I'm a sucker for stuff like this.
Vocal fry -- sometimes called verbal fry -- is a term I heard on the radio a few days ago. It refers to 'a guttural fluttering of the vocal cords' and is increasingly used by young women - as in 'Motherrr' or 'Whateverrrr.'
Vocal fry -- sometimes called verbal fry -- is a term I heard on the radio a few days ago. It refers to 'a guttural fluttering of the vocal cords' and is increasingly used by young women - as in 'Motherrr' or 'Whateverrrr.'
I've been aware of this speech pattern for some time -- I love different dialects and this seems to be a distillation of Valley Girl speak. It's everywhere -- spreading into the general population.
For other word nerds out there, there's a good article in the NY Times about vocal fry. The article also deals with up talk which is the quirk of ending every sentence with a rising inflection. (She had this amazing outfit? And she used to date Justin Bieber?) Many Southern women have been doing this for years but now it's become a standard part of teenage-girl-speak.
And the article touches on the use of like for emphasis -- It's like, amazing! -- and goes on to draw some interesting (to me, at least) conclusions about why girls and young women adapt these speech patterns.
Me, I'm still stuck in the speech patterns of my youth. I think all this stuff is neat. Or cool. But not groovy. I never got comfortable with groovy.
And the article touches on the use of like for emphasis -- It's like, amazing! -- and goes on to draw some interesting (to me, at least) conclusions about why girls and young women adapt these speech patterns.
Me, I'm still stuck in the speech patterns of my youth. I think all this stuff is neat. Or cool. But not groovy. I never got comfortable with groovy.
16 comments:
I still use cool and awesome all the time. Somehow, it just works!
I still say cool and awesome...stuff like that. I remember back when I was a kid, early 80s, we read an article about Valley talk. This was before it was real popular, I think I was in the 6th grade maybe. We started using some of the sayings we read about: "Gag me with a spoon", "Totally tubular", "Gnarly", stuff like that. We were so annoying. :)
I still use cool, sound, neat, and crazy. Every generation makes its mark, etc, but up talk I find irritating. The students at the University where I worked, used it all the time. On more than one occasion, I confess, my response was, "Are you asking me, or telling me?" I'm guessing that, behind their puzzled expressions, they were thinking, 'Old fart'.
"...I'm still stuck in the speech patterns of my youth..."
Me too! lol!!! especially when I speak English!
The link is not working for me??
I noted that uplift just lately on TV. Something I'd only associated with Southern accents previously.
Dialect patterns are just getting more complex. Eh?
I have fixed the link -- I think!
I'm good with the occasional vocal fry, even with the eye-roll that frequently accompanies its use. I do, after all, spend several hours a week with freshmen college students where I am keep score on the best eye roller in the classes--so far I have a leader, hands down. She will get bag of MMs at end of semester if she can hold on to the front spot. I am also, like, you know, mostly okay with the 'like' usage. But throw in a couple of up-speak sentences and that conversation will go on with me. Not sure why, but since I first noticed it way back in the early 80s, up-speak has simply driven me nuts. I'd rather explicate the nuances of a cat fight under the porch window than hear it even once! Interesting post, Vicki, as always.
Lindsay is studying Speech Pathology and her linguistics class is studying dialects - next up Appalachian dialects - I told her she should talk to you! Her generation thinks everything is "sick" which means good, go figure LOL
One thing that made Joss Whedon's television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer and (to a lesser extent) its spin-off Angel so good was the slang the writers generated and incorporated into the scripts. I still find myself in the habit of adding -age to words, as in: "Look at that hump over there -- there's a whole car buried in that drift. That was some major snowage we had last night!" -- and, believe me, I'd left my teenage years long behind me before those shows ever hit the air.
I worked with a guy who said, 'like' every other word. It was exhausting. Now the new gal inserts 'you know what I mean' after every sentence. I just want to scream sometimes and say NO! I don't know what you mean...if you would just tell me....Sometimes I'm pretty sure I'm not aging gracefully...
Tammy
I cannot stand the up speak. I didn't have a name for it, just knew it drove me nutty to hear people end every sentence as if asking me a question.
As a young teenager some girls in class started using the "guttural fluttering of the vocal cords" and I thought it was so cool and began to imitate them. My mom set an immediate stop to that nonsense. I am still ashamed I thought those girls were cool. ;-)
The phrase that popped my buttons was usually from my son. "You're point being?"
I heard the upswing in southern speech long before the Valley Girls phenomenon emerged. During the 70's when I lived in south central PA I was fascinated by the downswing at the end of questions among the natives there. Now if someone would explain where the use of "no problem" in place of "your welcome" came from, I may be able to let go of that pet peeve!
Yes! I still say 'neat' and 'cool' but never 'groovy' - that was just too pretentious. But for laughs sometimes we'll say that something is 'far out'. Hate the up talk when it's every sentence. Drives me crazy. I have to get my 30 year-old son to interpret some of his words - I have to ask whether they're positive or negative, because apparently the reverse holds true now. But I've noticed he uses 'cool' and 'neat' too!
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