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[dzuunmod]

I know I'm a little behind the times on this one, but I love the story about the schoolchildren in Baltimore inventing a new pronoun.

In short, kids in (I guess) certain parts of Baltimore have begun using "yo" to replace "he" and "she". I just heard an interview with the woman credited with really documenting the phenomenon, and she - yo -

Comments

[skaloop]

That's one thing I've learned in my study of language; it's darn near impossible to purposefully implement a new word (see: failure of xe or zhe). It has to come organically from usage and spread naturally. Anyway, it's cool to see it in action and also cool to see it with a non-tech word that is filling a long-vacant niche (as opposed to 'blog' and the like which are new words for new things).

[dzuunmod]

Yeah, they talked about that aspect of it in the radio piece I listened to. The conclusion was basically that pronouns have long been seen by linguists as especially tricky to change, but the Baltimore kids went ahead and did it anyway because they're too young to know better. :p

[wendykh]

I feel extremely old and uncool. My thoughts in order:

"Oh HELL NO."
"Mental note: never ever send children to Baltimore schools."
"Josh is totally fucking with us, right?"
"Is this the onion? Or an Onion wanna-be?"

It is extremely sad to read letters written by civil war soldiers, largely with even high school education, and see how verbose they were compared to "peep yo!" Good god.

/fans self.

[dzuunmod]

I'm a little surprised at you, Wendy. I woulda figured you to be the type to embrace this. And I'm the type to blog with words like 'woulda', so what were you expecting from me anyway? ;)

That said, I understand your point about how we're losing something as the generations go by, but people aren't saying different things, are they? Just finding different ways to say them. In the minds of these children, I'm thinking that they understand "Peep yo!" the same way we understand "Look at that guy!", so what's the harm?

[wendykh]

I guess I don't see it as evolution, I see it as pure and total laziness. The concerning thing to me is most ...shall we say economically disadvantaged.... children are not doing this because they need a new word, they're doing it because no one ever taken the goddamn time to teach them to speak properly. That's SAD. And "look at that guy" can be understood by most people's great grandparents. "peep yo!" WTF?!?! No one can understand that! Bah, I need a cane, clearly.

Keep in mind you are talking to someone who relentlessly hounds her children to not say things like "aynglish" and "shut teh door" and "open/close the lights" and works with them on the difference of the th sound in such words as "cloth" and "clothes."

God. Honestly, stuff like this makes me glad I am solely responsible for my children's English education. Da FUCK. "Peep, yo!" good god.

[dzuunmod]

children are not doing this because they need a new word, they're doing it because no one ever taken the goddamn time to teach them to speak properly.

Are you sure about that? I mean, I just refuse to believe that if there are linguists in the classroom observing them and interviewing them, that they don't know the difference. In the interview (I heard it on this program), the woman talked about how the kids were (for the benefit of the adults observing them, I presume) 'translating' their use of 'yo'. Like they know the other way to say it, they just choose to say it this way.

Also, what's wrong with 'shut the door'? Or are you patrolling netspeak with your kids and keeping them from using 'teh' instead of 'the'?

[bee_york]

Omg, that is SO awesome! :D The evolution of English is amazing, and is also what I'm studying right now in my intensive.

But, you just KNOW there's some whiners somewhere who are gonna be like, "Ohhh no the downfall of the English language blah blah blah". Dyyaaam. It's like, lighten the fuck up and experience evolution. There's nothing wrong with it. It's so neat to see! ^_^

[dzuunmod]

Yeah, I can't quite put my finger on it, but somehow, the idea of a bunch of children using 'yo' for 'him' or 'she' is so cute on top of it!

[bee_york]

It is! And damn, we need some non-gender-specific pronouns anyway. :)

[sourdick]

The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary.

[eclips1st]

I just want to say that what most people perceive as laziness is seen by linguists as linguistic evolution. The objective of most languages is to be as simple as possible since the raison d'être of a language is to communicate easily, quickly and efficiently.

[sourdick]

Thats why Futurama rocks with all their little nods to changes in language.

[wendykh]

I figured out it's not so much they speak this way that bothers me. Kids especially and regions all have their particular speak. I myself tend to use the British slag of "is" instead of "are." (Is you going to the store?) This is inappropriate. I can't help it though. I like it.

What bothers me is this acting like wow it's some big new thing meriting a two freaking year study. No. It's a bunch of kids talking like kids do in one extremely small setting. No one is going to be using yo in 50 years for he/she. In fact, I wish we'd get over ourselves and just use them whenever and learn to be adults and comprehend when we're reading it as neutral and when we're not.

[dzuunmod]

Well, I guess we were just looking at it in different ways then. When I saw it, I just thought, "Neat, I like it."

And what I think is missing from most of what I read about it is some kind of scale. Because if this is happening at one school, it's nothing. If it's happening at four or five (or more), it's something bigger.