- First, let’s take like in just its traditional, accepted forms. Even in its dictionary definition, like is the product of stark changes in meaning that no one would ever guess. To an Old English speaker, the word that later became like was the word for, of all things, “body.” The word was lic, and lic was part of a word, gelic, that meant “with the body,” as in “with the body of,” which was a way of saying “similar to”—as in like. Gelic over time shortened to just lic, which became like. Of course, there were no days when these changes happened abruptly and became official. It was just that, step by step, the syllable lic, which to an Old English speaker meant “body,” came to mean, when uttered by people centuries later, “similar to”—and life went on.
- Like has become a piece of grammar: It is the source of the suffix -ly. To the extent that slowly means “in a slow fashion,” as in “with the quality of slowness,” it is easy (and correct) to imagine that slowly began as “slow-like,” with like gradually wearing away into a -ly suffix. That historical process is especially clear in that there are still people who, colloquially, say slow-like, angry-like. Technically, like yielded two suffixes, because -ly is also used with adjectives, as in portly and saintly. Again, the pathway from saint-like to saint- ly is not hard to perceive.
- Because we think of like as meaning “akin to” or “similar to,” kids decorating every sentence or two with it seems like overuse. After all, how often should a coherently minded person need to note that something is similar to something rather than just being that something? The new like, then, is associated with hesitation. It is common to label the newer generations as harboring a fear of venturing a definite statement.
- That analysis seems especially appropriate in that this usage of like first reached the national consciousness with its usage by Beatniks in the 1950s, as in, “Like, wow!” We associate the Beatniks, as a prelude to the counterculture with their free-ranging aesthetic and recreational sensibilities, with relativism.
- Part of the essence of the Beatnik was a reluctance to be judgmental of anyone but those who would dare to (1) be judgmental themselves or (2) openly abuse others.
- like transformed from something occasional into something more regular.
- The 50s beatniks, who said “like, wow” and brought this monosyllabic utterance into the national consciousness. In novels too, the “like” suffix started being used more liberally. Instead of just “slow-like” we got sentences like, “That’s the right clue and may do me some good. Something very big. Truth, like.” (Sieze the Day, 1965).
- Now, it’s become something else. A mark of hesitation, a transition, or if you like fancy and specific turns of phrase: “Like has morphed into a modal marker of the human mind at work in conversation.” — John McWhorter in The Atlantic
- He further makes the point that unlike “um” or “uh”, “like” is not a marker of unconfident speech. Not at all. People use like to manage expectations, reinforce ideas, soften blows, or attribute speech in conversations. Confused yet? Here’s a few examples.
- Like is no longer a verbal tick of the young. The beatniks and mainstreamers who started using it in the fifties are “like, old” or at least middle-aged now, and are still likely to use like in these ways. But it’s also being carried on as a subtle but important speech pattern in younger generations.
- The problem with the hesitation analysis is that this was a thoroughly confident speaker. He told this story with zest, vividness, and joy. What, after all, would occasion hesitation in spelling out that a family was holding an event in a room? It’s real-life usage of this kind—to linguists it is data, just like climate patterns are to meteorologists—that suggests that the idea of like as the linguistic equivalent to slumped shoulders is off.
- Understandably so, of course—the meaning of like suggests that people are claiming that everything is “like” itself rather than itself.
- So is it that young people are strangely overusing the like from the dictionary, or might it be that like has birthed a child with a different function altogether? When one alternative involves saddling entire generations of people, of an awesome array of circumstances across a vast nation, with a mysteriously potent inferiority complex, the other possibility beckons as worthy of engagement.
- And in that, note that there is also at the same time an acknowledgment of counterexpectation. The new like acknowledges unspoken objection while underlining one’s own point (the factuality). Like grandparents translates here as “There were, despite what you might think, actually grandparents.” Another example: I opened the door and it was, like, her! certainly doesn’t mean “Duhhhh, I suppose it’s okay for me to identify the person as her . . .” Vagueness is hardly the issue here.
- The original meaning of like applies in that one is saying “You may think I mean something like a couple and their son, but I mean something like a whole brood.”
- Essentially like has become a word used to emphasis fact as well as cover assertiveness – possibly as we take less responsibilities for our narratives
Summary:
- Context - it started from the Beatniks
- Counter-expectation and reinforcement
- To water statements down
- As a quotation
- Online verification
The first counter-culture of language
Beatnik was a media stereotype prevalent throughout the 1950s to mid-1960s that displayed the more superficial aspects of the Beat Generation literary movement of the 1950s. Elements of the beatnik trope included pseudo-intellectualism, drug use, and a cartoonish depiction of real-life people along with the spiritual quest of Jack Kerouac's autobiographical fiction.
- An example of youthful hedonism and creative freedom that was the first of its kind - subsequent of marijuana and rock and roll
- poetry magazines that were censored / band in the end
- first publication suppressed
- questioning freedom of speech
- The banning of 'unacceptable ideas' provoked certain politically aware students to begin questioning the values, the motives and the judgements of school officials and others in authority
- The school then banned Catcher In The Rye - made everyone curious and read it
- CENSORSHIP of language - books could be censored but music couldn't - the rise of rock and roll & freedom of expression
Beat Generation:
'The Beat Generation was a literary movement started by a group of authors whose work explored and influenced American culture and politics in the post-war era. The bulk of their work was published and popularised throughout the 1950s. The central elements of Beat culture are the rejection of standard narrative values, making a spiritual quest, the exploration of American and Eastern religions, the rejection of materialism, explicit portrayals of the human condition, experimentation with psychedelic drugs, and sexual liberation and exploration.
Allen Ginsberg's Howl (1956), William S. Burroughs's Naked Lunch (1959) and Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1957) are among the best known examples of Beat literature. Both Howl and Naked Lunch were the focus of obscenity trials that ultimately helped to liberalise publishing in the United States. The members of the Beat Generation developed a reputation as new bohemian hedonists, who celebrated non-conformity and spontaneous creativity.' - Wiki
Jazz music was central to Beat philosophy and served as the soundtrack for the movement. Much of the vocabulary and ethos of jazz was infused into beat culture, and in fact the word "Beat" was taken from jazz slang, meaning down and out.
The Beat movement blended disparate elements of surrealism, jazz, and post-modernism into its own unique modes of expression. At a reading on Thompson Street in Greenwich Village, one man recites poetry while accompanied by a flutist.
Beat culture found its home in the then-new, now-omnipresent coffee shop. Here, people could congregate, listen to music, and drink their beverage of choice without time constraints.
Coffee shops also served as the defacto venues for oft impromptu Beat performances. In this photograph, a woman recites poetry during a late night session in a Greenwich Village cafe in 1959.
A handmade sign outside the Cafe Wha? offers "Beat poets, jazz, crazy bongos, congos, Live Beatniks, Creepniks, ?!?!?!"
A candid moment from the Cock N' Bull coffee shop in 1959.
Famed for his motto of "jazz is my religion, and surrealism is my point of view," poet and trumpeter Ted Joans was a fixture of the Beat scene in New York City. He was similarly famed for holding bohemian parties, like in this photograph taken at a costume party in Greenwich Village in 1960.
Ted Joans reads poetry at the Bizarre coffee shop in 1959.
Coffee shops were often run illicitly and sometimes operated as fronts for drug dealing. In 1960, the fire department and the police department began shutting down coffee shops throughout New York City. In this photograph, a group prepares for a protest against city actions.
Beatniks protest in front of New York's City Hall in 1960 in response to closures of coffee shops.
Beatnik culture was quickly commodified by the mainstream and was used to sell things like record players and movies. Similar to what would happen later in the 1960s to the hippies in San Francisco, Greenwich Village became a tourist destination and featured bus tours to see "beatniks in real life."
Key Notes:
- 1950s aesthetic
- B&W
- Prints
Allen Ginsberg's Howl (1956), William S. Burroughs's Naked Lunch (1959) and Jack Kerouac's On the Road (1957) are among the best known examples of Beat literature. Both Howl and Naked Lunch were the focus of obscenity trials that ultimately helped to liberalise publishing in the United States. The members of the Beat Generation developed a reputation as new bohemian hedonists, who celebrated non-conformity and spontaneous creativity.' - Wiki
Culture and influences
Before becoming a poet and a fixture of the Beat community, Gregory Corso spent most of his life in orphanages and prisons. Thanks to the donation of an extensive library at Clinton State Prison by reputed mobster Charles "Lucky" Luciano, Corso was able to study poetry and literature, which would spark his own creative talents.
- Drug use
- Romanticism
- Early American sources
- French surrealism
- Modernism
Before becoming a poet and a fixture of the Beat community, Gregory Corso spent most of his life in orphanages and prisons. Thanks to the donation of an extensive library at Clinton State Prison by reputed mobster Charles "Lucky" Luciano, Corso was able to study poetry and literature, which would spark his own creative talents. 
Jazz music was central to Beat philosophy and served as the soundtrack for the movement. Much of the vocabulary and ethos of jazz was infused into beat culture, and in fact the word "Beat" was taken from jazz slang, meaning down and out.
The Beat movement blended disparate elements of surrealism, jazz, and post-modernism into its own unique modes of expression. At a reading on Thompson Street in Greenwich Village, one man recites poetry while accompanied by a flutist.
Beat culture found its home in the then-new, now-omnipresent coffee shop. Here, people could congregate, listen to music, and drink their beverage of choice without time constraints.
Coffee shops also served as the defacto venues for oft impromptu Beat performances. In this photograph, a woman recites poetry during a late night session in a Greenwich Village cafe in 1959.
A handmade sign outside the Cafe Wha? offers "Beat poets, jazz, crazy bongos, congos, Live Beatniks, Creepniks, ?!?!?!"
A candid moment from the Cock N' Bull coffee shop in 1959.
Famed for his motto of "jazz is my religion, and surrealism is my point of view," poet and trumpeter Ted Joans was a fixture of the Beat scene in New York City. He was similarly famed for holding bohemian parties, like in this photograph taken at a costume party in Greenwich Village in 1960.
Ted Joans reads poetry at the Bizarre coffee shop in 1959.
Coffee shops were often run illicitly and sometimes operated as fronts for drug dealing. In 1960, the fire department and the police department began shutting down coffee shops throughout New York City. In this photograph, a group prepares for a protest against city actions.
Beatniks protest in front of New York's City Hall in 1960 in response to closures of coffee shops.
Beatnik culture was quickly commodified by the mainstream and was used to sell things like record players and movies. Similar to what would happen later in the 1960s to the hippies in San Francisco, Greenwich Village became a tourist destination and featured bus tours to see "beatniks in real life."Key Notes:
- Surrealism
- Coffee shop culture
- Post-modernism
- Jazz
- Poetry
- counter-culture / protests
- 1950s aesthetic
- B&W
- Prints
No comments:
Post a Comment