She’s Watching Your Language
She still uses words like “neat” and “nifty,” but Pamela Munro is very much a slang expert. As a professor of linguistics at UCLA, Munro’s primary research actually focuses on American Indian languages. But while teaching a historical linguistics class in the early ‘80s, she asked each student to write down three current slang words--an assignment that proved so popular that Munro now offers a class just in slang. “U.C.L.A. Slang 4,” the latest edition of a compendium by Munro and her students, is scheduled for publication in June and will be sold in the UCLA bookstore. It will feature new entries such as: “Hanging chad (an unwelcome follower).”
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Why compile dictionaries?
I really love making dictionaries. Dictionaries are such a wonderful way for people to have something where they can say, “This is a record of my language.” Most people feel very attached to their language. Their language helps define who they are and what their culture is.
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What’s special about Southern California speech?
Slang is vivid. It uses very fresh metaphors. Slang expressions often originate here and then they travel eastward. The spread is probably faster now that we have the Internet. There are two big historical influences on UCLA college slang and California slang as a whole--surfer language and the African American community. There are three things that have helped African American slang spread into the mainstream community: black comedians like Eddie Murphy, who did videos with extensive comedy routines with language people had to think about and had never heard before; youth-oriented black-themed TV shows; and rap music. Lots of people don’t realize a lot of slang words that they know and use originated in the black community.
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Do people develop languages to feel part of a group?
Oh, absolutely. Particular groups have their own way of talking. You can recognize another group member by the fact that they know the right things to say. It’s like a badge, an invisible badge, that you belong to that group. Certainly the industry in Hollywood has its own.
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What surprises you the most about slang?
It’s just so fun. People say these terrible things about slang. But slang follows grammar rules just as much as regular language does. It’s just different. People who take my slang seminars are typically students who think they’re really interested in slang but don’t know much about grammar, and they find out grammar can be fun. And that’s neat.
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What word most defines Southern California?
I don’t think there’s just one word. But I think I’d probably say “cool.” I know that cool is a word that everyone in the country knows, but cool so perfectly applies. Yeah. You know, L.A. is cool [“good, unusual, impressive, hip,” per “U.C.L.A. Slang 4”].
Do you let your students call you “Dude Munro”?
No.