Slang and (bad) language

"From catch farts to flaybottomists: celebrating a golden age of invective," (THE WEEK, 8th of january) reports a story of British slang which is .. "alive and well, but it's no match for the wit, vigour and invention of the 18th century, says Roland White in the sunday Times." The week writes about Tony Thorne, author of the Dictionary of Contemporary Slang and who is working on a biography of Francis Grose.

The article starts with the following observation: "in the age of the internet and instant communication we rather pride ourselves on the witty and imaginative way that we create new words. We speak in a rather smug, knowing way of affluenza and low-hanging fruit. For no useful reason we refer to mobile phones as blab slabs and use them to diss our frenemies among the twitterati.. Yet our slang turns out to be flat and colorless compared with the vigour and invention of the 18th century, when the only technology available was a quill pen and the pox."
In a new reprint the "golden age of invective is celebrated in Lobcocks and Fartleberries," extracts of celebrated slang of that time and first published in 1785.
England was teeming with drunks, rogues, beggars, tricksters and good-for-nothings... and one man was quite at home in this shadowy world: Captain Francis Grose, former army officer, connoisseur of antiques, caricaturist, journalist... "and above all a character."

"Grose," writes The Week, "not only lived up to his name, but also revelled  in it.. he toured the underworld and made a list of 2,000 words of which 250 can be found in the previous mentioned dictionary L & F."

"Historians can tell a lot about the age from its slang," f.i. "how important the military side of life was in the 18th century says Thorne." ... "Many of the words and phrases uncovered by Grose are still familiar today... nincompoop, beetle-browed, old biddy, whipper-snapper, ..., hatchet-faced, bamboozle"... (Frank Zappa) and ...

Slang is pretty much universal, writes The Week, "no country is too conservative to use it" and some borrow it (Japan - from England and Slovenia, from Serbia and Germany). Professionals also use slang. Doctors have their slang, journalists and academics says David Crystal and English language guru. "Being part of a gang means you don't want other gangs using your vocabulary.. Crystal says that its unclear where slang comes from, but likely it "happens underground and out of sight.".. It begins as a secret code and then catches on in wider society...

Culture reveals itself in language and slang is a special language that makes the members of the group able to identify easier with this group. The stronger this language the stronger the internal cohesion and with it the stronger it fights against foreign influences and other groups: engineers use their language and don't want to mix it with slang from the sales agents as they represent an other "planet."
A speculation.
I would argue that language also shows the groups' cultural level. Scientists will use a more elaborate language than the low-skilled worker. But the above study also shows that new technology not necesarily elevates the cultural level, for instance on creativity; when only the quill pen and the pox were available, the language seemed more creative than current times with Mobile phones, Internet and social media. Does more technology means that people get less creative or wouldn't there be any such a co-relation?

---
More or less at the same time in Spain, newspaper El Pais... (ninth of january 2011): The language of  trash (translated with Google/translate).
The insult is installed in Spanish conversation and turned into a spectacle - The degradation of the deal is the result of a vocabulary increasingly reckless with other (Juan Cruz)

QUOTES:
- "Socialization of Stupidity
- For the filmmaker José Luis Cuerda "words have become cheaper"
- "Evil is often spoken evil thought," says the philosopher Lledó
- A Cuban academic was stunned to see a television talk show
- The insult is already an institution covered by some media ...
In the last scene of the movie The Butterfly's Tongue, based on the story of the same name by Manuel Rivas, a boy struggling with his parents and other neighbors in pursuit of increasingly blunt insults against the teacher, a Republican who in the film plays Fernando Fernan-Gomez.

The boy did not come looking for insults, the teacher who insulted and stoned now taught her to read. Then came the war and the population became the national side and chased the teacher in red.

Then the neighborhood was screaming red, goat, while the rebels they loaded in the vans terrible. Then the boy found in its report two words that shouted with all his might,

- Tilonorrinco! Espiditrompa!

He had not learned insults ... Tilonorrinco really is a weirdo who lives in Australia and espiditrompa is the language of the butterflies ... Master's words.

The insults have their origin in the contempt or hatred, as the philosopher says Emilio Lledó, are aimed at "the disqualification of the other, the nullification of others." It's a slap, a ninguneo. And blackmail.

Insult is severe, but society is getting used. Perhaps because the words weigh less, or, as José Luis Cuerda, director of that film, "because the words have become cheaper." The ingrained habit of insult so that the insults are televised, in reality shows and other talk shows, women and men, sometimes with studies such as journalism, are disqualified each other shouting insults that issue. Son, disqualification, "attempts" as Lledó reiterates, "to annul the other, blackmail, therefore."

If that were teaching, "and the media is teaching" that would be what society is learning this: that the insult is free. Juan Marse, Cervantes Prize, says that what is heard on these programs "is said to create tension", the moderators, who are there to wield that power, "seem to receive orders to do otherwise," the more it raises the volume of the discrepancy seems to register more audience ...

"If there is no controversy," Marse said, "no show." And is what it is: the insult is the spectacle. José Luis Cuerda acknowledges that what politicians say to each other, in Parliament or at rallies, I tell other powerful (bankers, for example), "there will be war." Imagine, considered the director, the chairman of Santander gets on a soapbox for the president of BBVA afearle how you manage your bank ... "I imagine that ends his speech: 'Go away, Mr. Gonzalez!'. Well, at those levels are."

So the media, especially media, are weaving the yarn in which society has become entangled insult and taco, "language society garbage," says Emilio Lledó. The conversation is interrupted, someone gives a slap on the table and yells "Come to the point!". "The more yelling gets the turn, and screaming that we get down! Is appreciated because it is more direct and sincere, the less developed is the language, the more appreciation seems to have what he says." Who indicates that those who shout "get to the point!" is another philosopher, now education minister, Ángel Gabilondo. "It's the world upside down: he who speaks well, well, no website, the most neglected, shouting insults have a receipt or further considered, as one who takes care of his speech was suspected of lack of commitment ..." .

Lledó says that "evil spoken evil is often thought of him who thinks evil", but is now much talked bad predicament in life and in the media. Alex Grijelmo, president of Efe, who has written The Book of Style of this newspaper, and also a book entitled The style of the journalist, believes that impunity insult has enlarged its presence in society. "And there is no justifiable insult. It is not justifiable insulting a public office, since his salary is not the fact that I can be insulted. And you can not insult anyone, in principle. In the media might justify certain descriptive expressions, spoilers, for example, or dull, and reproduction of such insults in public can be justified only by the relevance of the person who has uttered, the context in which it was said, and only makes sense if enclosed in quotation marks ... "

The insult is a companion to the bad word, it may be, in itself, insulting ... Grijelmo see the taco or insult in the audiovisual media in the print media. To block this in the media, or untimely in public speeches, or even in private conversations, is a comparison: "The tacos are like clothes. You can not go in his pajamas to a wedding and get into bed with a suit ... in a particular field of work and are useful anchors. A doctor can release a highly effective block in casual conversation, but very bad sit listening to the same block in a congress of surgery ...".

We are witnessing a degeneration of the deal, says Mars, and we are seeing a degradation of public discourse, he adds Grijelmo. And, therefore, is ignoring the meaning of words. "Now," says Grijelmo, "it says censorship, torture, Nazism, in circumstances where it is not correct to say that someone has censored, or that someone has been tortured or that particular attitude is characteristic of Nazism. They say those words and those not weigh the claim. " Degradation of such calls is what language Lledó trash, based on the insult.

Humberto López Morales, the Cuban-born academic has just published the book The journey of Spanish around the world (Isabel de Polanco Prize Essay) got checked a day at home watching a program on Spanish television in the which included an interview with a writer. He heard the speaker astounded the author asked him about the word 'shit' that was dedicated to her colleague. Undeterred, the questioned lingered over the word that he had been thrown and the conversation turned to shit. "In America that would have been impossible, and impossible. In Spain," says Lopez Morales, who at the book explores the social evolution of Spanish in the world, "has been degraded everyday conversation, and broadcast media are the origin and the amplifier in this situation ...". A few days ago was in a smart bar hearing about smart girls Madrid. "What they said, he is a bastard, the other is scrotumtightening, is unthinkable in America, and that means words which were taboos have been the subject of a destabuización, as we say in sociolinguistics ...".

"Traditionally proscribed words of conversation, especially conversation in the media, are at the center of the table, and also appear in writing, without comillitas or anything," says Lopez Morales. "People read your articles very relevant in the Spanish daily newspaper, you will see that cross all boundaries, speaking of politicians, for example. The insult, the words that compose it, seems to have come to stay, resulting in a downturn in quality of public discourse and, therefore, private discourse. "

The insult is cowardice that seeks to leave the other helpless. So says José Luis Cuerda. "An insult is always results intractable. You insult someone. How can you respond? The conversation is a matter of cause and effect. If you say to another 'bastard', what hope will happen next? Ever I tried, when I have called the son of a bitch, do this consideration: It is impossible that you record. But of course you can not always react well ...". Rope wondered how you can stand in the political arena, the schizophrenia of those who insult by trade and then have to live. "Those politicians who are up to the lectern, rant, and then down and ask the opponent to have turned green how will the child with the flu ...".

The insult and is an institution covered by the TV, mostly. Now plug the device, looking for some dials, and if you have placed before the screen you want to bronze. Mars believes that "if there is no debate show", Alicia Gómez Montano, director Weekly Report, Spanish TV, he agreed, she looks in awe how some colleagues (and other intruders) extend or excite the insults, including themselves or among their guests. That reverses the rules of the trade "as we were taught, we should be respectful of ethics, we had to be based on the dialectic and rhetoric, we had to take care of the language, had to respect everyone, to the anonymous and actors ... Instead, we see these sms defective communication, these short and effective messages have the effect of paralyzing the insulted. "

The audience, prompted by the chain of garbage (so to speak, as defined by Emilio Lledó), "tend to repeat what they hear. And there's the mess armed." Montano asks that we look at what some chains of DTT do with Leire Pajin, whose statements slow down to be more evident these Lips of a mayor who spoke ...".

Mars believes that some moderators of programs in which each other struggling to speak above are indications that the shouting is greater. "Many magicians of the information," Montano says, "They know what they are worth shouting or insults, and know they have the time assessed. Shouting and swearing to make that time more profitable."

Nuria Espert, actress, contemplates the scene with "a growing concern. The conversation has deteriorated to an alarming extent, is a vulgarization fatal road ... As if speaking well beyond presumptuous." Now you are not worth the boundaries of private life, not those imposed by the privacy of politicians, "have gone down so many stairs ... Politicians, to be closer, they have lightened their luggage verbal, must believe that it is not profitable speak well, and be aware, as some journalists, that the rudeness and poverty of thought about them to the electorate. What must think the electorate. "

In the language of the butterflies the child who yells the teacher finally throws a stone, the maximum insult. Sometimes the stones are less impressive than words, even the word tilonorrinco if this is said to insult the other.