RuKsaK

Ms Jeffries had a cropped, academic hairstyle and a fixed squint through her glasses about seven inches above her skinny, horizontal lips. Her voice was a delicate, borderline whisper and her personality seemed to have about four thousand books of linguistics weighing it down.
------
‘So this fucker, Scottish Paul, that little stubby twat in the West Riding – he fucking blasts me with the bastard thing. So, I’m standing in the middle of the bloody pub, fucking soaked through, looking like a right cunt. I was so fucking livid - wanted to kill the cunt. Couldn’t fucking believe this frigging little shit had drowned me with a fucking soda syphon. I was sticky as a cunt full of syphilis B. So, I’m gonna get the bastard back. I’m gonna get some cunting revenge…’
------
‘Is this a word?’ Ms Jeffries winced.
‘Which one?’
‘That one in line six.’
‘I dunno which one you mean?’
‘That one there.’ Her finger dabbing the page gently as though it’s infected with Ebola.
‘Ah – cunting?’

An audible, mini-groan:
‘Mmm, yes. Don’t say it. Please just point to it. Is it a word?’
‘You’re the expert Ms Jeffries – is ‘cunting’ a word?’

Another precise, elegant hiss:
‘Please RuKsaK – point to the words, rather than enunciate them so. It’s unconventional, but I suppose it’s a qualifier of sorts. What’s your hypothesis on the transcript?’
‘Well, the ‘cuntings’, the ‘fuckings’, ‘shits’, ‘bastards’, etc are a social device. One used to acquire status, amongst young males, as a rule. The more diverse, successfully frequent and imaginative, the more reverence is gained. So, in many respects, the ability to spill all those ‘cuntings’, in an appropriate speech community, enables the speaker to promote his standing in the group. In fact, it is based on this supposition, fair to state that a lack of swearing would lead to a lower social position within the group. So, in this case, we can see a bid for prominence within this particular societal bracket.’
‘Where did you transcribe it from?’
‘I set up the cassette in my room. The Dog – Josh Beach, came round and told me about his night out. That’s what I got and there it is - verbatim.’
‘Did he know the tape was on?’
‘No, I wanted something natural. I told him after and he said it was alright to use it.’
‘I don’t like it. I’m giving you a bare pass.’

Incredulous:
‘Hey – I’ve done tons of work on this. Why that grade?’
‘I don’t like the swearing. It’s too much.’
‘What! That’s what he said. It’s real!’
‘I understand, but it’s too much. Thank you RuKsaK – I’m giving you a third.’

I walked out of her office, my face twitching into my nose, looking at my upturned, open hands, mumbling:
‘That’s what he said. That’s what he said.’
------
I got my third. Matters fuck-all now, but swearing has continued to fly out of my mouth since, perhaps more so.
------
It’s all about ‘Open Sesame’ – words are ways into another’s mind. To Ms Jeffries ‘cunting’ said:
‘Lock the doors - this is not coming in!’

Her cerebral cave is decorated very differently from mine. If you say to me:
‘How about shoe shopping today?’
My mind legs it to my ears, barricades the bastard and denies any linguistic understanding of the question. That's a definite 'close sesame' for me. My ‘open sesames’ have quite a few cunt derivatives in them however.
------
I’m sorry to Ms Jeffries – the silly cunting cow.

Sunday, January 23, 2005

Anti-sociolinguistics