7 ms·

Uptalk is becoming more frequent among men

57 points by Zhenya 13y ago

Zhenya 13y ago
The wiki entry that really got me looking into this. I see this rampantly in my company: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_rising_terminal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_rising_terminal
anateus 13y ago
Every time I see language coverage from the BBC I break out in cold sweat. It's usually horrifyingly bad. This one wasn't terrible. If you want some more background on uptalk and some of its spread from linguists: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=568 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=568 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8879 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8879
- XaspR8d 13y ago
  Every time I see linguistics on HN, I break out in a sweat too. Thanks for jumping in quickly with some good sources!
  - woodson 13y ago
    but it's about language. we can all speak, so we're all experts, right? right? I see this phenomenon a lot, also with topics like education.
- barry-cotter 13y ago
  Every time I see TOPIC I am expert in coverage from journalists I break out in cold sweat. It's usually horrifyingly bad. FTFY
  - jjh42 13y ago
    I recently learned this has a name. The Gell-Mann effect. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2011/08/the-murray-gell-mann-amnesia-effect/ http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2011/08/the-murray-ge...
area51org 13y ago
The thing is, people (women and men) were talking in a similar way in the '80s — I was there. In CA. This has been a long time in coming, and I don't believe it was every especially isolated to females. Also, the phenomenon of "vocal fry" (that sort of gravelly sound made by younger people, usually near the end of a sentence)—that's not new, either. I happen to like it, and I remember listening pleasantly to girls who talked that way in the '90s, and possibly before.
- _delirium 13y ago
  There was even a debate about its spread in the NYT letters section in late 1991 and early 1992, e.g.: http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/opinion/l-high-rising-terminal-declarative-eh-061992.html http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/opinion/l-high-rising-term...
- b_emery 13y ago
  *"vocal fry" Do you have an example? I was there too, but have no idea what you mean. Spicoli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High perhaps?
  - anateus 13y ago
    Looks like my job in this thread is to drop in Language Log links. Here's some information on vocal fry (another phenomenon perennially trotted out as coming back or expanding): http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3626 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3626
  - skore 13y ago
    Male example: VICE Correspondent Hamilton Morris - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fRTk9F9FGU#t=103 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fRTk9F9FGU#t=103
  - biot 13y ago
    Here's a good rant on vocal fry, exaggerated for effect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsE5mysfZsY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsE5mysfZsY The sad thing is that I know someone who talks exactly like this.
JohnDoe365 13y ago
Seems like a natural thing in a world increasingly in favor of woman. Might not be true for the CS department.
pessimizer 13y ago
I do it on purpose sometimes, but just to make fun of Australians.
dmourati 13y ago
As in, "I'm Ron Burgandy?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtVjRG7PB_4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtVjRG7PB_4
mwfunk 13y ago
We really need to come together as a species to combat this. This isn't a gender thing or a generational thing- I remember uptalk from the '80s; much like hatred, greed, and violence, it has probably been around in one form or another ever since we were evolved enough to engage in such activities. If we fail to stop this, we richly deserve whatever horrifying apocalypse follows as a result, whether it's getting stomped to death by a newly-arisen and understandably annoyed Cthulhu, or (more likely) Idiocracy comes true within our lifetimes. Seriously: THIS CANNOT COME TO PASS. It cannot be allowed to happen. It doesn't matter what extremes we have to go to to stop it, even WWIII. Honestly, the complete and total extinction of humanity in a nuclear holocaust is preferable to someday waking up in a world where adults uptalk at any time ever for any reason at all whatsoever. There are times in one's life where everything comes down to one struggle; one fight; one crusade. This is one of those times. Do not disappoint me, humanity. Please, please, please, please do not disappoint me, as you have so many times in the past. Do not let this happen. Thanks in advance?
- radicaledward 13y ago
  I especially like that you ended your comment with a misplaced question mark? Unfortunately it looks like you are being down voted quite a bit? This seems like a genuine example of Poe's Law[1] in action? 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
  - gamegoblin 13y ago
    I don't think it qualifies as Poe; it's too clearly intentionally exaggerated for humor.
    - sitkack 13y ago
      To offset Poe's law? I give that guy Kudos if I a KudoCopter.
- Zhenya 13y ago
  upvote only for the question mark at the end of a statement[?] my new symbol for uptalk --> [?] /s
skywhopper 13y ago
It's not clear from this article that the researchers claim any evidence of uptalk in the past being more common among girls and women. The only claim seems to be that this current research showed no difference based on gender. Which isn't surprising. There are a lot of stereotypes about language usage differences between men and women that are entirely without basis, often in reality being the opposite of the CW.
- hanley 13y ago
  They only studied 23 people. I don't think anything at all can be claimed from such a small sample.
  - skywhopper 13y ago
    Well, I'm sure they discuss that risk in the actual paper. But it's worth noting that they've done far more research into the topic than people who repeat the myth that uptalk is "girl talk".
erehweb 13y ago
Is writing being similarly affected? Seems like it would be interesting to know? Further research would be useful? Edit: Of course, a joke. But note that an article title currently on front page "How to tell when someone is lying?" adds a question mark not in the source.
abledon 13y ago
"The team recorded and analysed the voices of 23 native Californians aged between 18 and 22. The researchers were therefore not able to infer similar language patters in older Californians." Mmmm, gotta love that solid 23 person sample size surely representing the general youth population :)
Selfcommit 13y ago
The team recorded and analysed the voices of 23 native Californians aged between 18 and 22. - How is this even news? They're saying they happened to find 23 people.. in the entire state...
- Zhenya 13y ago
  I started researching this when I noticed it was highly prevalent in my company. Furthermore, new people would join (from other parts of the country) and would pick up this speech pattern within days.
  - dredmorbius 13y ago
    Certain speech patterns are very highly addictive and tend to be adopted quickly. I notice this most particularly with southern drawls (US) and regional northeastern accents (New Jersey, Long Island, Southie, Bronx, etc.). Others not so much (southwest / native American, northern plains (Wisconsin / Minnesota).
bluthru 13y ago
When someone always up talks they come off as needlessly timid and desperate for agreement. Or, coming off as faux-inquisitive, as if everything's an open-ended question to ponder. What also bugs me: Prepending every answer with "So…" a la Zuckerberg.
- flurpitude 13y ago
  I know, right?
- frou_dh 13y ago
  The "So" plague is not limited to answers. It shows up line zero column zero in all things written. I imagine all 365 entries in a contemporary teenager's diary begin "So today ..." / "So I ..." / "So thing happened ..."
- l33tbro 13y ago
  Don't forget the other virus of beginning every statement with "you know what?" No, actually, I don't know "what". That's what I'm waiting for you to tell me, jack-ass.
sfeng 13y ago
They only studied 23 people.
- marincounty 13y ago
  Yea--end of study.
jinushaun 13y ago
Big focus on California, but I feel like this is just West Coast accent in general.
trhway 13y ago
i thought it is just (male) hipster talk :) (i'm a Russian immigrant, live in the Valley for more than a decade)
Dewie 13y ago
> "Typically, women are trail-blazers in language change and take up innovative features first, then males start using them later. OT, but why say "women", but then "males"? Or vice versa? I don't particularly like "fe/male": since it's a generic term for the sex of any animal, it comes off more as a biological taxonomy. "We have seen this behaviour in multiple human specimen." You kind of need those two words as adjectives. But not as nouns.
- randallsquared 13y ago
  The word "women" is unambiguous, whereas "men" could mean "males", or could mean "people", depending on the age and/or ideology of the writer.
  - Dewie 13y ago
    You're right. But not in this particular sentence.
Hominem 13y ago
I work with a lot of male geeks 10+ years younger than me and they all do this when stating an opinion. It is so prevalent I even started doing it. It got so bad I was doing it when I was actually right about stuff "you may want to add comments? And create a new branch? Don't just merge it into master? wait until I someone reviews it?" I've tried to make a conscious effort to stop but it is like a virus.
clockworkelf 13y ago
I think it's the estrogen mimickers in the plastics and the female hormones in the drinking water due to flushed birth control pills.
dorfsmay 13y ago
I know a few people I like and whose opinions I respect who talk like this, and if I don't make a conscious effort to ignore the uptalk, it drives me mad. What is it? Why is it so irritating?
delinka 13y ago
I keep seeing uptalk used to insult someone should "know better" than to ask such revoltingly dumb questions: "How do I debug my app?" "Um...with a debugger?" Or I've seen uptalk used to supply guesses from other people who don't know the answer but are willing to pontificate: "How does one get a test VM?" "Download a VM product? Contact operations and requisition one?" Most often the former though, and yes it is annoying.
ktzar 13y ago
Not only people is sounding more like idiots, people say more and more idiotic things.

57 points by Zhenya 13y ago

The wiki entry that really got me looking into this. I see this rampantly in my company: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_rising_terminal http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_rising_terminal

anateus 13y ago

Every time I see language coverage from the BBC I break out in cold sweat. It's usually horrifyingly bad. This one wasn't terrible. If you want some more background on uptalk and some of its spread from linguists: http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=568 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=568 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8879 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=8879

XaspR8d 13y ago
Every time I see linguistics on HN, I break out in a sweat too. Thanks for jumping in quickly with some good sources!
- woodson 13y ago
  but it's about language. we can all speak, so we're all experts, right? right? I see this phenomenon a lot, also with topics like education.
barry-cotter 13y ago
Every time I see TOPIC I am expert in coverage from journalists I break out in cold sweat. It's usually horrifyingly bad. FTFY
- jjh42 13y ago
  I recently learned this has a name. The Gell-Mann effect. http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2011/08/the-murray-gell-mann-amnesia-effect/ http://www.patheos.com/blogs/geneveith/2011/08/the-murray-ge...

area51org 13y ago

The thing is, people (women and men) were talking in a similar way in the '80s — I was there. In CA. This has been a long time in coming, and I don't believe it was every especially isolated to females. Also, the phenomenon of "vocal fry" (that sort of gravelly sound made by younger people, usually near the end of a sentence)—that's not new, either. I happen to like it, and I remember listening pleasantly to girls who talked that way in the '90s, and possibly before.

_delirium 13y ago
There was even a debate about its spread in the NYT letters section in late 1991 and early 1992, e.g.: http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/opinion/l-high-rising-terminal-declarative-eh-061992.html http://www.nytimes.com/1992/01/19/opinion/l-high-rising-term...
b_emery 13y ago
*"vocal fry" Do you have an example? I was there too, but have no idea what you mean. Spicoli from Fast Times at Ridgemont High perhaps?
- anateus 13y ago
  Looks like my job in this thread is to drop in Language Log links. Here's some information on vocal fry (another phenomenon perennially trotted out as coming back or expanding): http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3626 http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=3626
- skore 13y ago
  Male example: VICE Correspondent Hamilton Morris - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fRTk9F9FGU#t=103 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0fRTk9F9FGU#t=103
- biot 13y ago
  Here's a good rant on vocal fry, exaggerated for effect: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsE5mysfZsY http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsE5mysfZsY The sad thing is that I know someone who talks exactly like this.

JohnDoe365 13y ago

Seems like a natural thing in a world increasingly in favor of woman. Might not be true for the CS department.

pessimizer 13y ago

I do it on purpose sometimes, but just to make fun of Australians.

dmourati 13y ago

As in, "I'm Ron Burgandy?" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtVjRG7PB_4 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UtVjRG7PB_4

mwfunk 13y ago

We really need to come together as a species to combat this. This isn't a gender thing or a generational thing- I remember uptalk from the '80s; much like hatred, greed, and violence, it has probably been around in one form or another ever since we were evolved enough to engage in such activities. If we fail to stop this, we richly deserve whatever horrifying apocalypse follows as a result, whether it's getting stomped to death by a newly-arisen and understandably annoyed Cthulhu, or (more likely) Idiocracy comes true within our lifetimes. Seriously: THIS CANNOT COME TO PASS. It cannot be allowed to happen. It doesn't matter what extremes we have to go to to stop it, even WWIII. Honestly, the complete and total extinction of humanity in a nuclear holocaust is preferable to someday waking up in a world where adults uptalk at any time ever for any reason at all whatsoever. There are times in one's life where everything comes down to one struggle; one fight; one crusade. This is one of those times. Do not disappoint me, humanity. Please, please, please, please do not disappoint me, as you have so many times in the past. Do not let this happen. Thanks in advance?

radicaledward 13y ago
I especially like that you ended your comment with a misplaced question mark? Unfortunately it looks like you are being down voted quite a bit? This seems like a genuine example of Poe's Law[1] in action? 1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law
- gamegoblin 13y ago
  I don't think it qualifies as Poe; it's too clearly intentionally exaggerated for humor.
  - sitkack 13y ago
    To offset Poe's law? I give that guy Kudos if I a KudoCopter.
Zhenya 13y ago
upvote only for the question mark at the end of a statement[?] my new symbol for uptalk --> [?] /s

skywhopper 13y ago

It's not clear from this article that the researchers claim any evidence of uptalk in the past being more common among girls and women. The only claim seems to be that this current research showed no difference based on gender. Which isn't surprising. There are a lot of stereotypes about language usage differences between men and women that are entirely without basis, often in reality being the opposite of the CW.

hanley 13y ago
They only studied 23 people. I don't think anything at all can be claimed from such a small sample.
- skywhopper 13y ago
  Well, I'm sure they discuss that risk in the actual paper. But it's worth noting that they've done far more research into the topic than people who repeat the myth that uptalk is "girl talk".

erehweb 13y ago

Is writing being similarly affected? Seems like it would be interesting to know? Further research would be useful? Edit: Of course, a joke. But note that an article title currently on front page "How to tell when someone is lying?" adds a question mark not in the source.

abledon 13y ago

"The team recorded and analysed the voices of 23 native Californians aged between 18 and 22. The researchers were therefore not able to infer similar language patters in older Californians." Mmmm, gotta love that solid 23 person sample size surely representing the general youth population :)

Selfcommit 13y ago

The team recorded and analysed the voices of 23 native Californians aged between 18 and 22. - How is this even news? They're saying they happened to find 23 people.. in the entire state...

Zhenya 13y ago
I started researching this when I noticed it was highly prevalent in my company. Furthermore, new people would join (from other parts of the country) and would pick up this speech pattern within days.
- dredmorbius 13y ago
  Certain speech patterns are very highly addictive and tend to be adopted quickly. I notice this most particularly with southern drawls (US) and regional northeastern accents (New Jersey, Long Island, Southie, Bronx, etc.). Others not so much (southwest / native American, northern plains (Wisconsin / Minnesota).

bluthru 13y ago

When someone always up talks they come off as needlessly timid and desperate for agreement. Or, coming off as faux-inquisitive, as if everything's an open-ended question to ponder. What also bugs me: Prepending every answer with "So…" a la Zuckerberg.

flurpitude 13y ago
I know, right?
frou_dh 13y ago
The "So" plague is not limited to answers. It shows up line zero column zero in all things written. I imagine all 365 entries in a contemporary teenager's diary begin "So today ..." / "So I ..." / "So thing happened ..."
l33tbro 13y ago
Don't forget the other virus of beginning every statement with "you know what?" No, actually, I don't know "what". That's what I'm waiting for you to tell me, jack-ass.

sfeng 13y ago

They only studied 23 people.

marincounty 13y ago
Yea--end of study.

jinushaun 13y ago

Big focus on California, but I feel like this is just West Coast accent in general.

trhway 13y ago

i thought it is just (male) hipster talk :) (i'm a Russian immigrant, live in the Valley for more than a decade)

Dewie 13y ago

> "Typically, women are trail-blazers in language change and take up innovative features first, then males start using them later. OT, but why say "women", but then "males"? Or vice versa? I don't particularly like "fe/male": since it's a generic term for the sex of any animal, it comes off more as a biological taxonomy. "We have seen this behaviour in multiple human specimen." You kind of need those two words as adjectives. But not as nouns.

randallsquared 13y ago
The word "women" is unambiguous, whereas "men" could mean "males", or could mean "people", depending on the age and/or ideology of the writer.
- Dewie 13y ago
  You're right. But not in this particular sentence.

Hominem 13y ago

I work with a lot of male geeks 10+ years younger than me and they all do this when stating an opinion. It is so prevalent I even started doing it. It got so bad I was doing it when I was actually right about stuff "you may want to add comments? And create a new branch? Don't just merge it into master? wait until I someone reviews it?" I've tried to make a conscious effort to stop but it is like a virus.

clockworkelf 13y ago

I think it's the estrogen mimickers in the plastics and the female hormones in the drinking water due to flushed birth control pills.

dorfsmay 13y ago

I know a few people I like and whose opinions I respect who talk like this, and if I don't make a conscious effort to ignore the uptalk, it drives me mad. What is it? Why is it so irritating?

delinka 13y ago

I keep seeing uptalk used to insult someone should "know better" than to ask such revoltingly dumb questions: "How do I debug my app?" "Um...with a debugger?" Or I've seen uptalk used to supply guesses from other people who don't know the answer but are willing to pontificate: "How does one get a test VM?" "Download a VM product? Contact operations and requisition one?" Most often the former though, and yes it is annoying.

ktzar 13y ago

Not only people is sounding more like idiots, people say more and more idiotic things.