The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-07-23
SLANG OF COLLEGE MEN
Queer Words and Phrases Used by
University Students.
Expressions That Had Their Origin
On the Campus Mixture of thc
DIaIcct with Common Phrnseol"Ey
of the Streets - Characteristic
Words Used at Yale and Harvard

! have just been reading copy OF "Dia-
lect Notes" which is taken up almost eis-
tirely with 4 sort of glossary of college
words and phrases" prepared and provided
wi;h an introduction by professor in q
I prominent university, assisted by other
members of the American Dialect Society.
The glossary processes to be fairly COM
plcte collection of the words ,u.d phrases
which have sprung up among American
university students in various parts of the
country, and which, taken together, afford
a clcw TO the dialect of the undergraduate.
| 1t even includes more than mere slang.
! 1t contains also such terms as class day, -
class dinner" academic costume, ''di-
vision officer" etc, which are in no sense
slang, but which belong to the official Ian
! guagc of the university.
! College slang in itself, and students
! slang so fax as it really had its origin
! on the campus, form 4 most interesting
| study. Students slang, indeed, in Ger
many has been investigated in the most
serious spirit by SO prominent scholar
( as Professor Kluge. 1t ought to be investi-
gated in precisely the same manner here.
/ The real thing is full of instruction as
well as of interest 10 the student of Ian
pound Of picturesqueness, vigor, and mys-
terry with occasionally classical infusion
that is decidedly quaint.
But this particular collection before me
is good Illustration of how not to do a
thing II anyone were preparing a die
tionary of the English language would he
include in it all the words and phrases
which We occasionally borrow from the
French and German and Italian by way of
nun . not hn IfT-
tionary OF English, because 1t would in
clude great deal that is not English at
all. In like manner, if one is making
glossary of students slang he should in
clude in 1t only those expressions which
the student has acquired in his student
life; and he should not mix in with it the
slang of the street, the slang of the out
slider. the slang Ito use Harvard eX-
pression) of the "mucker." AS soon as you
do this you have, to be sure, a full col
lection of words that are used by students,
and yet they cannot properly be called
students slang.
The trouble is with those who go about
collecting words for dialect societies that
they are altogether too anxious to make
full chewing in their lists. Another trou-
bic is that they do not know enough about
their particular subject to 6isc1 inmate.
They hear a student using some rather
forcible bit OF aTgot, and they Immediate
ly book 1t and catalogue 1t, and put the
proper initial after # to denote the univer
sity in which it is employed; but they are
not sufficiently familiar with the slang OF
the outside world to know that the express
sion which they have just heard originated
very far indeed from the academic shades
Let US take few instances from the pres
ent collection. Opening it at random, !
find on pages "A and IS the following
words set down as strictly college slang:
ITO kick kid" lady" (the queen OF
cards., lush" NASH and "measly"
Not one Of these words had an academic
origin. ITO kick IS Western; kid we
have inherited from the cockney London
ers OF the last century; lady is an ex-
preston common enough with all card
players. as is its coarser equivalent also
mentioned in this glossary; while lush"
is cant English. and mash as well The
compiler Of the glossary has even included
such bits of university slang as Jay"
PUNK" peach" "sinker" SKY pilot"
'snide - "spieIer,' ito sponge" Ito spot
Ito swloe," and WOODY" all OF which
word. in their origin owe absolutely moth
ing TO the student-world. l might easily
select hundred terms in this collection
which have no business there, but which
the compiler evidently believes to have
been originally as well as now actually
expressions peculiar to the American IN
dergraduate. With all his ingenuity and
patient research. however. he has missed
some very characteristic words and mean
lngs. Thus, the Yale expression ''snab" is
a collective term for girls and smear"
as a name for hash. and the very express
sive Harvard adjective doggy" are not
given a all in their proper Specification.
1t is rather a pity that some one can
not take hold Of this thing and brips to II
not only a knowledge of the student
world and Of the language used in it, but
also Of the greater world without II the
university dialect could be sifted down TO
its actual elements the result would be a
very valuable and characteristic collection;
but what have before me is nothing but
hodgepodge prepared deliberately and
with a display OF scientific precision, but
actually jumblng together cheek and jowl
the crudities of the backwoods. the jar
gon OF the Bowery and the picturesque
but thoroughly unacademic phraseology Of
the wild west, amid which the true lin
guistic ccinages of our universities ere
either lost or else robbed OF all their flavor
and quaintness by the incongruousness Of
such proximity.-Rafford Pyke in the New
York Commercial Advertiser.