by Nicholas Hamner
Investment Advisor Representative & Director of Marketing
[email protected]
The hawkshaw kicked the dead soldier betwixt the divan and the davenport.
Read that again if you have to. It makes absolutely no sense and sounds kind of violent, but in the 1920s it made perfect sense as a casual act. Translating the vernacular, it reads, “The detective kicked the empty bottle in between the low-backed sofa and the sleeper sofa.”
Words change. Language changes. We know this. Sometimes we realize it happens. Most of the time we don’t. If I, in my 1990s high school classroom, wanted to make sure someone was telling the truth, I would ask, “Are you for real?” (which my parents thought sounded ridiculous). My daughter, now in 7th grade, will instead ask a potential liar, “No cap?” (which I think sounds ridiculous). But did anyone consciously note or lament people not calling a couch a Chesterfield anymore?
Related to this—but for a completely different reason—I realized we are all in the midst of a fairly significant language shift. We are going to see a large chunk of words disappear, replaced by what appears to us now to be nonsense, by the time Gen Z and Generation Alpha are the majority. And it’s all due to technology limitations and technology company decisions.
But first, why does language change in the first place? There are many reasons why language changes according to the language experts at UPenn:
- Language learning – As language is learned by new generations, context can change or mistakes can be made and stick into subsequent generations.
- Language contact – New words can enter the language through the introduction of a second language. The English language exists largely due to this phenomenon, containing words from more than 350 other languages.
- Social differentiation – This is the one we’re most familiar with. This is when people—usually small groups with a shared trait or interest—make up words as slang unique to their group as part of the group’s identity. The new slang becomes sort of a uniform along with unique clothing, style, and behaviors.
- Natural usage shifts – As speech is spoken and repeated, changes occur. Over time, these changes can be “codified” and the original version disappears. When was the last time you saw a bottle of catsup in amongst the ketchup?
But none of these explanations adequately explain what we are currently witnessing. They are all voluntary, with the speakers willingly incorporating the altered language. What we are seeing now is a forceful shift, mandated by changes in technology. It has never happened before.
Here’s what I mean.
As we saw during election season, Gen Z gets its information online. A large chunk of this online information is on video social media platforms like TikTok and Instagram and through podcasts. This audio and video media is pushed/censored by algorithms that filter content using words they find controversial or unpleasant. Content creators/broadcasters make money off total views, so they need to keep the algorithms happy.
What happens as a result is that creators will use a word like “un-alive” instead of “kill” to get around the algorithm filtering for upsetting words like “kill”. Sensitive topics ranging from adult content (using the word “corn” as a substitute for its adult-oriented rhyme, for example), to violence, to hate speech, to misinformation all have similar linguistic workarounds, forming a new sublanguage known as “algospeak”. And while algospeak came about to get around filters that only exist online, it is finding its way into Gen Z and Generation Alpha’s everyday verbal conversations.
So your nephew who went all in on conspiracy theories and is no longer invited to Thanksgiving dinner? He wasn’t really as upset with Panda Express as his Facebook posts suggest. He was using the algospeak that let him spread crackpot theories about the pandemic.
Words change. Language changes. And now, the reason for these changes is changing.