Print friendly
E-mail story
Tip Us Off
iPod friendly
Comments
Bookmark This
del.icio.us.
Digg!
furl
google
newsvine
reddit
technorati
Facebook
Yahoo!I owe you all a big apology.
Because when I was a kid? Growing up in the San Fernando Valley? We talked in this totally weird way and all? And, like, it spread.
Starshine Roshell
More egregious than our senseless devotion to Vans slip-ons, more deplorable than our establishment of the Church of Mall, more reprehensible than our role in launching Moon Unit Zappa's "musical" career — we Valley Girls of the 1980s injected a hideous habit into the nation's lexicon.
It's the tendency to make every declarative sentence, every piddling phrase, sound like a question.
And it's only now that our kids are doing it that we can fully appreciate how utterly, vexingly brain-piercing it is.
So, like, someone's talking to you? And it's not like they're trying to sound moronic? But they can't really help it because they're caught in a sing-songy loop? From which escape ... is, like ... not likely?
Linguistic experts call these quips "high-rise terminals" for their upward intonation. But James Gorman, a journalism teacher at NYU, coined the term "uptalk" in 1993 after noticing his students doing it.
The verbal tic is associated with youth, but has been documented in high-profile adults from NPR's Terri Gross to President George Bush. And though its origin has been traced to Southern Californa, it's now common on the East Coast, and in Canada and Australia.
England, needless to say, is terrified.
While I confess to being more from the "yucky, make it stop" school of linguistic analysis, there are folks who actually try to figure out why such trends take hold. Some say kids haven't yet mastered the art of conversation and feel the need to check in with their audience at the end of each sentence; it's like saying, "Are you still listening?"
A fifth-grade teacher I know believes her students do it to buy time, to pause and collect their thoughts before proceeding with their story. But in a world where confidence is revered, uptalk can reflect negatively on a speaker's character.
"It says they're unable to take a stand, to make a definitive statement," says a friend of mine, whose brother-in-law is prone to it. It's also a passive-aggressive way of skirting censure, she says, as in, "We can't make it over to see you because we have this fancy party to go to?"
"You can't argue with a question," she points out ... "even if it isn't really a question."
A buddy of mine, a self-described linguistics geek, says the phenomenon's both natural and harmless. People use uptalk simply to identify with a cultural group: the cool kids at school, the surfer crowd in their community, the young folks in the office, etc.
We pass through different culture groups as we age, he says, and most people are able to "shift conversational registers" according to whom they are addressing. So your kids are no more likely to carry uptalk with them into the job market than they are to drag their favorite childhood blankie along.
Just to be safe, though, I recommend spending this summer breaking your kids of the habit. I know a second-grade teacher who reads to her students using uptalk so they can hear how absurd it sounds. My cousin simply asks her thoroughly exasperated daughter, "Was that a question? And if so, how do you expect me to answer it?"
My own parents — in an effort to ensure that when they took the girl out of the Valley, they could also shake the Valley out of the girl — simply mocked me by saying, "Uh-huhhhhh?" every time I paused to take a breath.
It may have been harsh, but I'm here to tell you it works. There's no question in my mind.
For more, visit www.StarshineRoshell.com.
Double-clicking on any word or phrase in this story will open a reference window with definitions and links to other reference material.
Previous Month
Comments
Discussion Guidelines
Uptalk makes the speaker sound like he or she (unfortunately, more often a she) sounds uncertain and lacks confidence. Thus, the speaker is not taken as seriously by the listeners.
The Starshine lesson here reminds me about how UCSB Biology Professor Bruce Mahall employed (or maybe still does) a highly effective training method for students (of all levels) when they mis-speak and mix up the singular and plural of the words datum and data. Scientist types always are talking about their data and so on, but most people initially and incorrectly think the word DATA is a singular noun, when it is not.
Datum is the singular. Data is the plural, as in these data are and this datum is.
Thus, statements like "this data shows..." and "the data reveals..." are an incorrect mix of verb tense for the noun. Such speaking makes the speaker appear dumb, when the correct phrase would be "these data show..." and "the data reveal..." or, in somewhat archaic style, "this datum shows...".
During a seminar or presentation, Mahall would loudly slap his hand on the table every time a student speaking would speak as if the word DATA were a singular noun. It was a highly effective aversion treatment that worked. Datum and data are not the same, as some believe or do not care.
Now only if the Indy and others wrote and edited so consistently. At least I have not read the fictitious SPECIE as the singular of SPECIES lately.
Like, omigod, these data are soooo revealing about the frequency of uptalking among the sloppy speaking youth of Am-MER-ica??
David_Pritchett (anonymous profile)
July 5, 2007 at 12:38 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Mr. Pritchett:
In many contexts and regardless of Latin roots, data is acceptable as a singular. The word has taken the meaning of "information" in the abstract sense. As in "Much data exists on subject X." It's not always quantifiable in the sense of one datum, two data. Most dictionaries report this now. Of course, maybe those sloppy-speaking youngsters have access to newer dictionaries than the eloquent people of your generation do.
Since you're picking on youngsters — and The Independent, for that matter — I'll point out that "specie," according to Webster, is "nonstandard," but certainly not "fictitious." And even a News-Press editor could clean up the redundancy in "It was a highly effective aversion treatment that worked."
And to Starshine: Great column. You really need to dig up some photos of yourself in your Valley Girl stage.
tessathomas (anonymous profile)
July 5, 2007 at 1:43 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Just because a word is contually misused and incorrectly stated does not make it correct after the fact as "taken the meaning". Why be technically and scientifically ignorant or apathetic??
One datum, two data. Many data are. These data indicate.
And always, one or more species. SPECIE is an old Spanish coin, and that is an effective treatment that worked as well in addition.
That always is the cor-REC-ct waaay??
FirstDistrictStreetfighter (anonymous profile)
July 5, 2007 at 6:24 p.m. (Suggest removal)
Data is, of course, a character on Star Trek played by Brent Spiner. Data are what empiricists gather to buttress their arguments.
pardallchewinggumspot (anonymous profile)
July 6, 2007 at 10:46 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Australia is mentioned in the column, as being new to the "uptalk", but I've known some Australians, and New Zealanders too, for years, and they've always sounded like everything they said was a question.
As for "data", if you consider it to be a collection of data, then I don't see why it couldn't be used with singular verbs. Besides, at what level does one break down the data into datum? If a database is made of tables, and the tables include records, which have fields, then you could say whatever is inside is a datum--even though any field could also hold multiple pieces of data!? For example, if you have an "address" field, should "216 State Street" be one datum, or three (#, street name, street type)? Furthermore, should each letter be considered separate "datums"? If you stipulate that the datum must have cohesive meaning ("216" is a number, but the individual numerals would not be correct for the given address), then the issue is reversed--where do you stop combining?
A better thought, if showing a chart, then "data" would be synonomous, and the singular verb conjugation would still be used. So, "this data shows" would be the same as "this graph shows", etcetera.
equus_posteriori (anonymous profile)
July 12, 2007 at 9:34 a.m. (Suggest removal)
Post a comment