Introduction to the Dictionary of Student Slang

Introduction to The Dictionary Of Student Slang

This project has aimed to provide an insight into the language used by a group of students at the University of Leicester. The intended audience for this project is other students of a similar age (university age, 18 – 21). In this introduction I will both introduce and evaluate the slang dictionary, and also provide some help on how it should be used most effectively. Other sources that I found useful will also be introduced briefly, and this will enable further research into different areas of the language that is slang.

Throughout this introduction, and throughout the dictionary as a whole, I have used as few abbreviations as possible. This is so that there should be no confusion as to understanding any part of any of the entries. In typing almost everything out in full I think that I alleviate the need for a separate page to tell the user about these abbreviations. The only abbreviations I have used are to call the Oxford English

Dictionary (on-line edition) the OED, and for recording grammatical information.

I believe that in order to for a study of slang to be complete, we must all understand what it is that I mean by the term “slang”. Slang is almost always oral, and it is very rarely (beyond dictionaries such as this) written. Colloquialisms are often written, as are jargon terms. Dialectal language must not be overlooked either. There are subtle differences between all of these. Perhaps the most individual of them, jargon, can be said to mainly regard a specific profession, a good example of which is computing. There are a lot of jargon terms involved in computer science, some of which are more well known than others, for example megabyte. This is a word that is not used widely outside of the computing “sphere” as it were, and so it can be called jargon. The differences between colloquial language, slang, and dialect are a lot more difficult to define, because the three overlap so much. It also depends on the various users of the language. By this I mean that to one person or group of persons, a term could be slang, yet to another person or group of persons, the very same term could merely be colloquial. Words in the English language move across all of the different areas with ease, and so it is only possible to provide a snapshot of language at this particular point in time. Some slang terms even make their way into “proper” English, for example the word

‘Ecstasy’, the Class A drug. The name Ecstasy, in this sense, began life as a slang term used solely on the streets, but now it has been so widely used by so many different groups of people, that the drug is now known almost exclusively as Ecstasy. National newspapers, radio and even BBC television now use the word – it has found its way into

“proper” English. Added to this is the fact that the new connotations of the word have detracted from the original meaning of ‘The state of being ‘beside oneself’, thrown into a frenzy or a stupor, with anxiety, astonishment, fear, or passion’ (OED). The OED gives a definition of slang as ‘Language of a highly colloquial type, considered as below the level of standard educated speech, and consisting either of new words or of current words employed in some special sense’, and a definition of colloquial as ‘Of words, phrases, etc.: Belonging to common speech; characteristic of or proper to ordinary conversation, as distinguished from formal or elevated language’. From these definitions it is clear that the distinction between them can easily be blurred.

This dictionary, entitled ‘A dictionary of Student Slang’, has been compiled by as it were the subheading ‘a study of student slang centred on a social group – my housemates’. This means that the information given in this dictionary is correct for myself and the others in my house. It may not be correct or accurate for another group of students at the same university, of the same age, and of the same sex. This is because of the very nature of slang, as I have already discussed. All of the subjects in this study are

21 years of age, and two are male and two are female. The information was collected between January and March 2006, and all the terms included in the glossary were uttered within our house in Leicester.

I employed a number of methods to gather the data I needed for this project, some of which were successful and some that were less so. To begin with I simply asked each of my housemates in turn to tell me a slang term that they used within our house, and I tries to do the same thing. However this proved difficult because it was an unnatural environment to carry out the project. A brainstorming session with all four of us in the room at once was slightly more effective, but I came across the same problems as with my previous method. I therefore decided to listen to conversations and pick out the slang words that were used, and this made sure that they were all spoken within context as well.

In order to overcome any ethical issues which may have arrived from this, such as giving the participants the option to withdraw at any time, I made sure I asked each of their permissions to carry the project out in this manner. This method proved to be very effective, because it was a natural environment, with no pressure to think of any words.

This is also why the data gathering took a matter of months rather than days. I had several different methods of recording the data, but the most effective idea was simply to leave a sheet of paper and a pen in the room we most often convene in, and to ensure that each time a new word was uttered, or in a new context or meaning, it was written down. Of the subjects of this project, two are from the south of England, and two are from the midlands. We have all also had contact with other students from all across the country, as well as many foreign and overseas students. This means that we have picked up some of the words that they have used. Whilst to them words may be dialectal, accentual, or even part of their native language, to us they are now slang terms. Examples of these shifts in language are relatively few in my dictionary, but I think that they warrant discussion. The entry ‘Miamy’ is a French word for ‘good taste’ or ‘yummy’ in the food sense. However, we use the word regarding people in a sexual sense. A different example, this time regarding a dialectal term that we have adopted, is ‘Rate’. However it is slightly more complex than simply a dialectal shift. This is a word for ‘right’, as in correct but used as a language intensifier. A student from Derbyshire often used to accentuate the word ‘right’ so that it sounded like ‘rate’ and we have adopted that as our word for ‘right’. An example of a citation could be “that’s rate good”. In this sense we have adopted a Leicestershire sentence structure and added in a Derbyshire accent, even though none of us are from either place. I have already discussed this kind of liquidity of language earlier in this essay.

At a very early stage in the project I decided to address the issue of pronunciation by using audio files accessible from the dictionary entry. I chose to do this because the other options available to me, in my opinion, all contained more flaws than audio clips.

This is by no means saying that they are wrong, and I did consider using the International

Phonetic Alphabet (IPA) among other more abstract techniques, but I believe that audio files are the most effective solution. The main problem with the IPA, in my opinion, is that it is difficult to understand. A casual user of this dictionary may well have to have a reference guide to the IPA symbols, and this would have meant navigating away from the page they were on just to check how the word should be pronounced. This would not be at all user friendly. The IPA would usually be very effective, as it is universal across language, but an on-line dictionary has the advantage of being able to add sound files to the entry. I think the very fact that it can be done in a project such as this gives it a distinct advantage. It also solves the potential problem of accent differences. The study is of our (myself and my housemates) language, and the audio files demonstrate exactly how the word or phrase is uttered by us. This includes accent, emphasis, and the most important of course – pronunciation. Whereas many dictionaries, both printed and on- line, will not include an indication of pronunciation for all of its entries, I decided to include a sound file for every entry in my dictionary. This is so that there can be absolutely no doubt as to how we pronounce any of the words or phrases. It may be that some of the examples are obvious, but I do not think that one person can or should have the authority on what should or should not be included. In a sense it is not my place to decide what is “obvious” and what is not. To alleviate the need for a decision such as this on each individual term, I took the decision to record an audio file for all of my entries.

Some entries in my dictionary have the same headword, for example ‘blag’. This is because the word is used in different senses and contexts, and therefore is either a noun or a verb in various situations. I have chosen to deal with these grammatical differences in this way so that there is no confusion that the word can be used in either sense. Whilst the separate definitions of the same headwords may be similar, the citations will demonstrate the differences between the two, and will indicate how to properly use each of them. I came across certain terms that could have been logged as either a noun or an adjective. Nouns can be used as adjectives in some cases, but for the purposes of this study I entered the grammatical information of the sense that was used almost all of the time. If a term was used as both a noun and an adjective on a regular basis, then I have created an extra entry to show this effectively. I made this decision so that my dictionary reflects the true way in which we use language, and how we typically use each of the terms. Regarding the recording of grammatical information, I have used the following abbreviations: “n” represents a noun, “v” for a verb, “adj” for an adjective, “interj” for an interjection, “nphr” for a noun phrase, “adv” for an adverb, and “vphr” for a verb phrase.

Of the citations that I have recorded, almost all of them are adapted from a genuinely spoken sentence. Some of the interjections, such as ‘meh’, I have created a scenario through language that should demonstrate how and when the word should be used. This is because some interjections are never used in a sentence – they are merely a snap response to something another person has said. In my opinion the “citation” field is the most important piece of information that my dictionary contains, because it can not only indicate meaning, but it can also enhance meaning. This is why I was sure to make up myself as few citations as possible, because there is nothing more effective than a genuinely used sentence to demonstrate what I am trying to show the reader. Of course there are an infinite number of sentences available to use in this field, and I have tried to choose the most common, and most typical to show next to the entries. In many cases I have used two separate citations that, while they are similar, they contain subtle differences. For example the entry for ‘rough’ contains the citations, ‘'she looks rough' or

'that colour scheme is rough'.’ This not only highlights the first part of the definition, ‘disgusting, horrible’, but it also reinforces the second part, ‘Can be used for all matter’.

Without the second citation, the subtle alternative ways that the word can be used for could well have been lost or overlooked.

The field entitled ‘Usage’ is a very rough guide as to what context the word or phrase should be used in. I have included such entries in this field as ‘slang’, ‘insult’, and even ‘friendly insult’. This perhaps on the surface seems like a contradiction in terms, because insults are inherently unfriendly. However I believe that some insults can be light-hearted, and there are some terms, for example ‘jessie’ or ‘punk’ I would typically only use to describe people I know. Similarly there are some, for example ‘spakker’ or

‘dickbow’, that I would never use to describe people I know. Therefore in this sense, the

‘usage’ field allows the user of the dictionary to understand a little more not only about the language we use, but also who we use it to, and how and when we do or do not use it.

Etymology is an important part of any dictionary. Etymology is the study of the sources that form a word or phrase, and how it develops its meaning or meanings. For a slang dictionary this is a difficult prospect, because slang is generally not written down. It is, as I have discussed, a spoken form of communication. This means that tracing a word and its meaning back to its origin is sometimes impossible for slang terms. Tracing meaning is perhaps the hardest strand of this section, because slang by definition takes on new meanings as it is passed from social group to social group, and from generation to generation. Sometimes there are no links from one meaning to another, no matter how abstractly it is searched for. In my dictionary I have tried to find the earliest recording of my terms that have the same, or a closely related, meaning. Where possible I have included the country of origin, or a more localised region if it was available. The date of origin is also included where I am certain it is correct. Some words, with the help of other dictionaries, can be traced back to their origin, but in slang I feel that this is relatively rare. Some words or phrases with the meanings in which we use them have come from television or films. In this case I have endeavoured to record the name of the production, the year it was released or shown, and the director.

Some entries in my dictionary have more information on etymology than others, and the reason for this is that some terms simply have no historical grounding for my individual meaning. There are some entries, for example ‘aresehole fish’, that have no written evidence anywhere, and for these I have simply recorded ‘Etymology unknown’.

This is more effective than including information that may not be completely accurate. In any future studies, this information will be available from my dictionary.

There is a lot of false information on the internet. This is because some websites, for example the Urban Dictionary (www.urbandictionary.com), have a forum-based data collection system, where users can add their own definitions and citations. As part of the entry on this website for ‘shit faced’, the etymology read: ‘Shit Faced: from the Latin

"shitibus faceibus".’ This, of course, is complete nonsense, and it shows that care must be taken so that the information I provide is accurate.

My methodology for etymological research began with the simple question of whether or not I knew for certain where the word came from. This was only true for one entry, ‘manwell’, because myself and my associates created that compound, and I know exactly where and when it was conceived. I could therefore confidently give that information without looking any further. Of the other terms, I first searched for them all in the OED, and recorded any relevant information. This proved to be particularly useful in finding the terms contained within my dictionary in a slightly different sense or meaning. I have endeavoured to include as much relevant information as possible, including the meaning of the term that I believe my meaning came from, and a supporting citation. For example, my entry for ‘jessie’ contains the etymological information ‘From

Jessie, OED: 'A cowardly or effeminate man; a male homosexual', OED: '1923 G.

BLAKE Mince Collop Close i. 20 He was a big Jessie,...but she liked him'’. I have first included the OED definition that I believe is the most relevant for my sense of the word, and then I have included a quotation, again from the OED, to reinforce the meaning. I believe that this gives enough insight into where the word and its meaning came from.

For any further information I required, I searched for entries using the on-line search engine at http://www.google.co.uk. In many cases the results turned up pages that

I have included in my ‘links’ section of the website, and these are below. I tried to include all relevant information in the same style and structure as the information from the OED. A selection of the external links are: http://www.peevish.co.uk/slang (A dictionary of slang), http://www.ocf.berkeley.edu/~wrader/slang, (The Online Slang

Dictionary), and http://www.csupomona.edu/~jasanders/slang/project.html (American

College Slang). There are other useful links on the website, but these twinned with the

OED and Google provided me with most of my background information, particularly for the etymology section of the dictionary.

The keyword field in my dictionary is very useful to use when searching. There is a list of keywords available on the website, and so it is not necessary to duplicate them here, but the list includes such subject areas as alcohol, people, and food (to name only three examples). This is set up so that when you search the keyword field from something such as ‘alcohol’, it will return numerous results, including ‘wankered’ and ‘wasted’, among others. For more help see the ‘Search Help’ page on the website.

In terms of the layout of the entries, I have tried to keep it as simple as possible.

All headwords are in bold, including those where I have written ‘see also’, or ‘opposite’ instances. All the citations I have recorded are in italic text, and this formatting of different types of text is a decision I made relatively late on in the project, after discussion with some of my colleagues, some of whom have employed the same techniques. It is difficult to describe what the dictionary will look like on-line, because at the time of writing this introduction, the two strands of the project (the database of entries and the website) had not been combined.

I will now discuss what this study reveals about this particular social group. At the data collection stage of the project, myself and the other subjects were initially surprised as to how difficult it was to think of slang terms that we used, in a brainstorming situation. However when a more natural environment was created, we found that we used a lot of slang without noticing it. While listening to other groups of people from the outside I could quite easily notice what was slang and what was not. This was simply because I did not understand a section of the words or phrases that were used.

This shows that slang is in no way separate from language for each individual social group. The question must be raised as to why the group I have studied use the language that we do. We are all from different parts of the United Kingdom, and have lived together for only one year. However, the slang terms in this dictionary have become second-nature to all of us, and this is because we are all in a very similar situation at the present time. We are all surrounded by the same language, either from each other or from our wider social contacts, and this becomes inherent in our everyday speech. Many terms have come from the medium of television or film, and this shows that technology and society are inseparably linked.

The multiple influences on the language that we use are completely unique. No other social group will have identical influences to us, and likewise other social groups will be unique as well. I believe that this means that the development and use of slang in everyday language is entirely involuntary, and that no two sets of slang language will be the same. Naturally there will be overlapping terms, and in particular terms that are used across similar social contexts but have slightly and subtly different meanings from one instance to another.

Of course the same words in my dictionary could mean something entirely different to somebody else, and I am in no way claiming that this is the true meaning of any of the words shown here, but it is just how the subjects of my study – my housemates and myself – use them. It is a snapshot in time, and of a very tiny number of people, but it is true to us. If this dictionary infuriates you because the way we use words is not the same as yours, then build your own, and create your own snapshot in time. This should serve as something of a disclaimer, and I need to add that if you are offended in any way by what you have read in this project then I cannot apologise enough. There is a warning on the front page of the website that the dictionary does contain swearing, but this is unavoidable because I merely recorded information as I heard it.

In parts this introduction may have been colloquial, and I hope that the irony is not lost that colloquial language and slang are almost inseparable in many different situations.