Filler (linguistics)

Filler (linguistics)

In linguistics, a filler is a sound or word that is spoken in conversation by one participant to signal to others that he/she has paused to think but is not yet finished speaking. These are not to be confused with placeholder names, such as thingamajig, which refer to objects or people whose names are temporarily forgotten, irrelevant, or unknown. Different languages have different characteristic filler sounds; in English, the most common filler sounds are uh /ə/, er /ɚ/ and um /əm/. Among youths, the fillers "like", "y'know", "so", "actually", "literally", "basically", "right", "I'm tellin' ya" and "you know what I mean?" are among the more prevalent.

The term filler has a separate use in the syntactic description of wh-movement constructions.