I am quite at home with Lady Georgie in the 1930s, because people actually spoke like that still when I was a child. When I was at school other girls still called one "Old bean". They still said, 'I say, you are a brick." I've had letters telling me that real people never spoke that way, but the real people I knew actually did. Of course working class people had an entirely different vocabulary. Cockney would say "Whatcher" instead of "hello" for example.
So I've been thinking how certain words are so specific to certain periods. Words to express appreciation, for example. In my early youth everything was "smashing and wizard"... expressions started by the RAF pilots during WWII. I think people still said "spiffing" too.
In the early Sixties a famous comedian coined the words SWINGING and DODGY. They both really caught on. And admiration for all things American meant that everything as SUPER, or even SUPER DUPER.
Then came the Hippie period and things were GROOVY, COOL, RAD and FAR OUT. (Point of interest: the expression Far Out was used in the early 1900s. I've never been able to use it in my Molly Murphy books because it would wrench the reader out of the period!)
AWESOME came into use around this time too. And TOTALLY.
Back in London this summer the catchword was CRACKING. People had a cracking good time. Sportscasters described it as a "cracking goal." I'm not sure where that came from.
I won't even attempt to keep up with the expressions my grandkids use. at one moment it was BAD meaning good. Have you ever said BOO-YAH? What is a BAE?
Some of us cling onto words from our past. I still have been heard to say "brilliant" or even "super". One friend who was a movie producer still called everything "cool" long after the Sixties were over. It sounded strange coming from a middle-aged mouth.
So what expressions do you cling onto, dear Reds? Do you have any regional ones that define you? Do you move with the times and use your kids' expressions?
JENN MCKINLAY: Dude, I totally hear what you're saying. Slang can really harsh a writer's mellow. You know? LOL. I write all contemporary and mostly 20-30 something characters so I need to know what's what, what's in, and what's out. I don't always get it right. I used "lit" the other day and was told by a hooligan that it's out. Then I said that's "hella bad" and was informed I was using hella wrong, too. *sigh* Perhaps a light touch is best when using slang so that you land somewhere between basic and extra without losing your mind.
HANK PHILLIPPI RYAN: Oh, gosh. See, rats, already wrong. My favorite story about this: a million years ago I worked at a record store. (okay? And there was a record by some group which was the preamble to the constitution set to music--like a Motown record. I didn't;t like it at all--I don't remember why. So this other high school kid comes in and asks for it--and I found it, and as I handed it to him, he said, "this record is really bad." and I said, "yeah, can you believe it? SO bad." And he smiled happily," yeah, really bad." Of course he didn't mean what I meant.
My latest slang bafflement is when people say "I'll do the latte" or I'll take the kale salad" --what? DO? TAKE? Isn't it--Have? I'll have a latte. Or--imagine-- I'd like a latte, please?
RHYS: Oh, Hank... please and thank you seem to have disappeared. And another thing that bugs me. "No Problem' when you ask the waiter for some water. Of course it's no problem, I want to yell. It's your job!
HALLIE EPHRON: Jenn, do you loan out the hooligans? My 2 1/2 year old grandson is smitten with the word buttcheeks. Does that count? Southern California in the 60s: bitchin. (Gidget used it.) It meant wicked awesome.
Rhys it's not an easy thing to get right because so much of slang is regional and class-driven. So one person's experience isn't another's. I'd love to hear what references people use to get it right.
LUCY BURDETTE: Hallie, I've already borrowed Jenn's hooligans! In DEATH ON THE MENU, I needed a bunch of young twenty-somethings to visit the houseboat next to Miss Gloria's place and declare that they loved it. "It's lit!" is one of the comments they made. And we learn that's already passe! I think the light touch idea is the best policy...but also, I've learned over and over that Facebook friends love to give advice. So I use them!
JULIA SPENCER-FLEMING: Like Jenn, I'm lucky to have the Smithie, the Sailor and Youngest to keep me au courant. So, Rhys, I can tell you BAE is Before Anyone Else, which you would think would be top spot in anyone's list of friends or romantic partners, but no! There are further divisions: Number 1 BAE, Number 2 BAE, etc. I asked Youngest how number 2 could be BAE when there was, demonstrably, someone else B, only to be told I didn't understand.
Honestly, in my writing, I try to avoid most current slang, because it seems to change much faster than it used to, probably due to the internet repeating everything 1000 times until a phrase is passe after six months. This has been a source of amusement to me as the Smithie, now 26, listens to her eight-years-younger sister and realizes she doesn't understand the majority of the latter's slang terms. Being cool and with it has an EXTREMELY short shelf-life, kid.
And Hallie, you didn't have boys. As I'm sure Jenn can attest, boys find all things associated with the rear end and what happens back there to be the ultimate in wit between the ages of 2 and 12. Maybe longer, but they tend to learn to hide it by then. I once drove a minivan full of 7 year old boys who spent the entire ride cracking themselves up by repeating "Butt", "poop", "Poopbutt," etc., etc. Having experienced them in their larval form, it continues to amaze me men rule the world.
RHYS: So let's hear from you now. Do you have favorite expressions that somehow date you? And those of you who write, how do you research speech and idioms?
I have never been “good” at slang . . . my daughter and my grandchildren will translate when I don’t understand something that’s been said . . . but these days the slang seems to change so fast I never seem to be able to keep up with it.
ReplyDeleteAs for slang in writing, sometimes I can figure it out from context; other times I have to ask someone what it means. ::sigh::
I taught high school in the era when bad meant good. I found myself continually asking if the student meant “ bad as in bad or bad as in good?” And they all found it hilarious. The big issue in language at school was swearing. I would get so mad sometimes that I would go to the teachers restroom and let loose with words I could be fired for saying in front of a child. I found a solution after a trip to England... I swore in British English.... the terms I borrowed weren’t on the list of words we couldn’t use, so.... I did get funny looks years later on a trip back to the UK when I let out a string of words a proper lady would never say and they understood them over there.... I was soooo embarrassed!
ReplyDeleteOoh, a topic close to my heart! As I also write a series set in Victorian times (but in America), I'm always looking for evocative phrases I can use in dialog. EVERYDAY LIFE IN THE 1800S is a favorite reference book, with a whole chapter on slang and everyday speech. "Cap the climax" is a fun one, meaning to beat all. At a living history center one of the interpreters sadly said her brother had "crossed the dark river" - meaning he had died.
ReplyDeleteI also use Google Ngram viewer and etmyonline.com to check when words or phrases were first attested. It doesn't mean they were in common usage yet, but it's a start.
In my contemporaries I also try to stay away from too much slang, although it's fun to throw in a "wicked" here and there in the books set in Massachusetts. In my southern Indiana series I have great fun throwing in colorful southern-ish phrases said by a couple of quirky ongoing characters. I still say "cool" a lot, but attempts to bring back "groovy" have failed miserably. ;^)
*etymonline dot com* I think.
DeleteOops! Right, David. My bad, to use a much more current (or ten years out-dated) phrase.
DeleteI have been laughing so much reading this, I had to stop and wipe my eyes and blow my nose!
ReplyDeleteYes, slang is a funny thing. Having 5 girls that span 20 years has shown me just how much the meanings of words has changed. I do have a daughter that still says cool on a daily basis and I think she has stopped saying rad. I do remember the phrase awesome sauce, which I take to mean it was beyond awesome! It does make one feel dated!
Jenn, I would love to spend just one day, sitting quietly, in the corner of your home! The things that go on and are said by you and your family always have me in stitches!
Oh, what fun this is! But, Rhys, what is your source for learning Victorian era speech? And for different classes?
ReplyDeleteI still use 'cool' and no one is making fun of me so maybe that word is still alive around here. Sometimes I'll say 'swell' just for the heck of it because it was a word my grandmother used. I would never use 'awesome' because I heard it all the time and then it meant nothing and now that word seems to be replaced by 'brilliant' at least in books.
My book is set in 1897, almost at the end of the era, and a lot of information came from my great aunt who lived with us and told tales of her childhood... What the butcher boy had said, when she got in trouble for using a bad word etc, and essentially from the way she and my grandmother spoke. They had huge vocabularies and used long words. Also from books written in the era. Sherlock Holmes is useful!
DeleteI listen to my kids for millennial slang. Otherwise, I eavesdrop and take a few discrete notes, especially in New Orleans.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure my slang dates me as a child of the 80s. My kids, The Boy in particular, rolls his eyes frequently.
ReplyDeleteI am, however, banned from trying to use current slang. Like Jen, I used "lit" one day and The Boy cut me off at the knees. "We don't say that any more, Mom." One day, I was asking him about school and he said it was "slight work." I had no idea what that meant. "Easy, Mom. It means it's easy." Said in a tone of voice that clearly indicated I should have known that. Of course.
I think slang changes faster than technology.
Mary/Liz
Said in a tone like you were slight-headed, no doubt, Mary! I know that tone. "MU-THER." Does that count as slang? Because it's loaded with meaning.
ReplyDeleteAnd how about perfect? Everything is perfect. Have you noticed that? No matter what question you ask or no matter what thing you ask for, the other person says perfect. Then you say perfect then they say perfect.
ReplyDeleteAnd absolutely! Everything we ordered the waitress said absolutely, with exaggerated enthusiasm
DeleteIt’s so funny! As if some consultant said to make the customer feel smart or something.
DeleteHow about when you say thank you, and they come back with "no problem." I guess I'm an old fogey to hope for a simple "you're welcome."
DeleteMaybe the rule is if it is not your generation, don’t try to say it. I cannot stay woke or Lyft. And I am nervous about legit.
ReplyDeleteWoke and woken are two words I find impossible to use. I think they were considered incorrect when I was growing up. In this house we wake, were wakened, and are awakened.
DeleteOh, true! But the new woke, you know? When you are hip and aware and whatever else it means :-)
DeleteI'm so out of date with slang. My favorite happy word is frabjous, and that is circa 1872. Since I don't write anything at all except the odd comment here, keeping my slang current is a non-issue.I have been known to used wicked, even though I've only passed through Massachusetts on the way to somewhere else. And I can drop the F bomb with elan. It's rather fun to see faces when I do that as it must not be something expected from an old Q-tip like me.
ReplyDeleteNo problem" is a phrase that may make me get violent. Also, in my life I've seen very few things other than newborn babies that can be called perfect.
As one who came of age during the sixties, I love the slang of that period and even the pervasive "daddio" of the fifties.
I do collect phrases from earlier times as in:
Slicker than snot on a door knob
Raining like a cow pissing on a flat rock
Like pounding sand in a rat hole (impossible)
Frog strangler (rain again)
Dumber than a box of rocks (presidential reference)
Scarce as hen's teeth
Haven't laughed this hard since the pigs ate up my little brother.
I could go on, but I won't. Aren't you glad?
The pig ate my brother? Where did that come from? Scary!
DeleteMy dad always said donkey's years. I haven't done that for donkey's years. I think it must be a corruption of 'as long as donkeys ears' don't you?
I lived in east Tennessee for four years and my landlord used to say: "That makes a man scratch where his head don't itch."
DeleteAnn, I'm like you. I've given up on current slang, except to use with finger quotes when my kids are around (and that's mostly to annoy them.) Instead, I use the slang my grandmother Greuling used - and she was born in 1909. So I say, "in good season" and "jackass" and "She doesn't have the brains God gave geese."
DeleteBetter to be eccentric than trying too hard, I say.
I love your collected phrases, Ann! Some expressions, like "dumber than a box of rocks" never go out of style, probably because there's always someone who fits the description.
ReplyDeleteI throw out "cool" and "awesome" with the gleeful abandon of a person who no longer cares if my speech is up to date or not, but I do listen to the things other people say, and try to figure out the internal logic of their language.
I am also a connoisseur of cussing. I was once introduced to a young man who had just given up his career as a tank driver, and returned to civilian life. He was happily describing a new guitar he longed for, but his language! Oh, my! Every noun and nearly every adverb and adjective was replaced by profanity--some American, some he'd clearly learned from the Brits and Aussies he'd served with. It was fantastic. I was riveted, plunging into his narrative and trying to figure out how he was doing the substitutions to make his story both perfectly comprehensible and also the most profane description I had ever heard. When our mutual friend finally cleared his throat and said, "Justin. Ladies." I wanted to howl in frustration because I hadn't figured it out yet, and Justin has never spoken that way around me again.
Tabernac!
DeleteSo . . . "Tabernac" is French for "tabernacle" and I know it's a terrible profanity in Quebec, but why? Isn't it like saying "church"? How is it profane?
DeleteI know, right ? (I actually kind of like that one.)
ReplyDeleteI'm really happy that I don't hear the phrase "my bad" as often as I did a few years ago. I hate that phrase. It's like fingernails on a blackboard to me. (You remember blackboards, right ?)
Please don't tell me that you "feel me". It sounds dirty.
I also can't stand the current misuse of "woke".
Back in the 90's, the phrase "cool beans" seemed to pop up among my coworkers. It never made any sense to me.
When my husband and I met, he laughed at my colloquialisms. There are two phrases that I heard all the time, from my family members, and he found them to be hilarious:
"It's pouring down the rain". Sounds normal to me, funny to him.
"I like to never", as in, "I like to never got the lid off that jar", or "I like to never got here, because of the traffic!"
I probably heard or used, "I like to never" every day of my life, growing up in WV, until he made fun of me.
- Jane
"Like to never" must be deeply rooted in hillbilly culture because you heard it in West Virginia, and I heard it all the time growing up in the Missouri Ozarks. Here in Texas all I hear is "fixin' to."
DeleteOmigod, Julia, so true about boys/men!! I also did not have boys myself, but I helped raise my two little brothers, and now have a teenaged grandson who thinks fart jokes were invented for his sole amusement.
ReplyDeleteDoes anyone but me remember using the word "tough" in the late 60's? A tough boy was super cute, and really cool.
I've had the toughest (normal sense) time breaking the habit of calling everything awesome.
Thanks or the memory..I do remember a few really tough guys.
DeleteI'm so glad I'm not the only one!
DeleteYes! I thought of that after I posted. "Tough" was one of my favorite words in the sixties and then I sometimes went a little farther with "super tough". I'd like to bring that expression back. The kids won't know what I'm talking about.
DeleteThat makes me think of another slang term, c. 1970s in upstate New York. "Tough noogies," meaning, "sorry, you're SOL."
DeleteA very embarrassing "cool" slips into my own vocab occasionally. Dating me just a teeny bit? :-) Writing, it can be tough, as current slang is already outdated by the time it even makes it into print or online. My third book, Brooklyn Secrets, partly takes place in current time, in a real, very tough neighborhood. I worked there many decades ago, so any slang I remembered was historical (almost pre-historical!) by now. What to do? I settled for a very occasional, more or less current phrase,(I do listen on the subway and bus) and tried to make the speech rhythms sound right. And I added a note about slang "street talk' to the historical facts I always include at the end. Don't know if it worked.
ReplyDeleteAs I don’t usual write anything that is not in my own voice, I don’t worry so much about slang in American English. I was studying Hebrew a few years back and the slang was confounding enough that I purchased a Hebrew dictionary of slang. The problem was that all the definitions were in Hebrew above my level so I haven’t used it very much. A lot of slang used by Israeli Hebrew speakers (particularly teenagers) comes from Arabic. Somehow, I learned the word “mabsoot” which means roughly “satisfied.” In my online class, the teacher would, at the end of each class, ask us to rate the class. She was a little amused when I said, “Ani mabsoot” meaning colloquially “I am very satisfied.”
ReplyDeleteTexting abbreviations. I have only picked up the most ubiquitous ones. Like OMG. LOL. TIA. If I really need to figure out something, I can usually find out the meaning by ‘googling’ the acronym. I try not to use them myself, preferring to write out everything. I don’t even like regular acronyms all that much. However, in Hebrew, it’s not possible to avoid acronyms. They use them for everything. Not just texting.
I am definitely prejudiced against new words that make their way into the vocabulary. Expressions like “pro-active” used as a sort of antonym of reactive when what you mean is acting pre-emptively as opposed to waiting for a situation to develop where one might need to react.
David, regarding Internet acronyms: one of my longest online friendships is with a woman named Roberta, who lives near Chicago. In about 1990 she started signing her emails, LOL. Not realizing what it was supposed to mean, she meant it as "lots of love".
DeleteWe still sign our emails to one another that way.
Hebrew would be fascinating to study, but I thought Yiddish would be the slang version. No?
In America now, except among the ulra-orthodox (mostly Hasadic sects), who still speak Yiddish as a language, Yiddish is used as a sort of slang by Jews and others. However, when the Ashkenazic Jews live in Eastern Europe and when they emigrated to wherever, they spoke Yiddish as their mother tongue. There was also a thriving literary movement, authors who used Yiddish to write novels and poetry in Yiddish. There were also many newpapers and periodicals written in Yiddish. Jews who were exiled from Spain (Sephardic Jews) and emigrated to the Middle East, Asia Minor and north Africa spoke a language called Ladino. It was a mix of Spanish, Hebrew, Arabic and more and it was written with Hebrew characters like Yiddish. The miracle of Hebrew is that at the end of the 19th century no one spoke Hebrew as a mother tongue. Today the vast majority of Jews born in Israel speak Hebrew as a mother tongue. The language as a mother tongue was raised from the dead.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteReading about how some of the slang I still use is obsolete makes me realize that I am hopelessly stuck in slang past. Cool, awesome, brilliant regularly find their way into my writing and speech. I think I need to quiz my teenage granddaughter, or maybe even the nine-year-old granddaughter, about what's "cool" these days.
ReplyDeleteAnd, I meant to add that I am in awe of all of you authors who must deal with the proper slang or language used during a period about which you write. Just another brilliant (yes, I said brilliant) example of your talents!
ReplyDeleteCool works for me. It is short and sweet. Colloquialisms certainly. They are an important part of our regional vocabulary and will last longer than the latest slang. I occasionally throw out a "dis" as in "disrespect" (which I think is a stupid expression) to annoy my husband. I remember my big brother saying "neato" or "neat-o" a lot back in the late 50s or so. I don't miss that one at all.
ReplyDeleteI just realized that I still say “neat” quite a bit, also still use “cool”! My contemporaries do the same. I recently decided that “brilliant” is greatly overused in British TV programs. One of my sisters and I decided that the American English version of it is the word “amazing”, which people seem to use to describe a performance or a movie or their grandchild’s social skills.
DeleteAn older friend prides herself on keeping up with slang used by young people. However, she’s a little hard of hearing and often what she thinks she heard is actually just part of a word or phrase. And she uses it the way she thinks she heard it. Fortunately, slang does change quickly so she doesn’t generally misuse something for very long!
DebRo
I was in high school 1959 - 1963, so much of the slang from the early to mid and late Sixties is familiar. Hep, square and hip were in late Fifties, cool was always current, and still is, one of the few slang terms that became regularized, I think. I well remember tough, meaning very good, and cherry, meaning perfect (often applied to descriptions of cars). Tight was used to mean desirable and also to describe a boy-girl relationship ("they are really tight"). And bitchen' was very common, meaning really good, desirable. I remember using it a lot, though not around my parents!
ReplyDeleteLater came some of the surfer slang like stoked, hang ten, wax, trippin'. The hippie stuff, groovy, bogart, joint, hit, fade, get high, roll-ups, fatty, grass, wasted and a lot more came from that time, as well as a lot of rock terminology. Awesome and excellent were about that time, maybe slightly later. These days? I can't keep up, and don't try.
One source for slang is The Dictionary of American Slang, but the latest edition is 1998. There are other slang dictionaries, but hard copy and on line, I believe. But your kids are your best best, fer sure.
Along the lines of this topic, I came across a really fascinating book recently about how (and how quickly) American English broke away from British English during the Colonial period and afterward. The Brits were not amused by the hick Americans, it seems! And one thing I had never thought of, many actually new English words came from Algonquin, as the dominant East Coast Native American language. Anywho, the book is Splendiferous Speech.
ReplyDelete- Melanie
Rick Robinson mentioned The Dictionary of American Slang. An online source for current slang is the Urban Dictionary.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure I use phrases that date me all the time. I just don't pay attention to all the current slang.
ReplyDeleteRhys, I was reminded of slang from Jeeves and Wooster by PG Wodehouse. I remember Bertie said "a good egg". When I watch BBC America, some of the shows are contemporary. I remember someone saying "Bollocks" or "Bloody".
ReplyDeleteSlang is quite interesting.
Diana