2002, “Newsweek”, in(Please provide the book title or journal name), volume140, page lxxx:
It's a great test of the claims of open-source gurus, who say that a self-motivated community can outcode any team working for a single employer—like,um, Microsoft.
2007 August 24, William Grimes, “Uh, Lead My Rips: No More Bloopers”, inThe New York Times[1], archived fromthe original on2013-01-04:
As the years go by, speech reverts to childhood levels of disfluency, with more pauses, more errors, more repeated words, but even the peak years are not great: up to 8 percent of the average person’s word output consists of meaningless fillers and placeholders likeum, uh and er.
2024 June 24, “Baldwin Judge on FIRE!”, inLaw of Self Defense[2], page 2:
Um And I don't knowum what to say to the court other than, I don't know how we could get through 1/5 of that.
While I was in her room, Sam walked by and said, “Um, I'm telling!” “You're telling what?” I asked. “You're reading Tori's journal,” she said.
2021, Sarah Strangeways,The Gingerbread House, page13:
Mair used to look after Laura. If anyone threatened to tease her, Mair would stand up straight, point her finger at the enemy and shout, 'Um! I'mtelling on you!'
2007 August 24, William Grimes, “Uh, Lead My Rips: No More Bloopers”, inThe New York Times[3], archived fromthe original on2013-01-04:
Although Shakespeare refers to “hums and ha’s,” sifting through etiquette manuals and public-speaking guides turns up scant evidence of a prohibition againstums, ers and uhs, which are profuse in the first recording of Thomas Edison’s voice, in 1888. Mr. Erard, rather ingeniously, traces the prohibition on um and other speech flaws to the advent of radio in the early 1920s.
(dated, sometimeshumorous, oftenoffensive)An undifferentiated determiner or article; a miscellaneous linking word, or filler with nonspecific meaning; representation of broken English stereotypically or comically attributed to Native Americans.
Me beInjun. Himum Growling Bear. Himum heap big chief.
1871, “Grand camp meeting on Bear River”, inThe Keepapitchinin[4], volume III, page 3:
“me heap brave—me talk toum white man so[…] me good injun, likeum white man,mebbe so, ugh!”
2000, “Matthew 8”, in Joseph Grimes, transl.,Da Jesus Book: Hawaii Pidgin New Testament[5], Wycliffe Bible Translators,→ISBN,page110:
He tellum, “Go.” So dey wen let go da guys, an go take ova da pigs. An you know wat? All da pigs wen run down one steep hill an fall ova da cliff inside da lake, an drown inside da water.
And he said untothem, Go. And they came out, and went into the swine: and behold, the whole herd rushed down the steep into the sea, and perished in the waters.
(Poetic Edda) indicates that the verbal action is completed, compare English “through” as in “readthrough”. For semantic development, compare adjectival usage of Germanum.
Vǫluspá, verse 2, lines 1-2, in1860, T. Möbius,Edda Sæmundar hins fróða: mit einem Anhang zum Theil bisher ungedruckter Gedichte. Leipzig, page1:
“um”, inSlovníkový portál Jazykovedného ústavu Ľ. Štúra SAV [Dictionary portal of the Ľ. Štúr Institute of Linguistics, Slovak Academy of Science] (in Slovak),https://slovnik.juls.savba.sk,2003–2025
