Slang is mint and cool, you tyke my word

WELL, pardon me for being a mush-head, schlemiel and prune - or, perhaps, a gazook, palooka and droop. A letter printed on this page on Monday drew attention to certain perceived failings in the nature of this column. Maybe I'll return to this matter in a moment, but for now let's talk slang.

The six unusual coinages in my opening sentence all refer to fools or incompetents. They are not words you would use every day, but they do provide a colourful alternative to the more usual form of insult.

My "Gawd forbids" keep me up with slang as it is spoken by five to ten year olds. If something is commendable it is cool or mint - funny how cool keeps spinning back, rather like yo-yos.

Gawd forbids is rhyming slang for kids, as I discovered in the new Oxford Dictionary Of Slang (Oxford University Press, £15.99). Occasionally, I call my children "squirts", which I now find is American slang dating from the late Fifties. Should I feel inclined, I could also refer to my three off-spring as saucepan-lids, ankle-biters or tykes. This last word has a double meaning in this part of the world, being also an old colloquialism for someone from Yorkshire. This latter use of tyke dates back to 1700 and is taken from 'tik', the Old Norse word for bitch.

Despite extensive investigations, I can find no similar word to describe someone born in Bristol, raised in Manchester, further raised in London, and now resident in a newspaper column in York.

Slang is a fascinating parallel language, the linguistic equivalent of a heckler. It is often crude, sometimes witty - usually in a muscular manner - and, best of all, gloriously undignified. Some slang words, such as the above-mentioned tyke, have ancient roots. Crud, meaning something disgusting, was first used at the beginning of the 16th century, though it did not come into regular use until the middle of this century. The word is a variant of curd (as well as being a slang anagram - a slangagram, perhaps).

Many forms of insult have been supplied to the English language via the back door or tradesman's entrance. Just look at the rich variety of words to describe a contemptible person: trash, tick, snot, squit, soor, scut, wart, pipsqueak, zob and snurge. And that's to omit those which are not fit to print.

Music has lobbed in many new words. A pretzel-bender is a French-horn player, while a monkey-hurdler is an organist - though I'm not sure that York Minster's Philip Moore would appreciate such a casual appellation. A liquorice-stick is jazz-speak for a clarinet, while a slush-pump provides a similar service for the trombone.

Politics is another rich source, as exemplified by the splendid American word snollygoster, meaning a shrewd, unprincipled politician. While lingering among the straddle-bugs and high-binders, I came across lefty and pinkie, which seems an apposite moment to wind things up. The Oxford Dictionary Of Slang is certainly a mint publication, and worth 16 quid of your brass, shiners, rivets and spondulicks.

WRITING a column is like being in the stocks.

Passers-by occasionally throw rotten vegetables.

And rotten spellings, too.

If you are going to use long words such as didacticism, it helps to know how to spell them. Still, it doesn't do to criticise Michael Pritchard's spelling. Someone else will only point out that there are 71 errors in the first paragraph of this week's column. With regard to the other jocular accusations of left-wingery made in Mr Pritchard's letter, I'll own up to reading The Guardian, but as to the chablis, recreational drugs, Ben Elton, Celt-worshipping... all wrong.

And beggars make me nervous. Interestingly, on the day last week's column appeared, The Sun did a prompt U-turn and announced that it would no longer print stories outing gays, unless there was overwhelming public interest. Which there isn't.

19/11/98

Converted for the new archive on 30 June 2000. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.