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Is Buffy responsible for Valley Girl style English?
In an article in the Sunday Times, John Harlow talks about the spread of Valley Girl style English and how Buffy had something to do with this! |
 THE American teenage girl is the most powerful influence on the English language around the world, according to research published last week.
The typical 16-year-old girl, armed with a mobile phone, a wide circle of friends and a keen fashion sense, has ensured the success of new phrases such as “muffin top” (a bulge of flesh over low-cut jeans) and “exogal” (an extremely thin contemporary).
She says the strongest recent shift has been the spread of Californian Valley Girl style, promoted around the globe by television shows such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer and The OC.
This style of speech is characterised by inserting drawled words such as “like” and “so” to add emphasis to a sentence, which rises in pitch at the end.
“Valley Girl has gone beyond a fad and is now rooted in different forms of English around the world,” Tagliamonte said. “Girls are the single most powerful force in the English language today.”
Her findings will be discussed this weekend by the American Dialect Society, whose academic membership voted for the word or phrase of the year.
To read the full article click here
| | [by Róisín (Times Online) ] [0 comments]
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