Tesco's old timers get yoof slang pamphlet Tesco has issued old timers working at some of its 1,500 stores with a handy guide to the kind of English guaranteed to have Middle England choking on its cocoa - that favoured by hoodies, wannabe homies, and anyone under 21 who considers the baseball cap to be the US's greatest contribution to English street culture. The …
"We youngsters learn a lot from the old timers. It is very interesting to talk to them - especially when they go on about the war. Hopefully, we will be able to have even better conversations with them now with the help of this guide."
So this 18-year-old yoof is perfectly capable of forming sentences without recourse to juvenile street slang. Sounds like this is yet another 'solution' to a non-existent problem, basically keeping some marketing-drone in work and drumming up a bit of publicity for the chain.
So Tesco think that their older staff should condescend to learn yoof speek, eh?
I say we distribute a leaflet among the under-24s explaining why "'sup, Homie?" is not an appropriate greeting for any situation and that "being well mingin', innit" is not grounds for a refund under the Sale of Goods Act.
How about teaching the "youngsters" to speak properly, like wot I do? ;)
One of the problems with this society is that we are pandering to their lazy self-absorbed culture - "bitesize" learning is about all they can manage. No wonder the upcoming generation are low achieving and scared of failure and that anyone who can afford to sends their offspring to independent schools to get them away from Tony "Education education education" Blairs schools policies.
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The English language has, lets face it, always changed, and it always will and for this reason there is no such thing as speaking properly, old words die, new ones are created all the time! (http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutwordorigins/quiz for example) Do you think 100 years ago the way you speak you have been considered 'proper', of course not!
Language changes for a number or reasons: regional dialects merging / immigration / exposure to other cultures, getting around limitations of the language, adapting to new mediums (IM / Text speak) and of course identity / community (ghetto or 'leet speak (back in the '90s)), or just because people hear a new word and they like it!
Although it may be true that with the spread of globalisation that this is speeding up / more noticeable.
But it seems to most of the people on this site anyone under the age of 30 who speaks differently is a lazy, self-absorbed, low achieving criminal, then complain about a lack of respect! (Do you post a lot on HYS on the beeb? If not you should take a look, I think you'd like it)
Kinda (slang alert!) reminds me of Family Guy:
"Hey, why do you cops always have to harsh our buzz?"
"He used a teenage colloquialism; Break out the tear gas."
But as noted by other posts the idea of a single guide to lazy-drunk-violent-yoof-speak is fundementally flawed as, guess what, different groups of lazy-drunk-violent-yoofs speak differently!
Although I do love the idea of the daughters making up words - Trying to remember the Blackadder episode where he met the guy who compiled the first dictionary!
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