SLANG,
YOUTH
SUBCULTURES
AND
ROCK MUSIC
PRIVATE«TYPE=PICT;ALT=»PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „CONTENTS
I. Introduction
II. Slang
1. Definition
2. Origins
3. Development of slang
4. Creators of slang
5. Sources
6. Linguistic processes formingslang
7. Characteristics of slang
8. Diffusion of slang
9. Uses of slang
10. Attitudes toward slang
11. Formation
12. Position in the Language
III. Youth Subcultures
1. The Concept of YouthSubcultures
2. The Formation of YouthSubcultures
3. The Increase of YouthSubculture
4. The Features of YouthSubcultures
5. The Types of Youth Subcultures
6. The Variety of YouthSubcultures
IV. Rock Music
1. What is rock?
2. Rock in the 1950s
3. Rock in the 1960s
4. Rock in the 1970s
5. Rock in the 1980s and '90s
V. Rocksubcultures
1. Hippie
2. Punk
3. Mod
4. Skinhead
5. Goth
6. Industrial
7. Hardcore
8. Straight Edge
9. Grunge
10. Alternative
11. Metal
VI.Dictionary
1. Dictionary of youth slang during 1960-70’s
2. Dictionary of modern British slang
VII. Bibliography
INTRODUCTION
My graduation paper is devoted tothe study of the topic “Slang, youth subcultures and rock music.” This work consists of 5 parts. The first partis about slang. What is it?
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „ PRIVATE«TYPE=PICT;ALT= „
Slang, informal, nonstandard words and phrases, generallyshorter lived than the expressions of ordinary colloquial speech, and typicallyformed by creative, often witty juxtapositions of words or images. Slang can becontrasted with jargon (technical language of occupational or other groups) andwith argot or cant (secret vocabulary of underworld groups), but theborderlines separating these categories from slang are greatly blurred, andsome writers use the terms cant, argot, and jargon in a generalway to include all the foregoing meanings.
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Origins of slang
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „PRIVATE«TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Slang tends to originate in subcultures within asociety. Occupational groups (for example, loggers, police, medicalprofessionals, and computer specialists) are prominent originators of bothjargon and slang; other groups creating slang include the armed forces,teenagers, racial minorities, ghetto residents, labor unions, citizens-bandradiobroadcasters, sports groups, drug addicts, criminals, and even religiousdenominations (Episcopalians, for example, produced spike, a High ChurchAnglican). Slang expressions often embody attitudes and values of groupmembers. They may thus contribute to a sense of group identity and may conveyto the listener information about the speaker's background. Before an aptexpression becomes slang, however, it must be widely adopted by members of thesubculture. At this point slang and jargon overlap greatly. If the subculturehas enough contact with the mainstream culture, its figures of speech becomeslang expressions known to the whole society. For example, cat (asport), cool (aloof, stylish), Mr. Charley (a white man), TheMan (the law), and Uncle Tom (a meek black) all originated in thepredominantly black Harlem district of New York City and have traveled farsince their inception. Slang is thus generally not tied to any geographicregion within a country.
A slang expression may suddenly becomewidely used and as quickly dated (23-skiddoo). It may become accepted asstandard speech, either in its original slang meaning (bus, from omnibus)or with an altered, possibly tamed meaning (jazz, which originally hadsexual connotations). Some expressions have persisted for centuries as slang (boozefor alcoholic beverage). In the 20th century, mass media and rapid travel havespeeded up both the circulation and the demise of slang terms. Television andnovels have turned criminal cant into slang (five grand for $5000).Changing social circumstances may stimulate the spread of slang. Drug-relatedexpressions (such as pot and marijuana) were virtually a secretjargon in the 1940s; in the 1960s they were adopted by rebellious youth; and inthe 1970s and '80s they were widely known.
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Uses of slang
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „PRIVATE«TYPE=PICT;ALT= „In some cases slang may provide a needed name for anobject or action (walkie-talkie, a portable two-way radio; tailgating,driving too close behind another vehicle), or it may offer an emotional outlet(buzz off! for go away!) or a satirical or patronizing reference (smokey,state highway trooper). It may provide euphemisms (john, head, can, andin Britain, loo, all for toilet, itself originally a euphemism), and itmay allow its user to create a shock effect by using a pungent slang expressionin an unexpected context. Slang has provided myriad synonyms for parts of thebody (bean, head; schnozzle, nose), for money (moola, bread,scratch), for food (grub, slop, garbage), and for drunkenness (soused,stewed, plastered).
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „ Formation of slang
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Slang expressions are created by the same processesthat affect ordinary speech. Expressions may take form as metaphors, similes,and other figures of speech (dead as a doornail). Words may acquire newmeanings (cool,cat). A narrow meaning may become generalized (fink,originally a strikebreaker, later a betrayer or disappointer) or vice-versa (heap,a run-down car). Words may be clipped, or abbreviated (mike,microphone), and acronyms may gain currency (VIP, AWOL, nafu). A foreignsuffix may be added (the Yiddish and Russian -nik in beatnik) andforeign words adopted (baloney, from Bologna). A change in meaning maymake a vulgar word acceptable (jazz) or an acceptable word vulgar (raspberry,a sound imitating flatus; from raspberry tart in the rhyming slang ofAustralia and Cockney London; Sometimes words are newly coined (oomph,sex appeal, and later, energy or impact).
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Position in the Language
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „Slang is one of the vehicles through which languageschange and become renewed, and its vigor and color enrich daily speech. Althoughit has gained respectability in the 20th century, in the past it was oftenloudly condemned as vulgar. Nevertheless, Shakespeare brought into acceptableusage such slang terms as hubbub, to bump, and to dwindle, and20th-century writers have used slang brilliantly to convey character andambience. Slang appears at all times and in all languages. A person's head was kapala(dish) in Sanskrit, testa (pot) in Latin; testa later became thestandard Latin word for head. Among Western languages, English, French,Spanish, Italian, German, Yiddish, Romanian, and Romani (Gypsy) areparticularly rich in slang.
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „The second part of my graduation paper is about youth subcultures.
«Subcultures are meaning systems, modes ofexpression or life styles developed by groups in subordinate structuralpositions in response to dominant meaning systems, and which reflect theirattempt to solve structural contradictions rising from the wider societalcontext»
The PRIVATE«TYPE=PICT;ALT= „next part is about rock music in the 1950s – ‘90s. What is rock?
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „
Rock Music, group of related music styles that have dominatedpopular music in the West since about 1955. Rock music began in the UnitedStates, but it has influenced and in turn been shaped by a broad field ofcultures and musical traditions, including gospel music, the blues,country-and-western music, classical music, folk music, electronic music, andthe popular music of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. In addition to its use asa broad designation, the term rock music commonly refers to music stylesafter 1959 predominantly influenced by white musicians. Other major rock musicstyles include rock and roll the firstgenre of the music; and rhythm-and-blues music, influenced mainly by blackAmerican musicians. Each of these major genres encompasses a variety ofsubstyles, such as heavy metal, punk, alternative, and grunge. Whileinnovations in rock music have often occurred in regional centers—such as NewYork City, Kingston, Jamaica, and Liverpool, England—the influence of rockmusic is now felt worldwide.
PRIVATE «TYPE=PICT;ALT= „The fourth part is about different rock subculturessuch as hippie, punk, skinhead, goth, hardcore, grunge, heavy metal and others.I discribed their fashion, style, bands, music, lyrics, political views.
And the last part contains twodictionaries. The first dictionary is about youth slang during 1960 –70’s and the second dictionary consists of modernBritish slang.
Slang… an attempt of commonhumanity to escape from bald literalism, and express itself illimitably… thewholesome fermentation or eductation of those processes eternally active inlanguage, by which froth and specks are thrown up, mostly to pass away, thoughoccasionally to settle and permanently crystallise.
Walt Whitman, 1885
I. SLANG
1. Definition
Main Entry: 1slang
Pronunciation: 'sla[ng]
Function: noun
Etymology: origin unknown
Date: 1756
1: language peculiar to a particular group: as a: ARGOT b: JARGON 2
2: an informal nonstandard vocabulary composed typically ofcoinages, arbitrarily changed words, and extravagant, forced, or facetiousfigures of speech
— slang adjective
— slang·i·ly /'sla[ng]-&-lE/adverb
— slang·i·ness /'sla[ng]-E-n&s/noun
— slangy /'sla[ng]-E/adjective
Main Entry: 2slang
Date: 1828
intransitive senses: to use slang or vulgar abuse
transitive senses: to abuse with harsh or coarse language
Main Entry: rhyming slang
Function: noun
Date: 1859
: slang in which the word intended is replaced by a word or phrase thatrhymes with it (as loaf of bread for head) or the first part ofthe phrase (as loaf for head)
Source:Webster's RevisedUnabridged Dictionary
Slang
nonstandard vocabulary composed of words or sensescharacterized primarily by connotations of extreme informality and usually by acurrency not limited to a particular region. It is composed typically ofcoinages or arbitrarily changed words, clipped or shortened forms, extravagant,forced, or facetious figures of speech, or verbal novelties.
Slang consists of the words and expressions that haveescaped from the cant, jargon and argot (and to a lesserextent from dialectal, nonstandard, and taboo speech) of specific subgroups ofsociety so that they are known and used by an appreciable percentage of thegeneral population, even though the words and expressions often retain someassociations with the subgroups that originally used and popularized them.Thus, slang is a middle ground for words and expressions that have become toopopular to be any longer considered as part of the more restricted categories,but that are not yet (and may never become) acceptable or popular enough to beconsidered informal or standard. (Compare the slang «hooker» and thestandard «prostitute.»)
Under the terms of such a definition, «cant»comprises the restricted, non-technical words and expressions of any particulargroup, as an occupational, age, ethnic, hobby, or special-interest group. (Cool,uptight, do your thing were youth cant of the late 1960s before they becameslang.) «Jargon» is defined as the restricted, technical, orshoptalk words and expressions of any particular group, as an occupational,trade, scientific, artistic, criminal, or other group. (Finals used byprinters and by students, Fannie May by money men, preemie byobstetricians were jargon before they became slang.) «Argot»is merely the combined cant and jargon of thieves, criminals, or any otherunderworld group. (Hit used by armed robbers; scam by corporateconfidence men.)
Slang fills a necessary niche in all languages,occupying a middle ground between the standard and informal words accepted bythe general public and the special words and expressions known only tocomparatively small social subgroups. It can serve as a bridge or a barrier,either helping both old and new words that have been used as «insiders'» terms by a specific group of people to enter the language of the generalpublic or, on the other hand, preventing them from doing so. Thus, for manywords, slang is a testing ground that finally proves them to be generallyuseful, appealing, and acceptable enough to become standard or informal. Formany other words, slang is a testing ground that shows them to be too restrictedin use, not as appealing as standard synonyms, or unnecessary, frivolous,faddish, or unacceptable for standard or informal speech. For still a thirdgroup of words and expressions, slang becomes not a final testing ground thateither accepts or rejects them for general use but becomes a vast limbo, apermanent holding ground, an area of speech that a word never leaves. Thus,during various times in history, American slang has provided cowboy,blizzard, okay, racketeer, phone, gas, and movie for standard orinformal speech. It has tried and finally rejected conbobberation(disturbance), krib (room or apartment), lucifer (match), tomato(girl), and fab (fabulous) from standard or informal speech. It has heldother words such as bones (dice), used since the 14th century, and beatit (go away), used since the 16th century, in a permanent grasp, neitherpassing them on to standard or informal speech nor rejecting them from popular,long-term use.
Slang words cannot be distinguished from other wordsby sound or meaning. Indeed, all slang words were once cant, jargon, argot,dialect, nonstandard, or taboo. For example, the American slang to neck(to kiss and caress) was originally student cant; flattop (an aircraftcarrier) was originally navy jargon; and pineapple (a bomb or handgrenade) was originally criminal argot. Such words did not, of course, changetheir sound or meaning when they became slang. Many slang words, such as blizzard,mob, movie, phone, gas, and others, have become informal or standard and,of course, did not change in sound or meaning when they did so. In fact, mostslang words are homonyms of standard words, spelled and pronounced just liketheir standard counterparts, as for example (American slang), cabbage(money), cool (relaxed), and pot (marijuana). Of course, thewords cabbage, cool, and pot sound alike in their ordinarystandard use and in their slang use. Each word sounds just as appealing orunappealing, dull or colourful in its standard as in its slang use. Also, themeanings of cabbage and money, cool and relaxed, pot and marijuanaare the same, so it cannot be said that the connotations of slang words areany more colourful or racy than the meanings of standard words.
All languages, countries, and periods of history haveslang. This is true because they all have had words with varying degrees ofsocial acceptance and popularity.
All segments of society use some slang, including themost educated, cultivated speakers and writers. In fact, this is part of thedefinition of slang. For example, George Washington used redcoat(British soldier); Winston Churchill used booze (liquor); and Lyndon B.Johnson used cool it (calm down, shut up).
The same linguistic processes are used to create andpopularize slang as are used to create and popularize all other words. That is,all words are created and popularized in the same general ways; they arelabeled slang only according to their current social acceptance, long aftercreation and popularization.
Slang is not the language of the underworld, nor doesmost of it necessarily come from the underworld. The main sources of slangchange from period to period. Thus, in one period of American slang,frontiersmen, cowboys, hunters, and trappers may have been the main source;during some parts of the 1920s and '30s the speech of baseball players andcriminals may have been the main source; at other times, the vocabulary of jazzmusicians, soldiers, or college students may have been the main source.
To fully understand slang, one must remember that aword's use, popularity, and acceptability can change. Words can change insocial level, moving in any direction. Thus, some standard words of WilliamShakespeare's day are found only in certain modern-day British dialects or inthe dialect of the southern United States. Words that are taboo in one era (e.g.,stomach, thigh) can become accepted, standard words in a later era.Language is dynamic, and at any given time hundreds, and perhaps thousands, ofwords and expressions are in the process of changing from one level to another,of becoming more acceptable or less acceptable, of becoming more popular orless popular.
2. Origins
Slang tends to originate in subcultures within asociety. Occupational groups (for example, loggers, police, medicalprofessionals, and computer specialists) are prominent originators of bothjargon and slang; other groups creating slang include the armed forces,teenagers, racial minorities, ghetto residents, labor unions, citizens-bandradiobroadcasters, sports groups, drug addicts, criminals, and even religiousdenominations (Episcopalians, for example, produced spike, a High ChurchAnglican). Slang expressions often embody attitudes and values of groupmembers. They may thus contribute to a sense of group identity and may conveyto the listener information about the speaker’s background. Before an aptexpression becomes slang, however, it must be widely adopted by members of thesubculture. At this point slang and jargon overlap greatly. If the subculturehas enough contact with the mainstream culture, its figures of speech becomeslang expressions known to the whole society. For example, cat (asport), cool (aloof, stylish), Mr. Charley (a white man), TheMan (the law), and Uncle Tom (a meek black) all originated in thepredominantly black Harlem district of New York City and have traveled farsince their inception. Slang is thus generally not tied to any geographicregion within a country.
A slang expression may suddenly become widely used andas quickly date (23-skiddoo). It may become accepted as standard speech,either in its original slang meaning (bus, from omnibus) or withan altered, possibly tamed meaning (jazz, which originally had sexualconnotations). Some expressions have persisted for centuries as slang (boozefor alcoholic beverage). In the 20th century, mass media and rapid travelhave speeded up both the circulation and the demise of slang terms. Televisionand novels have turned criminal cant into slang (five grand for $5000).Changing social circumstances may stimulate the spread of slang. Drug-relatedexpressions (such as pot and marijuana) were virtually a secretjargon in the 1940s; in the 1960s they were adopted by rebellious youth; and inthe 1970s and ’80s they were widely known.
3. Development ofslang
Slang emanatesfrom conflicts in values, sometimes superficial, often fundamental. When anindividual applies language in a new way to express hostility, ridicule, orcontempt, often with sharp wit, he may be creating slang, but the newexpression will perish unless it is picked up by others. If the speaker is amember of a group that finds that his creation projects the emotional reactionof its members toward an idea, person, or social institution, the expressionwill gain currency according to the unanimity of attitude within the group. Anew slang term is usually widely used in a subculture before it appears in thedominant culture. Thus slang--e.g., «sucker,»«honkey,» «shave-tail,» «jerk»--expresses theattitudes, not always derogatory, of one group or class toward the values ofanother. Slang sometimes stems from within the group, satirizing or burlesquingits own values, behaviour, and attitudes; e.g., «shotgunwedding,» «cake eater,» «greasy spoon.» Slang, then,is produced largely by social forces rather than by an individual speaker orwriter who, single-handed (like Horace Walpole, who coined«serendipity» more than 200 years ago), creates and establishes a wordin the language. This is one reason why it is difficult to determine the originof slang terms.
4. Creators of slang
Civilizedsociety tends to divide into a dominant culture and various subcultures thatflourish within the dominant framework. The subcultures show specializedlinguistic phenomena, varying widely in form and content, that depend on thenature of the groups and their relation to each other and to the dominantculture. The shock value of slang stems largely from the verbal transfer of thevalues of a subculture to diametrically opposed values in the dominant culture.Names such as fuzz, pig, fink, bull, and dick for policemen were not created byofficers of the law. (The humorous «dickless tracy,» however, meaninga policewoman, was coined by male policemen.)
Occupationalgroups are legion, and while in most respects they identify with the dominantculture, there is just enough social and linguistic hostility to maintain groupsolidarity. Terms such as scab, strike-breaker, company-man, and goon werehighly charged words in the era in which labour began to organize in the UnitedStates; they are not used lightly even today, though they have been taken intothe standard language.
In addition tooccupational and professional groups, there are many other types of subculturesthat supply slang. These include sexual deviants, narcotic addicts, ghettogroups, institutional populations, agricultural subsocieties, politicalorganizations, the armed forces, Gypsies, and sports groups of many varieties.Some of the most fruitful sources of slang are the subcultures of professionalcriminals who have migrated to the New World since the 16th century. Old-timethieves still humorously refer to themselves as FFV--First Families ofVirginia.
In criminalsubcultures, pressure applied by the dominant culture intensifies the internalforces already at work, and the argot forming there emphasizes the values,attitudes, and techniques of the subculture. Criminal groups seem to evolveabout this specialized argot, and both the subculture and its slang expressionsproliferate in response to internal and external pressures.
5. Sources
Mostsubcultures tend to draw words and phrases from the contiguous language (ratherthan creating many new words) and to give these established terms new andspecial meanings; some borrowings from foreign languages, including theAmerican Indian tongues, are traditional. The more learned occupations orprofessions like medicine, law, psychology, sociology, engineering, andelectronics tend to create true neologisms, often based on Greek or Latinroots, but these are not major sources for slang, though nurses and medicalstudents adapt some medical terminology to their slang, and air force personneland some other branches of the armed services borrow freely from engineeringand electronics.
6. Linguistic processes forming slang
The processesby which words become slang are the same as those by which other words in thelanguage change their form or meaning or both. Some of these are the employmentof metaphor, simile, folk etymology, distortion of sounds in words,generalization, specialization, clipping, the use of acronyms, elevation anddegeneration, metonymy, synecdoche, hyperbole, borrowings from foreign languages,and the play of euphemism against taboo. The English word trip is an example ofa term that has undergone both specialization and generalization. It firstbecame specialized to mean a psychedelic experience resulting from the drugLSD. Subsequently, it generalized again to mean any experience on any drug, andbeyond that to any type of «kicks» from anything. Clipping isexemplified by the use of «grass» from «laughing grass,» aterm for marijuana. «Funky,» once a very low term for body odour, hasundergone elevation among jazz buffs to signify «the best»;«fanny,» on the other hand, once simply a girl's name, is currently adegenerated term that refers to the buttocks (in England, it has furtherdegenerated into a taboo word for the female genitalia). There is also someactual coinage of slang terms.
7. Characteristics ofslang
Psychologically,most good slang harks back to the stage in human culture when animism was aworldwide religion. At that time, it was believed that all objects had twoaspects, one external and objective that could be perceived by the senses, theother imperceptible (except to gifted individuals) but identical with what wetoday would call the «real» object. Human survival depended upon themanipulation of all «real» aspects of life--hunting, reproduction,warfare, weapons, design of habitations, nature of clothing or decoration,etc.--through control or influence upon the animus, or imperceptiblephase of reality. This influence was exerted through many aspects ofsympathetic magic, one of the most potent being the use of language. Words,therefore, had great power, because they evoked the things to which theyreferred.
Civilizedcultures and their languages retain many remnants of animism, largely on theunconscious level. In Western languages, the metaphor owes its power to echoesof sympathetic magic, and slang utilizes certain attributes of the metaphor toevoke images too close for comfort to «reality.» For example, torefer to a woman as a «broad» is automatically to increase her girthin an area in which she may fancy herself as being thin. Her reaction may,thus, be one of anger and resentment, if she happens to live in a society inwhich slim hips are considered essential to feminine beauty. Slang, then, owesmuch of its power to shock to the superimposition of images that areincongruous with images (or values) of others, usually members of the dominantculture. Slang is most popular when its imagery develops incongruity borderingon social satire. Every slang word, however, has its own history and reasonsfor popularity. When conditions change, the term may change in meaning, beadopted into the standard language, or continue to be used as slang withincertain enclaves of the population. Nothing is flatter than dead slang. In1910, for instance, «Oh you kid» and «23-skiddoo» werequite stylish phrases in the U.S. but they have gone with the hobble skirt.Children, however, unaware of anachronisms, often revive old slang under abarrage of older movies rerun on television.
Some slangbecomes respectable when it loses its edge; «spunk,»«fizzle,» «spent,» «hit the spot,»«jazz,» «funky,» and «p.o.'d,» once thought to betoo indecent for feminine ears, are now family words. Other slang survives forcenturies, like «bones» for dice (Chaucer), «beat it» forrun away (Shakespeare), «duds» for clothes, and «booze» forliquor (Dekker). These words must have been uttered as slang long beforeappearing in print, and they have remained slang ever since. Normally, slanghas both a high birth and death rate in the dominant culture, and excessive usetends to dull the lustre of even the most colourful and descriptive words andphrases. The rate of turnover in slang words is undoubtedly encouraged by themass media, and a term must be increasingly effective to survive.
While manyslang words introduce new concepts, some of the most effective slang providesnew expressions--fresh, satirical, shocking--for established concepts, oftenvery respectable ones. Sound is sometimes used as a basis for this type ofslang, as, for example, in various phonetic distortions (e.g., pig Latinterms). It is also used in rhyming slang, which employs a fortunate combinationof both sound and imagery. Thus, gloves are «turtledoves» (the glovedhands suggesting a pair of billing doves), a girl is a «twist andtwirl» (the movement suggesting a girl walking), and an insultingimitation of flatus, produced by blowing air between the tip of the protrudedtongue and the upper lip, is the «raspberry,» cut back from«raspberry tart.» Most slang, however, depends upon incongruity ofimagery, conveyed by the lively connotations of a novel term applied to anestablished concept. Slang is not all of equal quality, a considerable body ofit reflecting a simple need to find new terms for common ones, such as thehands, feet, head, and other parts of the body. Food, drink, and sex alsoinvolve extensive slang vocabulary. Strained or synthetically invented slanglacks verve, as can be seen in the desperate efforts of some sportswriters toavoid mentioning the word baseball--e.g., a batter does not hit abaseball but rather «swats the horsehide,» «plasters thepill,» «hefts the old apple over the fence,» and so on.
The mosteffective slang operates on a more sophisticated level and often tellssomething about the thing named, the person using the term, and the socialmatrix against which it is used. Pungency may increase when full understandingof the term depends on a little inside information or knowledge of a termalready in use, often on the slang side itself. For example, the term Vaticanroulette (for the rhythm system of birth control) would have little impact ifthe expression Russian roulette were not already in wide usage.
8. Diffusion of slang
Slang invadesthe dominant culture as it seeps out of various subcultures. Some words falldead or lie dormant in the dominant culture for long periods. Others vividlyexpress an idea already latent in the dominant culture and these areimmediately picked up and used. Before the advent of mass media, such termsinvaded the dominant culture slowly and were transmitted largely by word ofmouth. Thus a term like snafu, its shocking power softened with the explanation«situation normal, all fouled up,» worked its way gradually from themilitary in World War II by word of mouth (because the media largely shunnedit) into respectable circles. Today, however, a sportscaster, news reporter, orcomedian may introduce a lively new word already used by an in-group intomillions of homes simultaneously, giving it almost instant currency. Forexample, the term uptight was first used largely by criminal narcotic addictsto indicate the onset of withdrawal distress when drugs are denied. Later,because of intense journalistic interest in the drug scene, it became widelyused in the dominant culture to mean anxiety or tension unrelated to drug use.It kept its form but changed its meaning slightly.
Other termsmay change their form or both form and meaning, like «one for thebook» (anything unusual or unbelievable). Sportswriters in the U.S.borrowed this term around 1920 from the occupational language of then legalbookmakers, who lined up at racetracks in the morning («the morningline» is still figuratively used on every sports page) to take bets on theafternoon races. Newly arrived bookmakers went to the end of the line, and anybettor requesting unusually long odds was motioned down the line with thephrase, «That's one for the end book.» The general public dropped the«end» as meaningless, but old-time gamblers still retain it. Slangspreads through many other channels, such as popular songs, which, for theinitiate, are often rich in double entendre.
Whensubcultures are structurally tight, little of their language leaks out. Thusthe Mafia, in more than a half-century of powerful criminal activity inAmerica, has contributed little slang. When subcultures weaken, contacts withthe dominant culture multiply, diffusion occurs, and their language appearswidely as slang. Criminal narcotic addicts, for example, had a tight subcultureand a highly secret argot in the 1940s; now their terms are used freely bymiddle-class teenagers, even those with no real knowledge of drugs.
9. Uses of slang
In some cases slang may provide a needed name for anobject or action (walkie-talkie, a portable two-way radio; tailgating,driving too close behind another vehicle), or it may offer an emotionaloutlet (buzz off! for go away!) or a satirical or patronizing reference(smokey, state highway trooper). It may provide euphemisms (john,head, can, and in Britain, loo, all for toilet, itself originally aeuphemism), and it may allow its user to create a shock effect by using apungent slang expression in an unexpected context. Slang has provided myriadsynonyms for parts of the body (bean, head; schnozzle, nose), formoney (moola, bread, scratch), for food (grub, slop, garbage),and for drunkenness (soused, stewed, plastered).
Slang is usedfor many purposes, but generally it expresses a certain emotional attitude; thesame term may express diametrically opposed attitudes when used by differentpeople. Many slang terms are primarily derogatory, though they may also beambivalent when used in intimacy or affection. Some crystallize or bolster theself-image or promote identification with a class or in-group. Others flatterobjects, institutions, or persons but may be used by different people for theopposite effect. «Jesus freak,» originally used as ridicule, wasadopted as a title by certain street evangelists. Slang sometimes insults orshocks when used directly; some terms euphemize a sensitive concept, thoughobvious or excessive euphemism may break the taboo more effectively than a lessdecorous term. Some slang words are essential because there are no words in thestandard language expressing exactly the same meaning; e.g.,«freak-out,» «barn-storm,» «rubberneck,» and thenoun «creep.» At the other extreme, multitudes of words, vague inmeaning, are used simply as fads.
There are manyother uses to which slang is put, according to the individual and his place insociety. Since most slang is used on the spoken level, by persons who probablyare unaware that it is slang, the choice of terms naturally follows amultiplicity of unconscious thought patterns. When used by writers, slang ismuch more consciously and carefully chosen to achieve a specific effect.Writers, however, seldom invent slang.
It has beenclaimed that slang is created by ingenious individuals to freshen the language,to vitalize it, to make the language more pungent and picturesque, to increasethe store of terse and striking words, or to provide a vocabulary for newshades of meaning. Most of the originators and purveyors of slang, however, areprobably not conscious of these noble purposes and do not seem overly concernedabout what happens to their language.
10. Attitudes towardslang
With the riseof naturalistic writing demanding realism, slang began to creep into Englishliterature even though the schools waged warfare against it, the pulpitthundered against it, and many women who aspired to gentility and refinementbanished it from the home. It flourished underground, however, in such malesanctuaries as lodges, poolrooms, barbershops, and saloons.
By 1925 awhole new generation of U.S. and European naturalistic writers was in revoltagainst the Victorian restraints that had caused even Mark Twain to complain,and today any writer may use slang freely, especially in fiction and drama. Ithas become an indispensable tool in the hands of master satirists, humorists,and journalists. Slang is now socially acceptable, not just because it is slangbut because, when used with skill and discrimination, it adds a new andexciting dimension to language. At the same time, it is being seriously studiedby linguists and other social scientists as a revealing index to the culturethat produces and uses it.
11. Formation
Slang expressions are created by the same processesthat affect ordinary speech. Expressions may take form as metaphors, similes,and other figures of speech (dead as a doornail). Words may acquire newmeanings (cool, cat). A narrow meaning may become generalized (fink, originallya strikebreaker, later a betrayer or disappointer) or vice-versa (heap, arun-down car). Words may be clipped, or abbreviated (mike, microphone),and acronyms may gain currency (VIP, awol, snafu). A foreign suffix maybe added (the Yiddish and Russian -nik in beatnik) and foreignwords adopted (baloney, from Bologna). A change in meaning may make avulgar word acceptable (jazz) or an acceptable word vulgar (raspberry,a sound imitating flatus; from raspberry tart in the rhyming slangof Australia and Cockney London; Sometimes words are newly coined (oomph, sexappeal, and later, energy or impact).
12. Position in the Language
Slang is one of the vehicles through which languageschange and become renewed, and its vigor and color enrich daily speech.Although it has gained respectability in the 20th century, in the past it wasoften loudly condemned as vulgar. Nevertheless, Shakespeare brought intoacceptable usage such slang terms as hubbub, to bump, and to dwindle,and 20th-century writers have used slang brilliantly to convey characterand ambience. Slang appears at all times and in all languages. A person’s headwas kapala (dish) in Sanskrit, testa (pot) in Latin; testa laterbecame the standard Latin word for head. Among Western languages, English,French, Spanish, Italian, German, Yiddish, Romanian, and Romany (Gypsy) areparticularly rich in slang.
II. YOUTH SUBCULTURES
Main Entry: sub·cul·ture
Pronunciation: 's&b-«k&l-ch&r
Function: noun
Date: 1886
1 a: a culture (as of bacteria) derived from another culture b: an act or instance of producing a subculture
2: an ethnic, regional, economic, or social group exhibitingcharacteristic patterns of behavior sufficient to distinguish it from otherswithin an embracing culture or society
— sub·cul·tur·al /-'k&lch-r&l,-'k&l-ch&-/ adjective
— sub·cul·tur·al·ly adverb
— subculture transitive verb
Source: Webster'sRevised Unabridged Dictionary
1. The Concept of YouthSubcultures
The word 'culture' suggests that there is a separate entity within the largersociety with which the larger society must contend. A subculture group is asocial-cultural formation that exists as a sort of island or enclave within thelarger society. One definition of subculture is: «subcultures aremeaning systems, modes of expression or life styles developed by groups insubordinate structural positions in response to dominant meaning systems, andwhich reflect their attempt to solve structural contradictions rising from thewider societal context» (Michael Brake). For Brake membership of asubculture necessarily involves membership of a class culture and thesubculture may be an extension of, or in opposition to, the class culture. Thesignificance of subcultures for their participants is that they offer asolution to structural dislocations through the establishment of an achievedidentity — the selection of certain elements of style outside of thoseassociated with the ascribed identity offered by work, home, or school. Hesuggests that the majority of youth pass through life without significantinvolvement in deviant subcultures. He says that the role of youth cultureinvolves offering symbolic elements that are used by youth to construct anidentity outside the restraints of class and education.
Snejina Michailova, in ExploringSubcultural Specificity in Socialist and Postsocialist Organisations,presents the following definitions of subculture: (1) Subcultures are distinctclusters of understandings, behaviors, and cultural forms that identify groupsof people in the organization. They differ noticeably from the commonorganizational culture in which they are embedded, either intensifying itsunderstandings and practices or deviating from them" (Trice and Beyer).(2) Subculture are a "...compromise solution between two contradictoryneeds: the need to create and express autonomy and difference and the need tomaintain identifications to the culture within whose boundaries the subculturedevelops" (Cohen)." Snejina adds: «Subcultures posses their ownmeanings, their own way of coping with rules, accepted to be valid for theorganization, their own values structured in specific hierarchies, they developtheir own categorical language for classifying events around them, they createtheir own symbolic order.» A key element in subcultures is sharedness- the sharing of a common set of perspectives.
The common elements of a subculture include: (1)relatively unique values and norms, (2) a special slang not shared withsociety, (3) separate channels of communication, (4) unique styles and fads,(5) a sense of primary group belonging seen in the use of 'us' and 'them', (6)a hierarchy of social patterns that clarify the criteria for prestige andleadership, (7) receptivity to the charisma of leaders and (8) gratification ofspecial unmet needs.
To suggest that there is a youth subculture requiresproof that they are a distinct group with their own set of characteristic. Thisis true in terms of (1) aesthetics: youth have a distinct style andtaste that is expressed in their personal appearance and an artistic flairexpressed in spontaneity and creativity. Their values include an emphasis oncommunity, a sense of belonging and on collectively shared ecstasy. Youthculture also exists as shown in their distinct (2) morality: there is astrong emphasis on liberation from all restraints and on a guiltless pursuit ofpleasure. In the area of sexuality we find an aspect of life where theindividual is to experience themselves and others with complete freedom andhonesty. There is a combination of both individualism (youth cultureaffirms the autonomy of each individual who has the 'right' to do their ownthing) and collectivism (many individuals are fused into a commonexperience). The search for identity is at the core.
2. The Formation of Youth Subcultures
A subculture group forms when the larger culture fails to meet the needs of aparticular group of people. They offer different patterns of living values andbehaviour norms, but there is dependence on the larger culture for generalgoals and direction (unlike counter-cultures which seek to destroy orchange the larger culture). Subcultures try to compensate for the failure ofthe larger culture to provide adequate status, acceptance and identity. In theyouth subculture, youth find their age-related needs met. It is a way-stationin the life of the individual — it is as if society permits the individual to'drop out' for a period of years and is even willing to subsidise the phase.However, for some people the way-station becomes the place of permanent settlement.This is when a group moves towards becoming a counter-culture.
Industrialisation and the related social-psychologicalfactors of modern industrial societies caused the phenomenon of youthsubcultures for the following reasons: (1) The deepening of the division oflabour separated the family from the processes of modern production andadministration. Youth is a further extension of the same process ofinstitutional separation or differentiation. With the industrial revolutionthere arose an institutional structure that 'allowed room' for youth. (2) Withthis division of labour there came an increasing specialisation which led to alengthening of the period of time that the individual needed to spend in theeducational system. Youth were separated from the process of production bychild labour laws. (3) The rise of modern medicine and nutrition led to thesheer numbers of youth increasing. (4) The sheer complexity of modern societyhas meant that different individuals lead vastly different lives. When adultsdisappear into a strange world, reappearing for limited contact with youth, adegree of estrangement results. This trend has caused youth to becomeautonomous, establishing norms and patterns of their own that are independentfrom the adult world. (5) Socialisation in modern societies is characterised byhigh degrees of discontinuity and inconsistency. This produces individuals whoare not well integrated and a period of time is needed where they can comp