Slang
Encyclopedia
Slang is the use of informal word
s and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language
or dialect
but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo
(see euphemism
). It is often used to identify with one's peers and, although it may be common among young people, it is used by people of all ages and social groups.
Slang is different from jargon
, which is the technical vocabulary of a particular profession, and which meets only the second of the criteria given above. Jargon, like many examples of slang, may be used to exclude non–group members from the conversation, but in general has the function of allowing its users to talk precisely about the technical issues in a given field.
, such as music
or video gaming. Nevertheless, slang expressions can spread outside their original areas to become commonly used, like "cool
" and "jive." While some words eventually lose their status as slang (the word "mob", for example, began as a shortening of Latin mobile vulgus), others continue to be considered as such by most speakers. When slang spreads beyond the group or subculture that originally uses it, its original users often replace it with other, less-recognized terms to maintain group identity.
One use of slang is to circumvent social taboo
s, as mainstream language tends to shy away from evoking certain realities. For this reason, slang vocabularies are particularly rich in certain domains, such as violence
, crime
, drugs
, and sex
. Alternatively, slang can grow out of mere familiarity with the things described. Among Californian wine connoisseur
s (and other groups), for example, Cabernet Sauvignon is often known as "Cab Sav," Chardonnay
as "Chard" and so on; this means that naming the different wines expends less superfluous effort; it also helps to indicate the user's familiarity with wine.
Even within a single language community, slang, and the extent to which it is used, tends to vary widely across social, ethnic, economic, and geographic strata. Slang may fall into disuse over time; sometimes, however, it grows more and more common until it becomes the dominant way of saying something, at which time it usually comes to be regarded as mainstream, acceptable language (e.g. the Spanish word caballo), although in the case of taboo
words there may be no expression that is considered mainstream or acceptable. Numerous slang terms pass into informal mainstream speech, and sometimes into formal speech, though this may involve a change in meaning or usage.
Slang very often involves the creation of novel meanings for existing words. It is common for such novel meanings to diverge significantly from the standard meaning. Thus, "cool" and "hot" can both mean "very good," "impressive," or "good-looking".
Slang terms are often known only within a clique
or ingroup
. For example, Leet
("Leetspeak" or "1337") was originally popular only among certain Internet subcultures, such as crackers
and online video gamers. During the 1990s, and into the early 21st century, however, Leet became increasingly more commonplace on the Internet, and it has spread outside Internet-based communication and into spoken languages. Other types of slang include SMS language
used on mobile phones, and "chatspeak," (e.g., "LOL
", an acronym meaning "laughing out loud" or "laugh out loud" or ROFL, "rolling on the floor laughing"), which is widely used in instant messaging on the Internet.
make a distinction between slangisms (slang words) and colloquialism
s. According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann
, "slang refers to informal (and often transient) lexical items used by a specific social group, for instance teenagers, soldiers, prisoners and thieves. Slang is not the same as colloquial (speech), which is informal, relaxed speech used on occasion by any speaker; this might include contractions such as 'you’re,' as well as colloquialisms. A colloquialism is a lexical item used in informal speech; whilst the broadest sense of the term ‘colloquialism
’ might include slangism, its narrow sense does not. Slangisms are often used in colloquial speech but not all colloquialisms are slangisms. One method of distinguishing between a slangism and the a colloquialism is to ask whether most native speakers know the word (and use it); if they do, it is a colloquialism. However, the problem is that this is not a discrete, quantized system but a continuum. Although the majority of slangisms are ephemeral and often supplanted by new ones, some gain non-slang colloquial status (e.g. English silly – cf. German selig ‘blessed’, Middle High German sælde ‘bliss, luck’ and Zelda, a Jewish female first name) and even formal status (e.g. English mob)."
, and the earliest attested use (1756) refers to the vocabulary of "low or disreputable" people. Beyond that, however, its origin is unclear. A Scandinavian origin has been proposed (compare, for example, Norwegian slengenamn, which means "nickname"), but is discounted by the Oxford English Dictionary
based on "date and early associations".
People
Word
In language, a word is the smallest free form that may be uttered in isolation with semantic or pragmatic content . This contrasts with a morpheme, which is the smallest unit of meaning but will not necessarily stand on its own...
s and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language
Language
Language may refer either to the specifically human capacity for acquiring and using complex systems of communication, or to a specific instance of such a system of complex communication...
or dialect
Dialect
The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...
but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo
Taboo
A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and or forbidden based on moral judgment, religious beliefs and or scientific consensus. Breaking the taboo is usually considered objectionable or abhorrent by society...
(see euphemism
Euphemism
A euphemism is the substitution of a mild, inoffensive, relatively uncontroversial phrase for another more frank expression that might offend or otherwise suggest something unpleasant to the audience...
). It is often used to identify with one's peers and, although it may be common among young people, it is used by people of all ages and social groups.
Defining slang
Few linguists have endeavored to clearly define what constitutes slang. Attempting to remedy this, Bethany K. Dumas and Jonathan Lighter argue that an expression should be considered "true slang" if it meets at least two of the following criteria:- It lowers, if temporarily, "the dignity of formal or serious speech or writing"; in other words, it is likely to be considered in those contexts a "glaring misuse of registerRegister (linguistics)In linguistics, a register is a variety of a language used for a particular purpose or in a particular social setting. For example, when speaking in a formal setting an English speaker may be more likely to adhere more closely to prescribed grammar, pronounce words ending in -ing with a velar nasal...
." - Its use implies that the user is familiar with whatever is referred to, or with a group of people who are familiar with it and use the term.
- "It is a taboo term in ordinary discourse with people of a higher social status or greater responsibility."
- It replaces "a well-known conventional synonym". This is done primarily to avoid the discomfort caused by the conventional item or by further elaboration.
Slang is different from jargon
Jargon
Jargon is terminology which is especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, group, or event. The philosophe Condillac observed in 1782 that "Every science requires a special language because every science has its own ideas." As a rationalist member of the Enlightenment he...
, which is the technical vocabulary of a particular profession, and which meets only the second of the criteria given above. Jargon, like many examples of slang, may be used to exclude non–group members from the conversation, but in general has the function of allowing its users to talk precisely about the technical issues in a given field.
Extent and origins of slang
Slang can be regional (that is, used only in a particular territory), but slang terms are often particular instead to a certain subcultureSubculture
In sociology, anthropology and cultural studies, a subculture is a group of people with a culture which differentiates them from the larger culture to which they belong.- Definition :...
, such as music
Musician
A musician is an artist who plays a musical instrument. It may or may not be the person's profession. Musicians can be classified by their roles in performing music and writing music.Also....* A person who makes music a profession....
or video gaming. Nevertheless, slang expressions can spread outside their original areas to become commonly used, like "cool
Cool (aesthetic)
Something regarded as cool is an admired aesthetic of attitude, behavior, comportment, appearance and style, influenced by and a product of the Zeitgeist. Because of the varied and changing connotations of cool, as well its subjective nature, the word has no single meaning. It has associations of...
" and "jive." While some words eventually lose their status as slang (the word "mob", for example, began as a shortening of Latin mobile vulgus), others continue to be considered as such by most speakers. When slang spreads beyond the group or subculture that originally uses it, its original users often replace it with other, less-recognized terms to maintain group identity.
One use of slang is to circumvent social taboo
Taboo
A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and or forbidden based on moral judgment, religious beliefs and or scientific consensus. Breaking the taboo is usually considered objectionable or abhorrent by society...
s, as mainstream language tends to shy away from evoking certain realities. For this reason, slang vocabularies are particularly rich in certain domains, such as violence
Violence
Violence is the use of physical force to apply a state to others contrary to their wishes. violence, while often a stand-alone issue, is often the culmination of other kinds of conflict, e.g...
, crime
Crime
Crime is the breach of rules or laws for which some governing authority can ultimately prescribe a conviction...
, drugs
Psychoactive drug
A psychoactive drug, psychopharmaceutical, or psychotropic is a chemical substance that crosses the blood–brain barrier and acts primarily upon the central nervous system where it affects brain function, resulting in changes in perception, mood, consciousness, cognition, and behavior...
, and sex
Sex
In biology, sex is a process of combining and mixing genetic traits, often resulting in the specialization of organisms into a male or female variety . Sexual reproduction involves combining specialized cells to form offspring that inherit traits from both parents...
. Alternatively, slang can grow out of mere familiarity with the things described. Among Californian wine connoisseur
Connoisseur
A connoisseur is a person who has a great deal of knowledge about the fine arts, cuisines, or an expert judge in matters of taste.Modern connoisseurship must be seen along with museums, art galleries and "the cult of originality"...
s (and other groups), for example, Cabernet Sauvignon is often known as "Cab Sav," Chardonnay
Chardonnay
Chardonnay is a green-skinned grape variety used to make white wine. It is originated from the Burgundy wine region of eastern France but is now grown wherever wine is produced, from England to New Zealand...
as "Chard" and so on; this means that naming the different wines expends less superfluous effort; it also helps to indicate the user's familiarity with wine.
Even within a single language community, slang, and the extent to which it is used, tends to vary widely across social, ethnic, economic, and geographic strata. Slang may fall into disuse over time; sometimes, however, it grows more and more common until it becomes the dominant way of saying something, at which time it usually comes to be regarded as mainstream, acceptable language (e.g. the Spanish word caballo), although in the case of taboo
Taboo
A taboo is a strong social prohibition relating to any area of human activity or social custom that is sacred and or forbidden based on moral judgment, religious beliefs and or scientific consensus. Breaking the taboo is usually considered objectionable or abhorrent by society...
words there may be no expression that is considered mainstream or acceptable. Numerous slang terms pass into informal mainstream speech, and sometimes into formal speech, though this may involve a change in meaning or usage.
Slang very often involves the creation of novel meanings for existing words. It is common for such novel meanings to diverge significantly from the standard meaning. Thus, "cool" and "hot" can both mean "very good," "impressive," or "good-looking".
Slang terms are often known only within a clique
Clique
A clique is an exclusive group of people who share common interests, views, purposes, patterns of behavior, or ethnicity. A clique as a reference group can be either normative or comparative. Membership in a clique is typically exclusive, and qualifications for membership may be social or...
or ingroup
Ingroup
In sociology and social psychology, ingroups and outgroups are social groups to which an individual feels as though he or she belongs as a member, or to which they feel contempt, opposition, or a desire to compete. People tend to hold positive attitudes towards members of their own groups, a...
. For example, Leet
Leet
Leet , also known as eleet or leetspeak, is an alternative alphabet for the English language that is used primarily on the Internet. It uses various combinations of ASCII characters to replace Latinate letters...
("Leetspeak" or "1337") was originally popular only among certain Internet subcultures, such as crackers
Software cracking
Software cracking is the modification of software to remove or disable features which are considered undesirable by the person cracking the software, usually related to protection methods: copy protection, trial/demo version, serial number, hardware key, date checks, CD check or software annoyances...
and online video gamers. During the 1990s, and into the early 21st century, however, Leet became increasingly more commonplace on the Internet, and it has spread outside Internet-based communication and into spoken languages. Other types of slang include SMS language
SMS language
SMS language or textese is a term for the abbreviations and slang most commonly used due to the necessary brevity of mobile phone text messaging, in particular the widespread SMS SMS language or textese (also known as txt-speak, txtese, chatspeak, txt, txtspk, txtk, txto, texting language, txt...
used on mobile phones, and "chatspeak," (e.g., "LOL
LOL
LOL is an acronym or abbreviation of "laughing out loud", "lots of luck", or "lots of love". In medical slang, it is used as an acronym for "little old lady", a reference to the novel House of God.LOL or Lol may also refer to:...
", an acronym meaning "laughing out loud" or "laugh out loud" or ROFL, "rolling on the floor laughing"), which is widely used in instant messaging on the Internet.
Distinction between slang and colloquialisms
Some linguistsLinguistics
Linguistics is the scientific study of human language. Linguistics can be broadly broken into three categories or subfields of study: language form, language meaning, and language in context....
make a distinction between slangisms (slang words) and colloquialism
Colloquialism
A colloquialism is a word or phrase that is common in everyday, unconstrained conversation rather than in formal speech, academic writing, or paralinguistics. Dictionaries often display colloquial words and phrases with the abbreviation colloq. as an identifier...
s. According to Ghil'ad Zuckermann
Ghil'ad Zuckermann
Ghil'ad Zuckermann is an Israeli-Italian-British-Australian linguist, expert of language revival, contact linguistics, lexicology and the study of language, culture and identity...
, "slang refers to informal (and often transient) lexical items used by a specific social group, for instance teenagers, soldiers, prisoners and thieves. Slang is not the same as colloquial (speech), which is informal, relaxed speech used on occasion by any speaker; this might include contractions such as 'you’re,' as well as colloquialisms. A colloquialism is a lexical item used in informal speech; whilst the broadest sense of the term ‘colloquialism
Colloquialism
A colloquialism is a word or phrase that is common in everyday, unconstrained conversation rather than in formal speech, academic writing, or paralinguistics. Dictionaries often display colloquial words and phrases with the abbreviation colloq. as an identifier...
’ might include slangism, its narrow sense does not. Slangisms are often used in colloquial speech but not all colloquialisms are slangisms. One method of distinguishing between a slangism and the a colloquialism is to ask whether most native speakers know the word (and use it); if they do, it is a colloquialism. However, the problem is that this is not a discrete, quantized system but a continuum. Although the majority of slangisms are ephemeral and often supplanted by new ones, some gain non-slang colloquial status (e.g. English silly – cf. German selig ‘blessed’, Middle High German sælde ‘bliss, luck’ and Zelda, a Jewish female first name) and even formal status (e.g. English mob)."
Etymology
The origin of the word slang is uncertain. It has a connection with Thieves' cantThieves' cant
Thieves' cant or Rogues' cant was a secret language which was formerly used by thieves, beggars and hustlers of various kinds in Great Britain and to a lesser extent in other English-speaking countries...
, and the earliest attested use (1756) refers to the vocabulary of "low or disreputable" people. Beyond that, however, its origin is unclear. A Scandinavian origin has been proposed (compare, for example, Norwegian slengenamn, which means "nickname"), but is discounted by the Oxford English Dictionary
Oxford English Dictionary
The Oxford English Dictionary , published by the Oxford University Press, is the self-styled premier dictionary of the English language. Two fully bound print editions of the OED have been published under its current name, in 1928 and 1989. The first edition was published in twelve volumes , and...
based on "date and early associations".
See also
- A New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting CrewA New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting CrewA New Dictionary of the Terms Ancient and Modern of the Canting Crew is a dictionary of English cant and slang by a compiler known only by the initials B. E., first published in London circa 1698...
- RegisterRegister (sociolinguistics)In linguistics, a register is a variety of a language used for a particular purpose or in a particular social setting. For example, when speaking in a formal setting an English speaker may be more likely to adhere more closely to prescribed grammar, pronounce words ending in -ing with a velar nasal...
- Diner lingoDiner lingoDiner lingo is a kind of American verbal slang used by cooks and chefs in diners and diner-style restaurants, and by the waitresses to communicate their orders to the cooks. It is virtually unknown outside the US.-History:...
- Urban DictionaryUrban DictionaryUrban Dictionary is a Web-based dictionary of slang words and phrases, which contained over 6 million definitions . Submissions are regulated by volunteer editors and rated by site visitors...
People
- G. Vernon Bennett, Pomona, California, school superintendent, orders "anti-slang week," 1915
External links
- The Online Slang Dictionary - American and English terms, features other statistical information
- SlangSite.com - Non-explicit American terms
- Urban Dictionary - Contributions by users, mostly US-terms, comprehensive but containing large amount of explicit language
- American slang - with part of speech and sample sentences