The Significance of Slang in the Social Media World

Reflection

After learning through all the lecture video, document film, and class discussion, I gained a better comprehensive understanding of sociolinguistics, which made me think deeply about what actually impacted our ways to talk, to speak, and to communicate.

The Power of Slang

Slang provides a sense of commonality, which is used and understood by those of peers you are most associated with. Youth slang exerts enormous power. Slang has allowed each generation to do history through the creation of their own lexical system. The purpose of slang is to make communication a comfortable practice between the people who manage the slang codes, the more spoken, the wider it turns into the next generations. However, young people are looking into creating more new terms because they feel old when putting in practice the slang used in their predecessor generations. Slang has embraced the creation of music about it, artists today inspire or include slang in their music in order to be part of the options of the generation that buys their music. 

Reflecting back to my usage of slang words, I tend to use most of my slang with friends who are around the same age group. It is said that once you grow older you tend to stop using slang. I can see why we would stop using slang once we get older. For example, working toward my degree I have had several opportunities of showing my professionalism where it would be inappropriate to use such slang. Another thing that made me think to stop using slang language is I have noticed that some of my older friends have stopped using it. 

In addition, I feel that using slang has become a way of communication and has also condensed some words that we use everyday. Some may feel that the use of slang is not the greatest of choices, but it allows us to enjoy the English language to fullest. Being able to use half a word or even making your own way of saying something is really a powerful thing. Slang can either affect an individual in a negative or positive way. Positive being that they use with friends in a manner that is appropriate. The negative being that they use it as slurs.  

Parents are Teachers

Parents play an important role in teaching their kids speak correctly. Even kids can hear from their friends, TVs, and radios, parents have responsibility to educate kids how to talk and behave.

Children have strong abilities to mimic the way that adults talk and act. I work in the restaurant, so I can observe the difference among the different families. Sometimes I am astonished how the dirty words come out from little kids mouth. I hear bad words a lot. I try to tell them it is not okay to use these words. They say very bad words and they just don't care or don't realize what they are saying can really hurt someone.

It is said that sometime kids curse do to the fact that their parents curse in their daily life. What the kids hear their parents say, they also repeat later on that day. It also said that kids hear their peers curse, so they curse as well. It is a passage of growing up. Grownups want the kids to know when it is appropriate to curse and when it isn't. Kids learn by example. They learn how to talk from their parents, and their peers. They see that it is okay to use these words when we say it in front of them and when they hear it at school with their friends. They think they can say whatever they want to say because they either hear their parents say those words or their peers say them. It is heartbreaking when I hear these kids say such horrible words. When I was their age, I didn't say those words and I still can't say those words. Even when I am very angry at someone, it is still no okay to say such words. I am not perfect or anything. But I feel that when those words are said it is because that person isn't using intelligent words to talk and wants to take the easy way out by saying hurtful words to people. 

 It is true that children are sponges when it comes to attitudes, language, demeanors, etc. They react in similar ways to what they see - if a parent is a screamer the child will be, if the parent hits things it is more likely that they child will too. Therefore, adults should be careful with how they speak and act around children especially if the way they speak and act is inappropriate. If adults want their children to act proper with good manners, then they should set a good example for their children.

Social Media Matters

In Module 1, we have been discussed what make a word “real”, which made me comes up another question – Can we make up new words? My answer is Yes, we can. In the age of the Internet, language change and neologisms are occurring at a higher rate than ever. Social media plays an important role in making up the new word. The majority of social media users are younger generation. They are creative and opened to change. They can easily change and accept the new word. There are many ways to make up a new work. For example, the word “Belieber”, using blending method to combine the word 'Bieber' and 'Believer', which means the fans of Justin Bieber. As I come from China, I know people use the same word formation to create the fans' name of the popular stars in China. The word “Obamacare” is compounding the noun 'Obama' and verb 'care'. It was a health reform law signed by President Barack Obama. I think all the American are familiar with this word. Nowadays, people spend more and more time on social media, you can actually see and acquire more and more new make up new words in social media than in daily communication. Moreover, some new work you can not even find out in the dictionary, you have to google it and understand the meaning. Some people just think those words are informal, they couldn't be “word”. In my opinion, I believed what is actual is reasonable. We need to accept and understand the new trend as well as the change of the language. Sociolinguistics is very important for our daily life. We need to pay attention on studying Sociolinguistics, not only for the class but also for our quality of life.