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Slang and The WWW
In order to obtain slang words for my study, I first had to choose some subjects
and analyse the words they used in everyday discourse. I considered studying a totally
alien group and analysing their language, but this would have been impractical within
the time constraints of the project. I therefore decided the best way to obtain data for
my study would be to use my pre-existing group of friends in my hometown of
Barnsley.
The social group I was studying have been friends since secondary school, from
the age of 12, and some have friendships spanning back even further. At the time they
were studied, their ages varied from 19 to 21 years of age. Due to the attendance of
universities the group had moved apart somewhat. Geographically, I was the one
displaced the furthest away from Barnsley, roughly 80 miles south in Leicester. The
other members all attended universities within our home county of Yorkshire, with
two going to Leeds and two going to Sheffield. The other participant spent roughly
six months in the London and Portsmouth areas with work before returning to
Barnsley six months before my study into the language used commenced.
All five of the participants in my group gave full permission for their
conversations to be transcribed and recorded and for their language to be used within
the study, thus quashing any ethical concerns. As I was the sixth member of the group
I could easily infiltrate the conversations, but was weary of adding bias to the study
by merely including words frequent within my own discourse. I therefore decided that
the fairest way to detail the words would be to bring to light when a friend uttered a
word which I considered unusual or slang in its nature. I then took a quick vote on
who uses the word fairly frequently within their everyday discourse. If three out of the
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five participants agreed to using the word within the same context, the word was
added to the dictionary.
As all members of the group had been away from home for a sustained period of
time I was aware that they would have absorbed slang from a variety of different
external influences, due to universities having a heavily diverse mix of people from
different cultures, ethnicities, races and backgrounds. Although these words picked up
from different sources would stick out and be far easier to identify as slang, I wanted
to create a current and accurate representation of the slang being used within our
group. Thus, to be included within my dictionary, the word must not only be
understood by the other members of the group but also actively used within their own
vocabulary. I also knew that as all the group was from the same area they would have
the same background knowledge of Yorkshire dialectical terms. As I was not an
outsider to this, it was difficult at times to pick up on words used. However, by
playing the recorded conversations back to my flatmate, who is not from Yorkshire,
we were able to identify such words.
The data that I collected came from three weekends which the group spent
together in the early part of the year. The days and nights spent together revolved
around playing football, drinking and playing computer games. This has led to
language being created and transformed to suit these purposes. When taking part in
these activities, a certain amount of code switching occurs. The vocabulary is changed
to reflect the current social situation, and phrases are used which would be rare
outside of the event. For example, the verbal phrase to ‘sky it’ takes the noun ‘sky’
and its connotations of being high in the air, and turns it into a transitive verb. To ‘sky
it’, when used within a footballing context, is the act of kicking the ball high in the
air, missing it’s intended target by some distance (mainly when taking a shot at goal.)
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A ‘stinger’ refers to the stinging sensation which is felt after being hit by a solidly
struck ball, and to ‘scuff it’ is when poor contact is made with the ball, when in the act
of shooting or passing. The utterance to ‘toss it off’ is a phrase which was absorbed
within our group after hearing it from an old manager, and means to not be trying
your hardest in the game situation. Whilst this started off as exclusively referring to a
footballing situation, its use within the group has now been broadened to
accommodate any sort of slacking.
It is somewhat unsurprising given the nature of the weekends that synonyms for
the word ‘drunk’ appear nine times within the dictionary. The words are verbs which
are used in their past tense form to describe a person’s current state. The ability to
‘affix any given word with 'ed' to describe a past experience of being drunk’1 was
coined the as ‘drunk fixing’ by the comedian Michael McIntyre. These are words such
as ‘mashed’, ‘hammered’ and ‘plastered’. The words appear to be mainly random in
their etymologies, and appear to slip in and out of favour constantly.
The ability to handle excessive amounts of drink is held in high regard by
members of the group. To be branded a ‘lightweight’ by friends is a swipe at a male’s
masculinity, whereas being characterised as a ‘heavyweight’ would signal a higher
regard and social status. Excessive drinking unfortunately leads to vomiting, and the
dictionary contains two separate slang entries to describe this: ‘chunder’ and ‘puke’.
Both words have onomatopoeic connotations, and are used jocularly to signify
weakness in drinking.
Despite only being ‘casual’ gamers (a few hours a week), some words from the
gaming community have infiltrated the groups vocabulary. The words ‘noob’,
1
Wikipedia Entry, Drunk Fixing, <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunk_fixing> [accessed 20th April
2009]
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‘pwned’ ‘woot’ and ‘wtf’ are all frequently used in both gamer discourse and that of
the group. ‘Noob’ has its etymological roots embedded in the US military slang of
‘newbie’2 and has undergone many typographical transitions before its present form.
It serves as both an insult to experienced players and as a label for other players who
are new to the situation. Interestingly, a ‘noob’ has narrowed in usage before
broadening out again, retaking its original connotation as ‘a person new to a particular
activity.’ The word ‘pwned’ is supposedly derived from a misspelling of the word
‘owned’ within an MMORPG, (a Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game.)
Within the online gaming community, the word ‘pwned’ is used to humiliate a player
who has lost convincingly, and is used in the same context outside of the gaming
world. For example, if a football team suffered a heavy loss, they may be described as
having been ‘pwned’ by the other team. The acronym ‘wtf’ comes from the words
‘what the fuck?’ and refers to an event which is puzzling or absurd in its nature. The
pronunciation of ‘wtf’ is different from that favoured by many other people: instead
of saying /ʍ t f/, our group pronounces the letters in the same way that a child
pronounces letters of the alphabet: ‘wuh teh feh’. The reason for this is unclear, but it
could be a way of distancing from the pre-existing groups which use the acronym and
pronounce it in its original context.
The fact that the group was made up entirely of males suggests some form of
hierarchy within the group. In order to maintain the alpha male position, there are
many words which act to insult and ridicule the other participant in the conversation.
These are words such as ‘spanner’, ‘tard’, ‘goon’, ‘muppet’, ‘bell end’, ‘pillock’ and
‘tool’. These words seek to undermine the person’s intelligence, whether it is in
2
Oxford
English
Dictionary
Online,
newbie,
st
<http://dictionary.oed.com.ezproxy.lib.le.ac.uk/cgi/entry/00323814?> [ accessed May 1 2009]
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comparing the person to someone with mental disabilities (tard), reducing them to
inanimate objects (spanner, muppet, tool), referring to them as a penis (pillock, bell
end) or to simply call them stupid (goon). By contrast, there are only two entries
which signal a positive reinforcement of friendship in the dictionary; ‘bud’ and ‘pal’.
The inter-male relationships are built on a system of mockery. The blatant bravado of
male interaction sees these words used not only to embarrass a person, but also as
positive reinforcements of friendships and affection. The group as a whole has a
mutually exclusive understanding whereby insults are tolerated when given in the
proper context. In a place where physical contact between males is regarded mainly in
a homosexual context, the language and words used act to strengthen the relationship,
with ridicule being a positive form of fondness between the speakers. However, the
words which carry the strongest connotations would be used far more sparsely if the
group was in the company of an outsider, who may not understand the light jest and
code of the group.
In his book, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics, Ronald Wardhaugh
comments on the vernacular language used by a group of working class men:
[Milroy’s hypothesis says] ‘the closeknit network may be seen as an important social
mechanism of vernacular maintenance, capable of operating effectively in opposition to a
publicly endorsed and status-oriented set of legitimized linguistic norms’… we see how
low-status varieties of a language maintain themselves in the face of heavy competition
from ‘above’: they enable those who use them to show their solidarity with one another
and achieve some kind of group identity. 3
The group I am studying all come from a working class background, and vernacular
language is used frequently within conversations. However, it is through looking at
3
Ronald
Wardhaugh,
An
Introduction
to
Sociolinguistics,
<http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=0J2VOzNYtKQC&pg=PA183&dq=mechanism+of+vernacula
r+maintenance&ei=x7UMSt3iC4r0ygSOlcmVCw> [accessed 27th April 2009]
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words which contain taboo lexis that more information is revealed about the
participants of the study. The all male group often uses vernacular words to express
their annoyance or to belittle a person. Some words are compounds of two lesser
words spliced together to create an added element of gravitas and meaning. An
example of this is the word ‘fuckwit’, which incorporates the profane and heavily
charged ‘fuck’ with ‘wit’. The OED cites one definition of wit as:
The understanding or mental faculties in respect of their condition; chiefly = ‘right mind’,
‘reason’, ‘senses’, sanity… in (one's right) wit, sane, of sound mind; chiefly out of (by,
from, of) wit or one's wit, insane, mad, out of one's mind; also out of wit advb., madly,
furiously. Obs. (or dial.).4
In the word ‘fuckwit’, the classical and accepted meaning of wit is polarised to mean
the opposite. A ‘fuckwit’ is a person whom is held in low regard due to their stupid
actions. The profane prefix acts as an indicator in the conversation, highlighting the
severity and anger of the speaker. Within the group, the introduction of such a word
would signal that the joke had gone too far, and that the person who used it was
genuinely annoyed at this point. Other lexis which have been omitted from the
dictionary due their similarity with the previous word also contain ‘fuck’, such as:
‘fucktard’ (a clipping of ‘fucking retard,’) ‘fuckup’ and ‘fuckface’.
The male bravado also extends beyond the use of insults and the vernacular.
The members of the group are all heterosexual males, and plenty of banter exists
when they are thrust in a social situation containing women, for example a night out
or a party (which is not a ‘sausagefest.’) There are words which are used mainly to
4
Oxford
English
Dictionary
Online,
wit,
<http://dictionary.oed.com.ezproxy.lib.le.ac.uk/cgi/entry/50286217?query_type=word&queryword=
wit&first=1&max_to_show=10&sort_type=alpha&search_id=X5Sk-Q3cuPT12057&result_place=2> [accessed 25th April 2009]
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describe women in a derogative manner due to their appearance, such as ‘munter’,
‘fugly’, ‘minger’, ‘skank’ and ‘bagjob’. All these words are used when referring to
females within a sexual context, with the males passing judgement on the exterior of
the females present. There are other words present to signify a form of sexual
attraction (including the aforementioned ‘bagjob’) such as ‘stacked’, ‘lush’ and
‘MILF’. These words are quite crass in their nature and would never be said to the
face of the female being described. Instead, the word remains part of the
understanding of the group and is used in a playful, if slightly misogynistic manner.
As well as qualifying themselves against each other and nearby females, the
group also view other males outside the group. Words such as ‘stacked’, ‘guns’ and
‘solid’ all refer to the physical appearance of males. The word ‘guns’ adopts the word
which is soaked in masculine connotations of war and death, and transposes it to
mean the well built arms of a person. It is clear that males feel the attention they
project onto women, derogatory or otherwise, is being reciprocated by females at the
same time, and they feel they are being compared to other men. Therefore, the words
used to describe the physical muscularity and presence of another male is due to the
insecurities and hang-ups about their own bodies. In this sense, alcohol can be seen as
a means of overcoming these mental obstacles and gaining confidence in the social
situation, and could be another reason why there are so many words included within
this dictionary for being drunk.
As well as testosterone-charged words, there are words used within the banter
which refer to the female genitals, for example ‘fanny’, ‘pussy’ and ‘wuss’. In each of
these cases the female connotations of the word relate to a weakness within the male,
mainly the aspect of fear. By being called a ‘pussy’, the speaker equates the
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conversational partner as possessing female qualities, mainly trepidation in the face of
some form of conflict.
Ultimately, it is clear that banter acts as a fixing agent within the group. The
ability to mock one another cements friendships and is both a form of affection and
male bonding exercise. The ability to not take yourself too seriously is an important
attribute to hold in an all male group. However, that exist that carry different levels of
seriousness. For example, a word that is prefixed by a severe profanity such as ‘fuck’
serves as an indication that the joke has gone too far. To understand the words used
within the group, it is important to understand the unwritten rules of the group, which
I feel have been highlighted within my essay. Overall, the study has shown that the
language used by my studied group within Barnsley comes from a variety of different
places, and that regional dialectal terms are being replaced in favour of more
recognisable national and international slang words. The use of the internet has added
the ability for slang (such as ‘noob’) to become far more widespread in such a shorter
space of time than ever before, and the influence of American slang is widespread due
to popularisation of various films such as American Pie (MILF) and television shows.
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Bibliography
Oxford English Dictionary Online, http://www.oed.com
Wardhaugh, Ronald, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics,
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=0J2VOzNYtKQC&pg=PA183&dq=mechanism+
of+vernacular+maintenance&ei=x7UMSt3iC4r0ygSOlcmVCw
Wikipedia, Drunk Fixing, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drunk_fixing