In the meantime, I never really considered these exaggerated words to be "correct" in English, and I certainly did not expect them to have a proper term to describe them. While I truly adore and appreciate the English language in its most formal uses, I cannot stop myself from reveling in the slangs and oddities that are always in abundance, more so everyday. Saying things like "unfuckingbelievable", "ain't", or "dat" feels almost like a release. Formality is great, but the occasional insertion of slang brings me back down to reality. Its funsies.
Tuesday, February 11, 2014
Initial thoughts on the English language...
Reading the text Blooming English for class I particularly enjoyed the idea of infixes. Frequently I use infixes, particularly the offensive ones our author so politely avoided. Its befuddling though how the rules of infixes are unspoken and unwritten, yet still widespread and known. When we hear an infix we know right away it was done correctly or incorrectly. It is painful on the ears if it has been done wrong, and us word lovers cringe and glare at the culprit.
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I can totally relate to feeling relief at being informal sometimes. I feel like we have to use formal language so much in papers, emails, and just the way we talk in classes (some, not all of them) that it's nice to relax and not worry about whether or not we're ending a sentence with a preposition ( a rule I think is stupid) and other restrictive rules of that sort of nature. I also think it's interesting that we've developed terms for some of our in-formalities. It shows that the English language is adaptable and fluid, willing to work with the changes in society and change to suit the needs of the people of the time.
ReplyDeleteI'll admit to having been accused of being a "grammar Nazi", but the more I learn about language, the more think maybe there is no such thing as "incorrect" English at all. People are brilliant at coming up with all sorts of novel ways to express meaning and emotion-- and as long as their intent is successfully conveyed, I don't think there is any reason why their particular usages should be disparaged. I think I overheard you in class on Monday, Michaeline, say something about the use of the word "finna," as in "fixing to," as an indicator of future intent. This is thrilling-- a completely different way of expressing the future tense, and with its own connotations and implications. There certainly seems to be a significant social influence on the direction of language change.
ReplyDeleteThis will definitely be a topic we'll be thinking about throughout the course: whether there really are "incorrect usages." While it's true that no usage can be "wrong" in an objective sense--one still can't deny the "wince factor" that we all feel when something isn't done "properly" in a certain context.
ReplyDeleteI also share Michaeline's surprise that there is a term infix to describe these types of exclamations ("unflippingbelievable," and so forth). In fact, I quite honestly had thought I came up with that on my own one day just a few years ago when I was really mad (probably looking for something I had lost)...but I find it even cooler and more fascinating that others use them as well and that they have these apparent rule usages connected to them.
Ain't and words similar to it aren't only informal but also come from different accents. If we were from the south the word ain't and y'all would not seem that informal as it is something we have heard all the time. At the same time, if we were from England we would look at American English as being incredibly informal, and in some instances wrong.
ReplyDeleteI also really liked the section on infixes; I thought it was very interesting that there would be such an extensive explanation for proper informal speech, but I suppose in hindsight, slang and other informal forms of speech have always been an interesting topic for language/culture studies. All that said, does the fact that there are now works that explain and give terms to certain aspects of informal speech mean that in the future we can legitimately use infixes in our formal speeches and papers? I have to say though, if this is the case I worry for the beautiful words we currently use because I can readily see our generation being very infix/other slang happy. Hell, I've already seen people using slang in formal presentations/speeches like there was nothing weird about it, but I bet we are all guilty somewhere with how murky the boundary between formal and informal is becoming. (Yeah is slang for Yes, but how often do we notice it is improper if they say it with confidence in a formal situation?)
ReplyDeleteI also found the section on infixes especially interesting. What really amazes me is our ability to determine whether a particular use of language is "proper" or "improper" simply by how it sounds. As was stated, the rules of infixes are unwritten (well, not anymore, since Burridge wrote some of them out), but it goes beyond this. It's not just that we don't mention the rules; we often don't explicitly think them at all. Since we're judging whether a certain use of an infix is "proper" based on how it sounds, one might expect such judgments to be very subjective, so the fact that there is a sort of general agreement, which allows us to figure out those unwritten rules if we want to, is truly remarkable.
ReplyDeleteInfixes, slang, and informal language are definitely an interesting thing to think and learn about. It is refreshing how prominent they are becoming in everyday speech and even writing. English changes all the time, and new words are coming up constantly, especially with the creativity of the newest generations. It’s also cool how a lot of them, particularly infixes, stem from high emotion such as anger, frustration, or on the other end extreme happiness (unflippingbelieveable is an example), and its way of allowing us to become more precise about how we feel.
ReplyDeleteWhen do words such as infixes, or other slang words, become English canon? Sometimes words enter into the current language temporarily, but other times they become more permanent fixtures. For example, describing something as a doozy. Like, that's a doozy. How did that become a thing? Well I recently read on the internet that it could have possibly come from the popularity of Duesenberg cars in the early 20th century. They were commonly referred to as "Duesy's". I also read that doozy could possibly have come from a mispronunciation of the word daisy. I have no idea which one of these two explanations is true, but it is interesting that doozy is not misspelled according to spellcheck, but Duesenberg is.
ReplyDelete