The Characteristic of Slang: Elisa Mattiello (2008)

Mattiello (2008) proposes that there are five types of slang characteristic, these are:

1.    Fresh

Fresh is a distinctive and general characteristic of slang. Slang is often described as a fresh vital vocabulary that keeps the language alive and growing.

Since teenagers and young people in general, tend to be up-to-date and innovative in their speech. Teenagers invent new words and modify the form or meaning of the existing ones. The young are indeed creative and continually in search of novel expressions which show that they are fashionable. (e.g in a mo for “in a moment”, indeedee for “indeed”, for yonks for “a long time”)

2.    Obscenity

          Slang with this characteristic uses taboo subjects of a culture. Slang is rich in dirty words and obscenities which are related to sex, especially male and female genitalia (e.g cock, dick, cunt, pussy), sexual intercourse (e.g fuck, screw), sexual stimulation (e.g. wank), and oral sex (e.g suck). Other obscenities are related to either excretion (e.g crap, shit).

3.      Offensiveness

          Offensiveness in slang is as derogatory words characterizing certain group of people with negative stereotypes. For example, slang words refer to male or female homosexuality (e.g. fag, lesbo, lezzy) and female promiscuity (e.g slut, slag, tart, cunt).

4.      Faddishness

          Slang with faddishness characteristic consists of an eccentric, strange vocabulary, mainly characterized by bizarre metaphors stated by Allen, 1998 cited in Mattiello (2008). The examples below were taken from book “Introduction to English Slang” by Mattiello (2008):

-          Bird and chick for “a girl; young woman”

-          Fairy and pansy bizarrely refer to “a male homosexual”.

          Mattiello also added that faddishness characterizes irony (e.g. bitching, killer) for having positive senses of “excellent”.

5.      Musicality

          Slang with this characteristic has typical tendency of slang to play with sounds or may display onomatopoeia. Musicality may be obtained by way of reduplicative formation or rhyming phrases. The examples below were taken from book “Introduction to English Slang” by Mattiello (2008):

-          Hotsy-totsy means “comfortable, satisfactory”

-          Gang-bang means “sexual orgy”

-          Humping and pumping means “having sexual intercourse”

-          Shitty brickitty from shit a brick for expressing surprise or amazement.

          An additional source of musicality is onomatopoeia, as in the word blabbermouth indicating ‘one who blabs; tell-tale’ that evokes the sound one produce when ‘blabbing’.