WHAT IS SLANG? 133 



It has thus been shown that in the eighteenth century there were 

 not wanting those — purists or what not — who entertained and expressed 

 no little concern as to the ultimate effect upon our speech of the multi- 

 tude of neologisms and asserted improprieties that were introduced. 

 Did space permit, utterances of a similar character by nineteenth-cen- 

 tury writers, from Walter Savage Landor down to critics of far less 

 renown, might be brought forward as evidence to show that the watch- 

 dogs of our speech were as numerous and as alert as ever. Nor is their 

 tribe yet extinct. Ever and anon, even in the last few years, some 

 prophet of evil is heard to raise his voice in vigorous protest against 

 the increasing use of slang as foreboding the decadence of our ver- 

 nacular. But the warning is not heeded; and the English language, 

 like the real living thing that it is, goes on developing according to the 

 subtle principles of speech development. 



The laws governing speech development are very imperfectly known. 

 Consequently none can foretell how a given tongue may develop. The 

 language appears to be independent of one's individual habit of speech; 

 yet it is the sum total of the individual habits of speech that constitutes 

 the language. No man makes a language; no man can make it. Not 

 even the greatest monarch on earth can, by decree or fiat, predetermine 

 the course of development of the language of his subjects. Language 

 is an involuntary product and does not result from any determined 

 concert of action. Yet it is modified and changed by various influ- 

 ences. As long as it is alive and spoken, it is constantly changing and 

 will not remain ' fixed ' according to the whimsical desire of the purist. 

 When it ceases to be used upon the lips of the people as a medium of 

 communication of their thoughts and feelings, then it will cease to 

 change and grow and will become ( fixed.' But when a language is no 

 longer spoken, it is characterized as dead. It is in this sense that we 

 call Latin and Greek dead languages, although they survive in modern 

 Italian and modern Greek, respectively. 



It follows, therefore, that it is the height of folly for any one, no 

 matter how highly esteemed as an author, to attempt the role of re- 

 former of the speech. Such an one is destined to have only his labor 

 for his pains. He can not directly purge the language of its neologisms 

 and improprieties of usage. These violations of standard usage which 

 offend good taste, strange as it may seem, furnish indubitable evidence 

 of the vitality of the speech; for from these contraband expressions 

 come the new terms and idioms which are to take the place of the obso- 

 lete words which drop out of the vocabulary. 



Viewed in this light, slang assumes a different aspect, and it be- 

 comes evident that it performs a certain necessary function in the 

 development of language. It is no longer proper, therefore, to refer 

 to slang with supreme contempt and to condemn it offhand as an un- 



