Language is a virus to quote Laurie Andersen. Slang is a specialized vocabulary and it moves organically between cultural subgroups; from the gay community to the straight world. It moves from the African American community to the broader community as a whole. Like all of language our words evolve, are regional and some even transform. As an example consider the word faggot and its original meaning. Slang is all about inside information, about belonging to a group, community even to a particular social class. I was talking with someone the other day and had one of the moments of self-awareness about just how much as a gay man I use terms that few outside my everyday community would understand. I was using what to me are everyday words but to them I might as well of been speaking French. Everyone knows what the term “top” means, but what’s the difference between a “Gayby” and a “Gayce?” That’s where knowledge of slang comes in. Slang helps us to find out who is “in the know” and who is “out of the loop.” Slang changes with the culture.
Certain category of words contain more slang than others, Sexual slang as you might guess is rampant in any culture. As a simple thought experiment, think of how many slang terms we have for body parts. Now think about how many terms there are for the penis. That’s the point — sex is what we talk about!
Recently a group of us went out clubbing, and I noticed a lot of conversations with words like “Bussy” and…
