New phrase much
Perhaps you’ve noticed a slight dropoff from the normally low-frequency posting here. Well, whatever it is that caused it, it’s also causing more cars to be on the road every day, and more people to be on various college campuses. In any case, I have a question. It involves things like this:
For example, in the item description she busts out with the following paragraph: “If you have any questions or comments, feel free to contact me! I do have cats, but I keep them away from the fabrics/craft area.” Uh… non sequitur much? (link)
Your writer’s true colors are revealed when they refer to a Big Mac as “charred flesh”. Ummm, vegan much? Thank you, and have a nice day. (link)
Uh, okay. Prejudiced much? (link)
Beetle: uh, hmmm…literate much? (link)
Not part of my idiolect much? I have to admit that this is not really part of my speech, and I don’t have a good grasp on how to use it and what phrases can the much-ified (thus leaning on the crutch of there sometimes being as uh/um before the item in question). And it sure seems like there must have been some popular or cult individual who popularized this sort of thing - any ideas?
And it could be that I’m not really all that sure what these things mean, at least in the semantic details. That is to day, in something like busy much? or come here much?, you’re asking about frequency. In enjoy movies much? you’re asking about degree/extent (or possibly frequency…I suppose). In something like non sequitur much? is the person (sarcastically) asking about the frequency of non sequiturs (by some individual), or is that not really what’s going on?
It seems like it’s generally used as a condescending comment verging on a complaint rather than a genuine request for information. I think it has valley girl origins, but I have no source for that.
It’s usually a sarcastic comment on whatever it modifies.
Uh… non sequitur much? = Do you often say totally irrelevant things?
Your true colors are revealed … Ummm, vegan much? Thank you, and have a nice day. = So you’re not really neutral at all, are you? Get lost.
Uh, okay. Prejudiced much? = That comment just proved that you are a bigot even if you think it didn’t.
Beetle: uh, hmmm…literate much? = Do you even know how to read?
It’s usually a sarcastic comment on whatever it modifies. As far as I can tell, you can attach to any one-word (or -phrase) summary of your assessment.
Uh… non sequitur much? = Do you often say totally irrelevant things?
Your true colors are revealed … Ummm, vegan much? Thank you, and have a nice day. = So you’re not really neutral at all, are you? Get lost.
Uh, okay. Prejudiced much? = That comment just proved that you are a bigot even if you think it didn’t.
Beetle: uh, hmmm…literate much? = Do you even know how to read?
This is, of course, really hard to Google for. The Ridger’s nailed the meaning. “X much?” with an adjective is a way of saying “You’re clearly extremely X”; with a noun or a verb, it means–well, either “You do X a lot” or “You don’t ever do X”, which is about the kind of reversal you’d expect from sarcasm. In any case, there’s no real question: “Come here much?” isn’t a shortened version of the literal question “So, do you come here much?” but of the sarcastic “Jeez, do you come here much?”, i.e. either “You clearly don’t know this place at all” or “You know this place far, far too well.”
Michael Adams wrote about it in Slayer Slang; relevant excerpt here. That dates it back to 2003, though of course in reference to a show that had been on the air and using it for a few years before that. Thus, from “I Only Have Eyes For You” (ep 2.19, aired March 1999), you have Cordelia see Buffy get mad and leave the room, to which she says, “Okay…overidentify much?”
Erik’s “valley” suspicion may be right, given the Buffy setting, and it may well predate Buffy. In any case, nothing new.
It seems to originate with the line “Jealous much?” in Heathers (1989). See here and the surrounding thread:
http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind0505b&L=ads-l&D=1&F=P&P=3045
(Apparently this sense of “much” is already in the OED??)
Heh, I was going to comment on the Buffy the Vampire Slayer usage, but I was beaten to it. By no means did I think it was the earliest use of ‘much’ in that fashion, but it was the first thing that came to mind.
Fangirl much?
Wow, cool info guys. I’ll have to take some time to process it, then follow up.
I did hear from a coworker that he thought the origins (or popularization) was in Buffy, but he wasn’t sure, as he’s not a watcher of the show.
I’m a little surprised that it might have “valley girl” origins, but I can’t say why. It seems a little too…something…to be from that dialect/register.