Great Falls tribune. [volume] (Great Falls, Mont.) 1921-current, 1922-08-09

Washington, d. c., Aug. 6.-Just
when Henry Mencken almost made
slang look respectable, along comes the
flapper to inject a complex into the
American language. If you walk aloof
from the flapper tribe, you may be
peacefully that there is an
elaborate f..apper patois, as much a
part of the outfit of the snappy young
thing as her roll tops, sport hat ana
sweater.
Like the uniform, the language OF the
flapper is. peculiar to her type. Inc
only exception is that the flapper IAN
guage is also spoken by the cake eater
and other male contemporaries OF the
! modern girl. To the rest of the popu-
%lation, including almost everyone over
% years, flapper talk comes cose TO
being incomprehensible. Not many or
the terms are in general use.
Few full-fledged adults. for instance,
would be able to use correctly IN their
flapper meaning tomato. egg. potato,
mustard plaster. lemon squeezer. SOUR
rel. berries, alarm clock and flat tire.
These are perfectly respectable English
words in their established sense. In
flapper language. they are used as met
aphors. Some are apt, while others
seem forced.
Flat tire is certainly an expressive
term for a maidenly flapper over 30.
Alarm clock. for chaperon. is not far
fetched, either. Chaperons nowadays
are about as popular and as little-heed-
ed as the family sleep chaser. A mus
tard plaster is listed in one flapper vo-
~cabulary as IAN unwelcome guy who
hangs around" Lemon squeezer is
flapper for elevator, though the term
might be applied equally well to a
street car or crowded automobile.
Truck Patch Technology
The agricultural terms are the hard
est to ~unravel. Why a brainless girl
who is pretty and dances well should
be a tomato is not explained. Nor is it
perfectly clear why a youth who let's
his girl pay her own way should be an
egg. unless perhaps such a person is
considered hard boiled. 1t is true that
to call a person an egg has a family in
sulting sound. ever if the meaning is
unknown. But the same might be said
of most agricultural terms. Yet the
meaning that we associate with them
may make them seem complimentary.
Peach and pippin have long been used
to express praise. On the other hand.
lemon, fish and purple COW carry a
meaning of disparagement.
A potato in its latest sense is the
male prototype of the tomato-a brain
less boy. To add to the confusion,
squirrel becomes a verb in the new
usage and means to hide.
Flapper jargon seems to be some
what different from the slang that
ordinarily enlivens everyday speech.
The ordinary slang phrase is the happy.
or unhappy. thought of some wit. If it
fills a need, replaces some dull alb
straction by a vivid mental picture,
then it becomes popular. In time il is
either worn out by too much use and
discarded. or it becomes respectable
English, recognized by the solemn
makers of dictionaries.
The flapper talk appears to be an
attempt to do a wholesale job. to turn
the entire English vocabulary of youth
into picturesque and sporty patois. Let
no noun or verb remain undisguised
seems to be the slogan Of flapper. or
ganized and u~norganized. New terms
are being added every day by earnest
gum-chewing young philologists.
An interesting tendency in the new