A recent article i read goes over the recent remake of "queer eye for the straight guy" called "queer eye", and it talked about how homosexual people have been revamping the English language, specifically with the word that was coined by the show zhoosh which means to tweak something slightly. This word caused a little uproar in the linguistic community because the English language has no letter for the first sound in this new word, even though the sound is present in the middle of words like mea(su)re. Another thing the host of this show does is abbreviate a lot of words such as "struggles to function" becoming "strugs to func." So I was curious, how do small minority groups change our language as a whole such as "strugs to func" becoming semi popular to use according to this article?
The Language of Memes and Popular Culture
Based on last class, I would like to discuss the linguistic properties of expressions of popular culture. Believe it or not, “YEET” has become a more common phrase, even if most people who know of this word use it ironically. For example, my friends and I use “Yeet” when we need to get each other’s attention, locate the other, or just as an acknowledgement that we are in fact speaking to each other. If she says my name, I sometimes respond with “Yeet?” Even if it’s in our tiny subculture of a clique, references and memes are an effective way for us to communicate. The origin of this word is in the link. Note that there is one curse word. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Bjy5YQ5xPc We can assume it’s an exclamation, commonly one of frustration or of effort, like when a person grunts when physically exerting themselves. However, as it seems to be a made-up word, can we count this as an example of the facets of linguistics and the development of human speech? One o...
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