 occurrences for girls, 43 for boys,
Sophie Vincent-Bour in a bilingual school in Cardiff in 2003,
out of 8000 words = 8.4 / 1,000 words out of 8000 words = 20 / 1,000 words
among 18 teenagers aged from 13 to 14 years old.
(cf. LLC = 3.38/ 1,000 words (Aijmer 1985); (cf. BNC London Spoken = 0.43 / 1,000 words
For the purpose of this study, we have selected a subcorpus
and COLT = 5.7 / 1,000 words (Erman 1996) (Andersen 2000);
of 2 conversations, one between two girls,
and COLT = 2.65 / 1,000 words (Erman 1996))
the other between two boys, which amount
Already a GENDER-related use of LIKE ?
to a total of 8000 words

Very frequent collocation with Verbs (53.7%), Very frequent collocation with
often in imperatives (10.45%) Goals (filled and silent) pauses,
and when preceded by modals (10.45%), Compare the use of JUST and LIKE in the conversations and unfinished utterances (47.6%)
just talk about anything (.) what girls do you fancy Bush is like uh (~) # here’s a statement (.) no one likes you
cos like if you just have like (.) cream trousers
Assess their respective degrees of pragmaticalization and they were like um (~) um (~) like #
Sometimes appears in PM clusters (11.9%) Relate this to teenage speech More than 30% of all occurrences produced after BE,
a bowl of hot chocolate that’s just like the size of your head as a period of pragmatic acquisition (24% of which in the prefab it’s like)
Also found in the prefab it’s just (that) (3%) It’s like if (.) you haven’t the braces you’re not cool
it’s just complete rip off Introduces quotative sequences (10.98%)
1 « isolated » occurrence I was like (.) wow
mmm (.) just (.) I love him Method Appears in clusters with :
Sometimes appears in unfinished clauses (13.4%) Conjunctions (but, and, etc) and PMs (cos, you know, etc)
I’ll just like # Study the context and frequency of just and like yeah (.) but like (.) what style of trousers though (~)
oh I’ll just # Study their prosodic profile cos like if you just have like (.) cream trousers

Lower syntactic flexibility > lower degree of pragmaticalization High syntactic flexibility > higher degree of pragmaticalization
Mainly appears in argumentative or hypothetical contexts Mainly appears in highly qualifying/descriptive contexts
(advice, imagined/recollected situations, « serious » topics) (anecdotes, imitations, jokes, colours, quantities)
+ speaker-oriented + hearer oriented

Prosody Prosody

500 0
500 0

Various realizations but often

Cf. spectrograms
Always attrition [lɑk]
cf. spectrograms 0
0
0 0. 43 37 91
Time (s) 0 0.23 803
Time ( s)

[ʤɪst]

500 500

Often level or slightly higher 400

300
400

300
Often lower in F0 and
in F0 than previous syllable 200 200 intensity than previous
100

0
100

0
syllable
no t hey're just like pause ( 669 ms) t he the F rench boys wel l hi s legs were lik e flo ating in t he air

327 300306 281 269 284 279 252 1 92 1 85 1 65 19 5 184

89 86 87 89 91 86 89 90 86 89 84 86 88

0 2.9328 0 1 .4861
Time (s ) Time ( s)

500 500

Sometimes followed by
400 400

300
300

a silent pause (10.4%) 200

200 Often followed by a
pause
100

(never followed by a filled pause)

100

0
0
it is just pause ( 556 ms) West Wal es

Often lower in intensity than

no they're just like pause (669 m s) the the Fr en ch boy s

198 Hz177 Hz 178 Hz 181

327 300 306 281 269 284 279 252

previous syllable 87 dB 84 88 dB 87 dB
89 86 87 89 91 86 89 90
0 1.84768
Time (s) 0 2.9328
T ime ( s)

Conclusions
• like is fully pragmaticalized whereas just is in the process of pragmatic diversification
(isolated use and prefabs)
• common semantic core around the notions of adjustment and conformity,
but diverging destinies: just is speaker-oriented whereas like is hearer-oriented
• speaker orientation (just) corresponds to ‘survival of the fittest’ (Poulsen 1996)
• hearer orientation (like) corresponds to the construction of a ‘collaborative floor’
(Edelsky 1981) vs. ‘single floor’ (just)
• both contribute to ‘high involvment style’ (Nordberg 1986, Tannen 1984)
• adolescence is a period of pragmatic acquisition, where teenagers
experiment their linguistic positioning among their peers
(anticipation of co-speaker’s (dis)agreement, emergence of face-saving consciousness,
and gender-related use of language)