He's absolutely massive. It's a super day. Madonna, she is a wicked singer. Youth language and intensification: a corpus-based study
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Ignacio M. Palacios Martínez,
Ignacio M. Palacios Martínez obtained his Ph.D. in English in 1992 from the University of Santiago de Compostela. Since 1995 he has been working as Associate Professor in English Linguistics. At present he is the principal investigator of a research project concerned with the description of spoken English. He has published extensively on youth language, negative polarity, and applied linguistic issues. He was also head of the university's Modern Language Centre from 2007 to 2010. Address for correspondence: Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Avda. de Alfonso Castelao, s/n, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain 〈ignacio.palacios@usc.es〉.
and
Paloma Núñez Pertejo,
Paloma Núñez Pertejo obtained an M.A. in English from the University of Santiago de Compostela in 1991 and a Ph.D. in 2001 on the development of the English progressive. From 1993 to 2007 she worked as Researcher and Lecturer in the English and German Departments, and in 2008 she obtained a permanent position as Associate Professor in English Linguistics. She has published mainly on verb categories and on adverbial intensifiers, and also has a keen interest in applied linguistics. Address for correspondence: Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Avda. de Alfonso Castelao, s/n, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain 〈pnunez.pertejo@usc.es〉.
Abstract
In the last few years, the language of teenagers has been the focus of attention from different perspectives. One of the features that characterizes this type of language is the particular way adolescents intensify their language. This is precisely the object of study of this paper. For this purpose, we have analyzed data from different corpora: COLT (The Bergen Corpus of London Teenage Language), SCoSE (Saarbrücken Corpus of Spoken English), and DCPSE (Diachronic Corpus of Present-Day Spoken English) together with additional materials from other written and oral sources, including magazines oriented specifically to teenagers, British Library archival sound recordings, Web sites and Web-based glossaries of British teenagers' language. The results obtained show the frequent use of really and so as intensifiers; taboo words (e.g., bloody, fucking) are also quite widely attested as intensifying expressions. Negatives are frequently intensified by teenagers in a particular way and expletives in certain types of questions and exclamations are a common reinforcing resource. Finally, a number of lexical devices to strengthen language are considered: prefixes (super-, mega-, uber-), and expressions denoting the very positive qualities (cool, massive, wicked). Comparisons are drawn with adult language to identify those intensification strategies which are typical of teentalk.
About the authors
Ignacio M. Palacios Martínez obtained his Ph.D. in English in 1992 from the University of Santiago de Compostela. Since 1995 he has been working as Associate Professor in English Linguistics. At present he is the principal investigator of a research project concerned with the description of spoken English. He has published extensively on youth language, negative polarity, and applied linguistic issues. He was also head of the university's Modern Language Centre from 2007 to 2010. Address for correspondence: Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Avda. de Alfonso Castelao, s/n, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain 〈ignacio.palacios@usc.es〉.
Paloma Núñez Pertejo obtained an M.A. in English from the University of Santiago de Compostela in 1991 and a Ph.D. in 2001 on the development of the English progressive. From 1993 to 2007 she worked as Researcher and Lecturer in the English and German Departments, and in 2008 she obtained a permanent position as Associate Professor in English Linguistics. She has published mainly on verb categories and on adverbial intensifiers, and also has a keen interest in applied linguistics. Address for correspondence: Departamento de Filología Inglesa y Alemana, Universidad de Santiago de Compostela, Avda. de Alfonso Castelao, s/n, 15782 Santiago de Compostela, Spain 〈pnunez.pertejo@usc.es〉.
©[2012] by Walter de Gruyter Berlin Boston
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Articles in the same Issue
- Masthead
- Lay metalanguage on grammatical variation and neutrality in Wikipedia's entry for Che Guevara
- The role of metaphor in tennis reports and forums
- Directing and requesting: two interactive uses of the mental state terms want and need
- Recruiting the reader in literary criticism
- He's absolutely massive. It's a super day. Madonna, she is a wicked singer. Youth language and intensification: a corpus-based study
- Suprasegmentals in the definition of narrative and intonational patterns in Turkish oral narratives
