The irruption of disfluent like, especially in the contemporary speech of adolescent and younger females, has been chronicled and typologized here in earlier posts, but it is noteworthy to observe that this trait has penetrated non-native English speech as well, witness the interview this morning on NPR’s “Weekend Edition Saturday”with a Filipina who survived Super Typhoon Haiyan. The interviewee sprinkled her English with ticastic like just like (NB!) a representative American female. Whether this use of like in the service of a discourse strategy by a non-native speaker can be judged an apotropaism is, however, an open question.

MICHAEL SHAPIRO