"you know"

Posted by R. Berg on February 28, 2005

In Reply to: Liberal peppering with "you know" posted by Bob on February 27, 2005

: : The term "moronic interrogative" has been usefully coined, so is there one for today's excessive use of "you know" in speech? I've thought up "gneisitis", but I'm not too well up on classical Greek (gneis = you know?).

: How about "Idiam?" The continued use of, like, moronic interrogatives (know what I mean?) is a telltale sign of one's idiocy (know what I'm saying?) because the questioner, you know, has only rarely been in the company of people capable of grasping simple concepts on the first try. He (can you dig what I'm saying) can't possibly make sense of things quickly and therefore assumes we can't either.

More charitably, one can construe the you-knows as an attempt to establish an interpersonal bond of understanding, something like "I'm sure you've had this experience too."

• "you know" Robert Jeffery 28/February/05
  • "you know" James Briggs 28/February/05
    • It, like, evolves Word Camel 28/February/05