Slang
Shoko Fujiwara
Kei Kobayashi
Introduction
“What’s up?”, “Gotcha”, “Piece of cake”. Have you ever heard of these words before? How about Japanese ones? Have you ever heard of words, “マックする” ( Makku suru) or “バリサン” (Bari san)? The English words which we mentioned before such as “What’s up?” or “Gotcha” surprised us when we were studying abroad in the U.S. because we had never heard of these words. In fact, dictionaries do not have the meaning of them. However, many people use these kinds of words. What is that?
We are talking about slang in some points. At first, we are talking about slang in general such as examples of it and its use and purpose. Next, we are going to talk about the attitude of people to slang. Finally, we will talk about a theory which is connected with slang..
- Slang
a)What’s slang?
Slang is the non-standard use of words in a language and sometimes the creation of new words or importation of words from other languages.
Slang is defined by the Longman Advanced American Dictionary as‘very informal language that includes new and sometimes offensive words, and that is those used especially only by people who belong to a particular group, such as young people or criminals’. Then slang generally implies playful, informal speech.
In addition, people do not use slang in public such as in meeting, official documents, announcements, speeches and scholarly books because it could be vulgar, offensive and make people uncomfortable. If people use slang in a bad way, it will cause him or her.
b)Its origin
Slang could be from abbreviations and comparisons. Moreover, it has its root in dialect., It used to be strongly connected with each region. It means it was difficultto recognize the differences of slang between region and another one. However, nowadays thanks to the advancement of technology such as the Internet and email, the differences between them is getting smaller and smaller. On the other hand, because of the advancement, slang has been changing.
Ex) in English
the word for “a good thing”
“swell” in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s
“groovy” in the 1960s
“cool” in the 1970s and still now
in Japanese
“うざい・うざったい” (Uzai ・Uzattai; it means annoyance)
used as the dialect of Tama, Japan in the past
used almost everywhere in Japan nowadays.
Hence, slang is often particular to a brief period of time from decades to only a few moths. It means slang widely used and understood at one time.
c)its use and purpose
Slang is used for some purposes and it has many kinds such as African American slang, Australian slang, Gay slang and Hip hop slang. As an another example, there is Internet slang. Internet slang has been developed by Internet users over the years. The purpose of it is saving keystrokes (acronym) and often written in lower case.
E.g.) Acronym
BTW ; By The WayCU See you
FYI ; For Your InformationTIA ; Thanks In Advance
Like this, the use and purpose of slang will be different from the subjects like Internet slang. However, another purpose of slang could be to communicate with other people, especially close and friendly people easily and smoothly. In addition, by using slang, people can share and show their feelings only among them.
Ex) When a girl talks to her friend about quarrel with her parents last night
With slang
“聞いてよ～。昨日、親とケンカして。マジむかつくんですけど”
( Listen to me, I had a quarrel last night. It really annoyed me.(
Without slang
“聞いてよ～。昨日、親とケンカして。本当に腹が立つの”
- Attitude
1)The reasons for agreement
① no interruption
Some people agree with use of slang because slang does not interrupt standard language. Slang just adds another expression of it. In fact, the words which people often use do not change.
② for communication
Some people think slang helps them to communicate with other people easily and more closely. They think it gives them the same feeling.
③ language changes
Some people think language changes because of three things; laziness, breaking castle, infectious disease. Speaking of laziness, people want to speak easier, shorter and faster so the language which they speak change. About breaking castle, this is one of the idea of language. Some people think language is like an old castle. They want to keep it beautiful because they think the castle is the most beautiful. However, in fact language changes so it is not beautiful anymore.
Because of these things, people who agree with use of slang realize that language changes. Same as slang..
2)The reasons for disagreement
①it causes confusion of Japanese
According to the survey of NHK (Nippon Hoso Kyokai), about a confusion of Japanese, the percentage of people who think that Japanese has been disturbing is more than 80 %. In addition, the number has increased year and year. People who are over 30 strongly think of it.
②to protect traditional Japanese
Some people think that we have to protect traditional Japanese forever because it is our history. It is so beautiful. In fact, many young people do not know honorific words, which are used to the older and they use slang or bad expressions. Especially the honorific words of Japanese are rich then they think young people should try to learn the honorific words rather than slang or bad expressions.
③uncomfortable
Some people feel uncomfortable to hear slang because they think it is not Japanese or they can not understand the meaning of it. Especially the older feel it.
- Accommodation Theory
When we talk with other people, subconsciously we tend to change our style of speech towards the style used by the listener. For example, we tend to speak more slowly when communicating with foreigners, or use grammatically simple language with babies or children. In addition, the length both pauses and utterances, the kind of vocabulary and syntax used, as well as intonation, voice pitch and pronunciation are all subjected to the accommodation theory. In other words, we accommodate to others by adjusting our communicational behavior to the requisite roles.
Accommodation theory tends to occur when the speakers like each other. In this case, to communicate is the most important for them. They do not need to care about grammatical rules or accuracy.
From this point of view, slang and accommodation theory is similar. It is the most important thing for people who use slang is to express their ideas and opinions to others easily. It is useful to use slang when we do not need to speak perfectly grammatical or politely.
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