What's the new "word!"?
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6rant6 (
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May 9th, 2011
I’m writing. I have a character who says, “Word!” to mean, “That’s right!” but I suspect that may be a bit dated. Is there another expression that’s more current?
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“That would appear to be the case, old chap!”
I never took the expression of “Word!” to mean “That’s right!”.
For me, it’s always denoted something to the affect of “In truth I agree with you”, but that doesn’t make it “right” by any means.
The expression of “Word!” is a tool of validation, not much different than a reciprocal laughter or a knuckle bump. It basically means “True That!”
Some of my friend say “You ain’t nevah lied!”
How about using instead an expression that is less up to the moment and more stable so your story won’t go out of date half a year after you finish it? Or make one up and let the reader infer it from context the first time?
@Jeruba I’m specifically trying to differentiate this character to be “younger” in speech.
I think, “Word.” is currently on a come back. If not it’s still perfectly valid in my youthful opinion.
@ucme “Safe!” huh? I just looked it up on UrbanDIctionary.com and it had an entry with that meaning dated 2003. So it’s just about perfect in that respect. I don’t recall ever hearing it used that way. Might it be regional?
I don’t seem to hear it too often at my college, unless someone is saying it to purposely be silly. I think you should be paying attention to when your story is taking place. Slang words can always be dated to their popular year/decade, so if you want your character to ALWAYS be current in a popular sense, I would probably suggest making up your own word.. then it’ll be “cool” before anyone uses it, and maybe it might actually catch on if your piece is published and widely read.
But I honestly feel that using slang already in use will automatically date your work, and eventually your story might be lost as pop-culture changes. Just my opinion.
Id say word. I just heard “safe” recently from watching skins. I love that expression.
@6rant6 I think its a British thing.
Word is fine to use (this is coming from a 20 year old who constantly here’s it from his 18 years and younger cousins and their friends)
For those who are concerned about the my writing not being “timeless” it’s a movie and a screwball comedy, so “timelessness” isn’t as big an issue as “voice”.
How about originality and quirkiness? Using a dated slang expression too much might bore your readers. You don’t want art to imitation life down to the last cliché, do you?
One of the first rules of writing is “Pity your reader.”
You could use “word”, but as others are saying, it might be kind of cool to make up your own slang word. Or since you’re wanting your character to be younger, you could always have him/her constantly making up new slang in an attempt to start the next trend. That might be kind of funny.
I have never heard that expression, and I work at a high school. Do you mean that if someone said something that you agree with, you would say “word” instead of “no kidding” or “for real?” That sounds weird to me.
Another one I hear a lot is “for sure!”
@rebbel I like “Def!”
@gailcalled “Using a dated slang expression too much might bore your readers.” Well, I guess there is some discussion about what actually is dated. And I’m only using it once, so there’s that.
@6rant6: As long as it’s, like, once, I find that kind of awesome and rather unique. Go for it.
It’s not that outdated. Word is making a comeback. I say “word” all of the time, and I know a lot of people who do the same.
A more modern version of slang intended to agree with someone’s statement is “I know, right?”
I think that might be more common among females, though, I’m no expert.
“I can’t believe Kelly Pavlik won the fight.”
“I know, right? I thought the same thing!”
I’m with @gailcalled on this one. There’s nothing I hate more than older people trying to connect with me, the younger consumer, by having the younger characters act “young” in almost always totally unrealistic ways. You’re better off establishing age through a difference in dreams, hopes, goals, if they have any responsibilities, etc.
These days it’s more like “YEAHHHH BUDDY”.
Well, that’s how it is around where I’m at.
@KatetheGreat And when he says “YEAHHHHH” he should scream it out while his buddy puts on a pair of sunglasses. You are on television AICMFP.
To achieve true timelessness, I recommend replacing all instances of slang with the word “flez”. It’s the wave of the future; and also that of the past.
I still say “Word” or “True? True!”
Some people say “True dat.”
I personally like “Indeed” the most. Haha.
I’ve been hearing “Safe!” a lot lately. “Yeah buddy!” is also popular. There’re always the teenage girls going “I know, right?”
A lot of my friends say “Pshyeah.” and “Chyeah”
I know a few people who say “Shah!” which I think is anoying. XD
^_^
I know FTW (For The Win) is really big. Annoys the crap outta me, though.
I think, and this is just me thinkin’, that “dis” and “word” are going to stick around much like “cool” has since the late 1920s.
I heard those words on the block more than 20 years ago now; people mid-50s and younger use it and know what it means to the point where it’s relatively mainstream today.
I say go ahead and use it.
Fo’ rizzle is great! I’d need to street up the character’s vocab a bit to make it in character, though. What other gems do you have, @erichw1504?
Goin’ Stokely Carmichael on me now…
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