When my daughter brandished her latest artistic masterpiece in front of me with the word "Holla!" I wanted to cry. Honestly, wouldn't you let a little sob slip out if your 6-year-old was talking like her teenage babysitter? But wait! There's, like, good news! Turns out teenage girls are who everyone will sound like one day anyway. My kid's on the right path. Squeeeee!
Linguists these days are turning to girls of a certain age to get a sense of what the next trend in talk is going to be. Those giggling girls that make you groan? They're calling them American "pioneers."
But instead of driving covered wagons, adolescent females are embellishing words in — I'm shaking my head as I say it — "more sophisticated ways" than people realize. For reals y'all. These girls are straight up changing the way everyone and your mother speaks, little by little, by creating new vocal patterns.
Which leaves us two choices, parents. Sob in a corner. Or stop fearing that you'll sound like the "tries too hard to be hip parent" and show the kiddos a little respect. Pick up on their patois because all that slang is going straight from their lips to our ears. You might even find it — dare I say it — useful!
My then 13-year-old (now about to turn 16, soooob) babysitter had been working for me for just a few weeks before the word "creeper" snuck into my vernacular — after hearing it on her lips several times over. Why hadn't I thought of this before? The simple "creep" to describe that weird guy who sits outside the corner store in his dirty undershirt eyeing you up and down doesn't begin to describe the way he makes your skin crawl, but "creeper," oh yes, this is so much better. You can almost feel his ickiness oozing across the pavement and up your skin. And there it is — the reason we need to give these girls mad props — because if you look beyond the "like" and the "OMG," sometimes they come up with gems that really blow us out of the water.
Our daughters are already changing the world. We just need to holla at them for it!
Spill it! What slang have you picked up from a teenage girl?
Image by Jeanne Sager
