Molnar Ana, 000001/2014

Nikolić Dragan, 000040/2014

THE USE OF SLANG USED FOR ADDRESSING PEOPLE IN RELATION TO AGE –

ADOLESCENTS AND ADULTS
1. INTRODUCTION
“Slang is a term commonly used to refer to lexical innovation by delegitimized groups—among them
adolescents—implying a qualitative difference from other kinds of lexical innovation. Although slang
is commonly thought of in terms of individual words, it is generally also part of a style. This style may
be sufficiently elaborated to be comprehensible only within the community that produces it”
(Eckert, 2003). The research which is proposed by this paper should deal with the intricacies and
differences in language use between adolescents and adults, namely, the use of slang in relation to
age. Before that can be discussed, an understanding must be established as to what influencers on
language can be found concerning both groups, especially the adolescents, for when it comes to
their position in society, they are quite commonly viewed as the ones who maim and butcher the
language, rather than the revolutionaries or innovators they quite commonly turn out to be, even
though that often goes unnoticed. But, of course, within both groups exist numerous subgroups, and
each subgroup determines how an individual can or will influence the language through slang. In its
own right, slang is a very flexible area of language due to the constant additions of words and
coining of new terms which are, sadly, commonly viewed as lower tier language use. The research
which we are proposing is supposed to deal with the relationship between slang used for addressing
purposes and age, specifically adolescents and adults.

2. LITERATURE REVIEW
A. Agha states in his paper “Tropes of Slang” defines slang in the following way: “Slang is an
ideological framework for reasoning about language that defines a class of deviant registers of
language. The ideology may exist with varying degrees of intensity, ubiquity, and institutionalized
force within a language community.” (Agha, 2015)

"The long-term confinement of large numbers of people of diverging backgrounds and interests to a
surprisingly small space with considerable constraints on general behavior gives adolescent life a
special intensity. Because of this segregation, the move into adolescence involves the establishment
of a peer-based social order and the appropriation of social control from adults" (Eckert, 2003).
Given the fact that they spend much of their time in schools, their language develops according to
their social status given to them by their peers. It is a common practice that teens divide themselves
into multiple groups which are characterized by their members, i.e. the behavior of the group will
reflect the behavior of individual members and vice versa. These groups often comprise of those
with various cultural or social backgrounds or behaviors, which in turn influences their language use,
often creating their own unique way of communication through inside jokes and terminology specific
to that particular group. Language is the driving force of social groups, not only in their creation, but
in maintenance of those same groups as well, which greatly encourages the formation of adolescent
peer groups (Eckert, 2003). Each member strives to contribute as much as they can to gain a higher
status among their peers, considering the fact that adolescent groups function on the system of
popularity. Given time, their slang would change, or rather, evolve, in accordance to the needs of the
group, be it through outside influences (for example, they could be intrigued by a statement of their

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role model or some other celebrity) or inside influences (a member of the group would start using
specific words or phrases, and the rest would pick up on it). "The centrality of schooling to
adolescence makes the opposition between standard and vernacular language prime material for
adolescent stylistic practice" (Eckert, 2003). This is the main difference in slang between adolescents
and adults – adolescents are more acceptant of nonsensical-sounding words which they, through
group effort (common use for the sake of fun), can find meaning in. Nevertheless, it is important to
note that, when speaking publicly or outside the group, they would not always use the same
language (slang), and when they would, they would still be careful with their choice of words in fear
of public humiliation, since not everyone would understand or approve of such language.

Contrary to popular belief, adults are not all serious all the time, although they are encouraged to
behave as professional as possible when at work. The use of slang during their working hours, where
it also mostly develops, can be attributed to the need for a sense of a relaxation, a loose
atmosphere. Nevertheless, there are a number of constraints influencing their language use. The
most apparent of them being age and the expected behavior that comes with it. During their
younger years, people tend to disregard the social norms and treat them as nothing more than as
constraints to their freedom, in this case, of speech (of sorts), so they don’t pay much heed to them.
Consequently, peer pressures will be strong, and their prime focus would be their peer groups and
how to better socialize with the members of the same (Cheshire and Milroy, 1993). However, as time
goes by and they mature, a need for change arises, not just physical, but also behavioral, they
become more active and start to adhere to the norms dictated by the society they find themselves
in. Naturally, this is mostly due to the pressures of work, personal independence, geographic and/or
social mobility, each being reason enough for social progression (Chambers and Trudgill, 1998;
Downes, 1998). Of course, such is to be expected, since no individual can, or even would stray too
far from the pack, most clearly seen in their earlier years of life. "For example, some British
teenagers in the 1980s used wicked for ‘good’; this usage seems to have stopped, however, as they
have grown older and abandoned in-group slang words. This, then, is an age-exclusive feature, used
only during the teenage years. The actual slang vocabulary may change from one generation of
teenagers to another, but the process of coining specialized in-group vocabulary during this period
of life persists" (Cheshire, 2014).

3. RESEARCH QUESTION
It is crucial to be aware of the fact that the ways in which people use slang vary across the ages.
Since the above mentioned researches which could be used as a theoretical framework for the
proposed paper, which were concerned with individual characteristics of the slang use when in both
the adolescent and the adult years, our goal is to propose a research which would deal with the
extent to which slang differs between the two age groups. We would like to conduct such a research
because we do not think that this subject has been investigated enough, but that there are plenty of
missing points.

We are of the opinion that such a paper would be an important item for filling-in the blanks which
still exist in this area of study, especially the one concerning the variety in the extent and the type of
slang language use across the ages.

Taking into account the fact which we have brought out right now, we assume that our research
questions would be the following:

I) What are the possible patterns in slang variety across the age groups of adolescents and adults?

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In order to answer this research question we would be forced to conduct data collection in such a
way that both target groups would be participating in the research process. Also, the environments
in which the “experiment” would take place have to be as relaxing as possible. Therefore, we do not
think that the data should be collected in the occasions such as formal business meetings and alike.
For the part of study concerning adolescents, perhaps the most desirable surrounding would be
school. It is of crucial importance that the participants in the experiment be relaxed enough to feel
free to use slang. Later on in this research proposal, we will give a detailed sketch of the way in
which the study would get the needed results. The elements of the final section of this work will
refer to: the methodological techniques, the possible range of the target groups, the way in which
the techniques and data collected should be blended together in order to gain a bigger picture in
regards to the research question, and to be able to draw a conclusion by which it would be
answered.

4. METHODOLOGY
Since we are aware of the broadness of the concept of “slang”, if we were to conduct this research,
we would make sure to narrow it to a subcategory. One of the possible solutions is to choose the
aspect of slang. For the purposes of this paper we propose, we would choose the subtype of
informal addressing people. This would cover the ways in which people across ages address each
other, and people in their surroundings, by using certain expressions such as “my man”, “buddy”,
“bro”, “girl”, etc. However, when we think of the possible target groups which could be used in the
research, we would have to be more specific than to discuss the phenomenon across the wide range
of age categories. Therefore, in order to conduct a successful research, the age groups used would
need narrowing to be clearly specified. In order to stay gender neutral, we would choose only male
participants, since the use of both genders would be influencing the results, since gender would be
another variable. The study which could be conducted could assign two target groups:

1. Adolescents – By using this concept, we suggest the age group of teenagers between ages 15 and
18. Therefore, the participants falling under this category are by vocation high school students.

2. Adults – Since the term “adults” assumes a very wide range of ages, we would go around this
problem by selecting a certain age range. For the purpose of this proposal, we would suggest the
participants aged from 35 to 45. This is due to the fact that the people belonging to this group are
assumed to have matured and have fulfilled their goals regarding family and career. Therefore, they
might be a perfect match for this type of research.

For purposes of the research, the corpus would consist of 30 adolescents, which would be put in
pairs which would be equally divided into 3 groups in the following way:

1. 10 people or 5 pairs who have known each other for a while.

2. Another 10 people or 5 pairs of best friends.
3. The last 10 people or 5 pairs of total strangers.

The first two groups would have to be chosen deliberately, because the amount of slang may differ
in relation to the level of acquaintance between the interlocutors. The last group could be chosen
randomly.

The similar division would be used with adult participants. There would be 30 adults which would be
put in pairs which would be equally divided into 3 groups in the alike manner used for adolescents:

1. 10 people or 5 pairs who have been co-workers for a while.

2. Another 10 people or 5 pairs who have known each other for many years.

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 3. 10 people or 5 pairs of total strangers.

After the pairs were created, the participants would be asked to talk for about 30 minutes about
ordinary things. The people responsible for the technical process of the research would record their
conversation. This part of data collecting would probably take about several weeks. After the data
collection, the next step would be to listen those recordings in order to find the expressions which
belong to the category of addressing slang. In this way, it can be observed whether there is a
considerable difference between the extent to which the two target groups use slang in their
informal conversation, and if there is the difference which group uses slang in greater extent than
the other one.

After this procedure, if the results would not bring enough desirable information, an additional
survey would be conducted. The same 50 + 50 people would fill in a questionnaire concerning the
ways in which they address people around them. The questionnaire would consist of multiple choice
questions, but more options could be possible to circle.

5. CONCLUSION
In conclusion, we believe that a research tackling the topic which we have suggested should be
conducted in the above explained way. The purpose is to broaden the knowledge of the links
connecting slang as a part of a linguistic culture and the communicational society which uses that
slang.

REFERENCES:
Agha, A. (2015). Tropes of Slang. Signs and Society, 3(2), 306-330. doi:10.1086/683179

Chambers, J. K. & Trudgill, P. (2003) Dialectology. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Cheshire, J. (2014). Age and Generation-specific use of language. Queen Mary University of London

Downes, W. (1998), Language and Society, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press

Eckert, P. (2003). Language And Adolescent Peer Groups. Journal of Language and Social Psychology,
22(1), 112-118. doi:10.1177/0261927x02250063