Of Jabberwocks and Nazgul
For today's post I thought we would discuss the topic of word formation and the way different languages structure their words. But we are going to be looking at something rather different linguistically and that is gibberish words. That’s right we are going to talk about words that don’t exist and have absolutely no definition. The thing is, that even though they are gibberish words they can still carry meaning in our minds. This ties together very well with our theme of constructed languages as you shall soon see.  

To start things off I would first like to look at one of my favorite poems, Jabberwocky, by Lewis Carroll. Now as you can obviously tell there are quite a few words in the poem that are in fact gibberish, 27 to be exact. But despite the fact that the poem relies only mostly made up words to describe itself, you get a wonderfully vivid idea of the world Lewis Carroll has created. I'm sure for everyone it's slightly different, but can't you just picture something in your mind when you read about the slithy toves or hear the noise of the burbling Jabberwocky. 

This is because Lewis Carroll does a fantastic job of using the English phonetic system to his advantage. He creates words using only sound pairings and phonetic combinations that naturally occur in the English language. This allows us to feel that these made up words are real and imprint meaning to them. And the method by which we do this is also fascinating.  

For our next example we use the Ringwraiths from lord of the rings. Now while wraith is not a made up word, before it was brought to popularity by Tolkien in the early 50s, it was not a commonly found word, so many were unaware of its meaning. Now the word wraith is fascinating because it brings a slew of images to mind. It represents evil, death, twisted haunting spirits, and generally not good things. But why is this? 

If we look at the word phonetically it share similarities with quite a few other English words. One being "wrath" a severe burning hatred, and the second being, "wreath" a ring of twisted gnarled branches. Both of these word bring very clear images to mind as well. So when combined with "wraith" the word Ringwraith, while totally made up, brings about a very clear idea of what one of these foul creatures might look and feel like if you were to meet one.  

Going back to the Jabberwocky, all of the made up words Lewis Carol uses bring to mind very clear images because not only do they follow our phonetic rules, but though phonetic similarities they can bring to mind strikingly vivid images of things that have no actual connection to. This to me is truly fascinating. 

Yolo, Swag and other such things

     For today's entry we are talking about something that I have been thinking about for while, and is a really fascinating subject in general, and that would be what makes the words we speak "real." Before we get into this too much, it would probably be beneficial to watch the video that is the cause of our post today. It’s a fascinating TED Talk by language historian Anne Curzan and it discuss in depth the very subject we are talking about and raises some interesting points, you can find it here. Now the main thing this video talks about that I find interesting the usage of slang.  

     Slang is a subset of words in a language that are considered very informal, and in some cases incorrect or "not real." Slang words come into being a million different ways and can mean a million different things. Another interesting fact about slang is that it is one of the fastest changing areas of a language. Each generation of speaker develop their own unique slang words and phrases that set the apart. Now why some may look at this as a way to draw rings around certain cultural groups, I look at it as almost a language experiment. A kind of test each generation does to find new and useful words for future speakers of that language. Let me explain.  

     As humans advance and culture, science, and history move forward, it's inevitable that we as speaker of language will need new words for things. But the funny thing is that in the past, these new words we developed to meet new needs started out as slang. A very recent example is google. Google started out as a slang term and is now a full fledged word with official meaning. Society recognized a gap in the language that could be filled and filled it. And because it was applicable and was frequently used and needed in conversation it stuck. But this isn't always the case with slang words. 

     Here is a list of slang words and phrases from the 1920s. This is an excellent example of slang terms that were common place at the time, but now have no meaning and are rarely, if ever, used. Now, this isn't necessarily because we didn’t need them, every generation comes up with its own euphemisms, (Netflix and chill seems to be a common theme with a very robust selection of terms and phrase) I think it has more to do with whether people like them, whether they "catch on". No one says gams referring to a woman's legs anymore, in fact right now Microsoft Word is telling me it's not a real word. But other 20s phrase you still here people today say, like wet blanket in reference to someone who is no fun, for example.  

      Slang is just a term for words that are on a trial run. Some stick and some don’t. I doubt people will be saying that a song is hype or fire in 10 years. But they might talk about how someone ghosted out of a relationship. Slang is each generations way of testing out word for future generations. 

(P.S. Sorry for the inconsistent format, I'm still figuring out the formatting)