The Fowler has an entry under "L" for 'like' as a sentence filler, the
Folwer remarks: "Overuse will cause [addressees] outside the [utterer]’s
immediate social circle or wider social group to ignore the content of the
message."
-- which may be a shame, since after all, it turns a metaphor into a
literality:
As in
i. You're like the cream in my coffee, like.
The Fowler is against the second 'like', not the second. But consider:
ii. You're the cream in my coffee, like.
It may be argued that (ii) is truth-conditionally equivalent to (i), and
hence it is a reasonable way to avoid Quintilian's paradox of 'literally'
used, figuratively, to mean (to use an expression by McEvoy's) 'figuratively',
and stuff.
In a way, like is like 'ilk', that McEvoy has used I believe with reference
to Grice, "Grice and his ilk", or I with reference to Popper (only that
Popper's ilk can possibly be falsified).
The Anglo-Saxons had a useful word here, "ilca."
It meant "same" (as in Wiggins, "Sameness and Substance"), but also "like".
It was only in the sixteenth century, that Englishmen preferred using
'same', from Old Norse (Englishmen had a weakness for old Norse).
"Ilk" survied in Scots, though, but in a specific phrase: "of that ilk."
As the Scots used this, "of that ilk" meant (in fact, it still does) a
person (or human being -- cfr. 'people are human) whose family name is the same
as that of the place he or she inhabits.
As if Geary were to live in Geary.
In such a case, we could properly say that Geary is "of that ilk": since he
inhabits a place that has the same name as he has: Geary.
Strictly, the Scots use it to indicate that the aforementioned person (not
necessarily Geary) is the proprietor or "laird" of the place (Argyle would
be another example).
So come across "of that ilk" in a notice like the following:
"The field and ground was chosen
in St. Andrews, and three landed
men and three yeomen
chosen to shoot against
the English-men, — to wit,
David Wemyss of that ilk,
David Arnot of that ilk,
and Mr. John Wedderburn, vicar of Dundee."
Note that Wedderburn is NOT "of that ilk", since he lives in Dundee, and
not in Wedderburn.
Scots will also use 'of that ilk' to mean (to use a phrase by McEvoy) the
head of a clan, such as Mackintosh of that ilk (a Scottish trial in 1539
referred to "Duncane Macfarlane of that ilk").
This usage eventually led to "of that ilk" weakening its implicatures to
mean people who had the same name because they were related.
The implicature later got further weakened to include people of the same
class or who had some characteristic in common.
While this broader implicature may annoy a language purist, it shouldn't,
seeing that 'ilca' did mean 'same' _simpliciter_ in Anglo-Saxon.
Thus we read in The Daily Telegraph, Apr. 4, 2015:
"I’m pretty no-nonsense myself, and
I know plenty of other women of that ilk."
The grouping need not be human people (cfr. Barnes, "People are human"):
"Such are the magpie, the crow, the jackdaw, and all of that ilk."
"It wasn’t a unicorn, but it was something of that ilk".
Of course, it may refer to something that is not even alive:
"She discovered the ace of that ilk peeping coyly
out from behind the seven of spades."
"A body may chatter about ideals — about right and wrong and matters of
that ilk."
However, it may be pointed out that a blurred survival of its Scots
aristocratic, landed gentry origin sometimes emerges but notably (people being
human) in almost always negative comments about class bias. Thus one reads in
"The Times" for Apr. 12, 2015:
"Given that David Cameron seems to be
comfortable only when surrounded by Etonians,
and that the Labour MP Chris Bryant has
complained about "Eddie Redmayne and James Blunt and their ilk"
rising in their professions thanks to their privileged public-school
education, a toff upbringing doesn’t feel terribly
cool or right-on at the moment. Lewis is
definitely a member of that "ilk"".
Which in a way is like back to "You're like the cream in my coffee, like."
Cheers,
Speranza
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