Youth, slang, and pragmatic expressions: Examples from Brazilian Portuguese¹

Abstract

This article draws on an ethnographic study of the stigmatized speech style of poor black male youth in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. These youth are said to speak gíria ('slang'), and their speech is often described as incomprehensible to the Brazilian middle class. Speakers and listeners point to a wide range of pragmatic expressions as some of the most salient linguistic features associated with this speech style. This article presents examples from Brazilian Portuguese slang, in which youth draw on sound words, obscenities, address forms, and addressee-oriented tags to create new pragmatic markers and forms of indefinite reference. It is argued that these pragmatic expressions offer multiple opportunities for speakers to convey stance, novelty, and style, social goals long associated with slang. This data suggests that we broaden the purview of slang beyond the lexicon to investigate the ways in which speakers actively innovate within the area of pragmatics.

Patterns of age‐based linguistic variation in American English1

“…I contend in this paper that the lexico‐grammatical categories identified in the present study as differentiating younger and older speakers' talk can be regarded as manifestations of a single, complex construct: stance. Slang, which I have treated here as a separate category, can arguably also be regarded as a marker of speaker's stance (Precht this issue; Roth‐Gordon 2007), rapport and emotional involvement (Tannen 1984: 145) because it indexes in‐group identity (Bucholtz 2000, 2001; Eble 1996).…”

Racial Malleability and the Sensory Regime of Politically Conscious Brazilian Hip Hop

“…The use of sound words such as pá and pum (representing gun shots) as lexical place holders (Roth‐Gordon ) is just one example of how rappers linguistically take up an anti‐establishment stance that is intended to darken their appearance—in part by associating them with the sounds of criminality and in part by distancing themselves from the proper speech associated with Brazilian schools, “high” culture, and boa aparência . While Brazilian youth often cannot understand the lyrics of U.S. rap songs, they are aware that African American rappers fill their songs with slang and profanity to create a different “sound” from white entertainers (both musically and linguistically).…”

“…When I spoke with KLJay, the DJ for Racionais MC's, he noted that the group only began to achieve success after they had “assumed” the language of the street (a theme that parallels their stance on “assuming one's blackness”). This support for slang directly contradicts linguistic ideologies that uphold the prestige of standard Portuguese and simultaneously suggest that nonstandard speech, including slang, sounds impoverished, uncultured, and uneducated (see Roth‐Gordon , 2009). Following D.J.T.R.…”

Quoting Mario Juruna: Linguistic imagery and the transformation of indigenous voice in the Brazilian print press

“…Brazilian Portuguese has many varieties associated with class, region, age and race; rural and urban distinctions are also noticeable. For recent discussions of variation in Brazilian Portuguese and Brazilian sociolinguistics, see, for example, Ilari and Basso 2006; Peres 2008; Roth‐Gordon 2007, 2009; Rubio 2007; and Meira 2007.…”