Secret language for friends. Secret children's languages. Languages ​​with letter substitution

Language does not always have to be understood by everyone. Since ancient times, guild and criminal communities have been inventing their own secret languages. The coded dialect helped to turn deals and discreetly transmit secret information.

Hobo

The secret language of American vagrant workers originated in the early 20th century. Its heyday came during the Great Depression, which forced thousands of people to leave their homes in search of a better life. The locals were not very friendly to vagrants - this was one of the reasons for the emergence of the secret Hobo language. If a layman saw a drawn rectangle with a dot inside on the house, he could hardly guess that this symbol was left by a hobo warning colleagues about danger. The graphic method of communication was not chosen by chance - most of the hobos were not literate. The hobo-code could advise “to get up as soon as possible” (a circle with two arrows flying out of it), report on the presence of work (two shovels), the proximity of a courthouse or police station (a circle with an intricate “squiggle”), and many other points that turned out to be useful in the difficult life of a hobo. So, a figure in the form of a cylinder (headdress) and a triangle meant that rich people lived in the house, and the “grave mound” and the cross became a symbol of a dishonorable person. Two rhombuses warned that one should be quiet here, and a circle crossed out by two crossed lines gave hope of receiving food in the form of alms.

Polari

According to linguist Paul Baker, the secret language of the British sexual minorities of the 20th century was born on the basis of the thieves' slang, common in the Elizabethan era. It was constantly replenished with slang words that were brought by numerous travelers. In the 18th century, a vocabulary was added used by "the most despised social groups", and in the 19th century, a secret language of wandering buffoons, beggars and street vendors derived from Italian. In polari, you can see the influence of cockney (an old London vernacular, which is characterized by the use of rhyming substitutes), "backing slang" with its mind-blowing pronunciation of words backwards, Yiddish, slang vocabulary of sailors and military pilots, as well as drug addicts. Polari became widespread in London in the circle of chorus boys who performed in musical plays in the western part of the city. Polari was also spoken by male prostitutes, for whom the secret language was vital. Their activity was considered a crime and punishable by death. Most Polari speakers had only a minimal vocabulary and used individual words, weaving them into their usual speech. Those who mastered the polari to perfection could communicate in public, discuss the unsuccessful outfits of nearby people, or talk frankly about their adventures. When a Polari transmission appeared on the radio in the 1960s, the language lost its halo of mystery. The abolition of criminal prosecution for homosexuality has led to the fact that the need for a language “for the initiated” has completely disappeared.

Lunfardo

Linguists have not come to a consensus on the origin of Lunfardo. Probably, it could be based on the dialect of Spanish convicts who arrived in Argentina and Uruguay in the 17th-18th centuries. The lunfardo vocabulary was supplemented with northern Italian dialects, English and French vocabulary, and Romani words. The origin of most of the lexemes remains unknown, so scientists suggest that they were artificially invented by Lunfardo speakers. The main features of this secret language, which today is often called the language of tango, are the abundance of metaphors and the inversion of syllables. So instead of "tango" (tango) appeared "gotán", and instead of "mujer" (woman) - "jermu". Many lunfardo words have become firmly established in the terminology of tango. With the popularity of this dance around the world, lungfardo has lost its mystique.

callahuaia

This secret language is used by the Kalawayas, itinerant healers living in the Bolivian Andes. The origins of their culture date back to the Inca period, from which the secret language probably came, which, along with healing skills, is passed down from generation to generation. However, not all linguists agree: it is quite possible that Callahuaya is associated with the Amazonian dialects, the vocabulary of which the healers borrowed during their travels in search of medicinal plants. Until alternative medicine was officially recognized in Bolivia in 1984, the Kalawayas were forced to lead a semi-legal lifestyle, fearing to lose their freedom for their activities. The secret language of Callahuaya is alive in the rituals and medical practice of Kalawaya today, as is the demand for the services of its speakers - virtuoso healers.

Parlache

Fenya

The language of the Russians ofen has been studied quite well at the moment. It was based on numerous borrowings from different languages ​​(Greek, Latin, Finno-Ugric, Turkic, Gypsy, Yiddish, etc.), as well as skillful word formation. The buyer, who was present at the conversation of two cunning ofen, could hardly guess what was at stake: they say, it seems, in Russian, but not a word is clear. “Masen is sleeping in condurs and I’ll send a polar-shin trader” (“I’ll run to the tavern and bring half a liter of vodka”) or “In Shilk yukhchay stucco, vahro and semishi” (“Take scarves, cloth and chintz in debt”). Vladimir Dal pointed out that this language was artificially invented "for picaresque meetings of merchants." It is not surprising that the activities of the officers periodically caused dissatisfaction with the police: they tried repeatedly to deal with the officers, and at the same time with their “strange language”. From the middle of the 19th century, the number of ofen began to decline, and at the beginning of the 20th century it became almost impossible to hear the elaborately mysterious speech at Russian fairs.

Code da pinci

For the first time, the symbols used by British burglars were noticed in 2009. Then, in front of some houses in Surrey, ominous chalk signs appeared that looked like children's drawings. It seemed strange to the policemen that the owners of all the "marked" houses had one thing in common: they were robbed. A little later, the symbols were deciphered: in some cases, they warned about the presence of a "defenseless woman" in the mansion or designated the object as "an excellent option", in others, the degree of risk was determined or it was reported that "there is nothing to profit from in the house." All homeowners were given instructions with character decoding and were advised to wash off the identified drawings if found. However, the British police are not asleep, assuming that the disclosure of the da pinci code will force inventive criminals.

1. Polari

Polari originated in the 19th century as a means of communication between British sailors, but became the unofficial language of British gays between the 1930s and 1960s. At the time, it was illegal to be gay in the UK. Polari allowed gays to secretly communicate with each other and recognize gays even when talking to strangers. If the stranger answered correctly, the gays knew that he belonged, if not, they still went about their business without revealing their sexual orientation.

In Polari, sex was called "trading", the word "cottage" meant looking for partners in the showers. "Wada" meant "to look at someone", the word "chrysalis" referred to someone with a pretty face, and "chicken" was any youth. The policemen were called "sharpers" or "lilies of the law" and an attractive man was called a "dish". The telephone was called the “Polari pipe”, and the word “Polari” itself meant “to speak”. Now the Polari dictionary can already be freely found on the Internet.

2. Pig Latin

Children, and sometimes adults, used pig latin, which is formed by mangling the words of the English language, to secretly communicate with each other. It first began to be used around 1869, but then this slang was called "hog latin", "goose latin" or "dog latin". Some Pig Latin words later entered the official English language.

The conversion of English words to "Pig Latin" depended on the letter or groups of letters with which the word began. If the word started with a vowel, "way" was added to the end, so "awesome" became "awesomeway." If a word started with a consonant followed by a vowel, the consonant was moved to the end of the word and "ay" was added, so "happy" became "appyhay". If the word started with two consonants, both consonants were moved to the end of the word and "ay" was added, so "child" became "ildchay".

3.Leet

Leet, aka Hackspeak, works by replacing individual letters in a word with a number, symbol, or group of numbers or symbols that resemble a letter. For example, "Hacker" is written "| - | @K3R" where "| - |» represents "H", "@" represents "a", and "3" is written instead of "e".

Leet was originally used by an elite group of hackers in the 1980s when it was used to send secret messages to members of the community. However, some Internet users can read it, albeit with difficulty. But computers can't read it, so spammers have started using it in mailing lists to bypass spam filters. Some Internet users use it to create passwords. Such passwords are difficult to crack with traditional brute-force hacking programs, but easy for the user to remember.

4. Buntling

Buntling is the unofficial language of Booneville, California, where it was spoken between 1880 and 1920. It is a mixture of several Indian languages, Spanish and slang words created by the locals. One of the reasons for the “closedness” of buntling is just these slang words. They were formed from the nicknames and characteristics of local residents, and now they are afraid that visitors can use them for ridicule.

For example, "Jeffer" means "fire" or "burn". The word comes from a man named Jeff Vestal who loved to start fires wherever he went. Similarly, the word "charlie", meaning "to disgrace", came from the name of a local Indian named Charlie Ball, who was famous for his awkwardness. There is also the word "shoveltooth", which means "doctor". It appeared because one of the doctors of the city had very wide teeth. The word "Tige" means "crazy" - because the famous local drunkard was very fond of singing the song "Hold That Tiger".

The word "almittey" ("burp") comes from a woman named Almittey, who was known for burping too much. "Apple-head" means "girl", but originally the word was used as a nickname for a girl of a native who had a very small head. In general, the art of speaking Buntling is called "playing the harp."

5. Carney

Professional wrestlers use carnies to talk among themselves, even if they are in front of a crowd of spectators. Carnie has its origins in the early days of professional wrestling, when match attendants (called "carnies") used it to communicate during public matches.

Carney, above all, is distinguished by the habit of adding the interjection "eaz" before each vowel. Thus "is" becomes "eazis" and "Kelley" becomes "Keazelleazey". But, in addition to this addition, carnie also contains several slang words, for example, “Andre shots”, which means strikes at certain angles (the expression appeared in honor of Andre Te Giant).

The expression "Batman match" refers to empty, uninteresting matches, the phrase "beat down" is used when a wrestler is beaten by a group of wrestlers, and "canned hat" refers to the moments when the screams of the fans begin to be broadcast through the broadcast speakers.

6. Lunfardo

Prisoners in Argentina use lunfardo to secretly communicate with each other. This language first originated among the lower strata of Buenos Aires and was based on a mixture of Spanish and Italian words. Lunfardo has more than 5,000 words, one of the main tricks of this slang is changing syllables in places, for example, "cafe" will sound like "feka".

Thanks to the spread of tango, lunfardo became popular in Europe, where it was perceived as a language of power and sex. In 1943, its use in tango music was banned at the behest of moralists, who were shocked that young people spoke Lunfardo. In the 1950s, its use fell into decline, but in the 1960s, the popularity of lunfardo returned again.

7. Swordspeak

Swordspeak is an arcane jargon used by gay men in the Philippines. It appeared in connection with the unfriendly attitude of the traditional society towards gays. The slang is a mixture of English, Spanish, Japanese words, and several native Filipino vernaculars, including Tagalog, Cebuano, Waray, Bicolano, and Hiligaynon. In addition, the names of domestic and foreign politicians, celebrities, and brand names are used. The very word "sword" in slang means "gay".

Swordspeak has no fixed rules or standards, and different localities have their own dialects. Words are added and removed as needed. Some Swordspeakers also change one or two letters of their words to further confuse the uninitiated.

Wordspeak is related to the Indonesian Bahasa Binan, which adds "in" in the middle of a word and removes other letters. The word Binan itself comes from the word Banci and means a male transvestite. It removed the "ci" ending, while placing "in" between "b" and "an".

8. Tives Kant

Thieves' Cant is also called Rogue's Cant and Peddler's French. It was the language for secret communication between thieves and beggars in several English-speaking countries, including Great Britain. Now it is used quite rarely, although it is still found among gangs in the US and the UK. There are two versions of it: Simple Thieves' Cant ("simple thieves' jargon") and Advanced Thieves' Cant ("Advanced thieves' jargon").

The "simple" version has always been the most common and was used by novice criminals, citizens from the social lower classes, as well as law enforcement agents. The "advanced" language was known to few and was used by higher level criminals. But even they rarely used it, and it could only be learned orally from an experienced criminal.

Examples:

In the "simple" version, the offender is called "pigeon plucker" ("pigeon baby"), and the victim is called "pigeon" ("dove"); the art of counterfeiting money is called "drawing pictures with kings".

In the "advanced language" "desert" is called "akban", "diamond" - "artel", "farm" - "narak", "food" - "safe", "hello" - "sayetonta".

9. Nushu

Nushu, which means "women's writing", is a language exclusively used by Chinese women. It appeared in the Chinese province of Hunan around 15 BC. At that time, many women were forbidden to receive education, and then they invented their own language and their own script in order to secretly communicate with each other. The language was so well kept secret that it was only discovered in the West in the 1980s.

Some words were taken from Chinese, some were invented. As in traditional Chinese writing, Nushu characters are written and read from top to bottom and from right to left. But unlike traditional writing, Nushu characters take up less space and contain more curved lines. The last complete nushu expert was Yang Huanyi, who died in 2004 at the age of 98.

Children's secret languages

Basic concepts: reasons and time of the appearance of children's secret language, education, lexical composition, varieties, organization, method of use in the game.

Origin. The period from seven to twelve years is characterized in the life of the child by the greatest activity, the formation of a "choral", social principle. The organization of an individual environment and the persistent allocation of one's own world determine not only the desire of children and adolescents to arrange their own way of life and social relations in their own way, to preserve their individuality and develop their own customs and rights. Usually, at the same time, their own folklore and a special language are formed. Sometimes they help build communities V cities and large villages. Separately, it should be noted "children's secret languages" that arise during the game.

Like many other parts of children's folklore, secret languages ​​are of ancient origin. The German ethnologist L. Frobenius was the first to write about the existence of secret languages ​​for communication between members of closed age unions. After him, ethnologists of many countries collected extensive material and showed that within such unions their own secret languages ​​\u200b\u200bfor communication are often formed. Even the parallel existence of male and female secret languages ​​within the same tribe has been revealed. M. Mead was the first to draw attention to the existence of such children's languages. She also pointed out that the reason for their occurrence is only partly in the imitation of adults, it is necessary to take into account the desire of adolescents for independence. The researcher revealed the main function of children's languages ​​- to hide certain information from strangers. At the same time, M. Mead believes that the possession of a secret language does not yet mean the existence of any organizational group. The opinion of M. Mead is confirmed by the work of later researchers.

O.I. was the first to write about children's languages ​​common in Russia. Kapitsa in programs for collecting children's folklore. In a letter to G.S. Vinogradov dated February 8, 1926, she asks him to study this problem. G.S. Vinogradov first of all showed the living existence of children's languages, believing that the main thing is to fix the material, and its scientific study is a matter of the future. At the same time, he wrote to O.I. Kapitsa in 1929: "It would be necessary to use a detailed history of the study of children's language, from which an intelligent reader will understand what and how can and should be done to observe children's speech." However, the work of G.S. Vinogradov "Children's secret languages. A Brief Outline" is still practically the only study on children's languages. Only M.V. Osorina partially touched upon children's languages ​​in connection with the problems of the article, therefore this section is mainly based on the works of G.S. Vinogradov.

Secret languages ​​are spoken among children between the ages of seven and thirteen. As G.S. wrote Vinogradov, it is characterized by "the development in children of the choral principle, social life, their departure into the life of their environment, isolation from the life and life of adults." The desire to imitate adults, combined with the marginalized position that children occupy, is the reason why the "languages" of various marginalized communities often become the sources of children's languages. A comparison of children's secret languages ​​with the languages ​​of secret and criminal communities shows that they are created for different purposes, although some elements (attributes, vocabulary) can be borrowed.

Fiction and memoirs are replete with examples of children's secret languages ​​used for play and communication. So, the travelers Tofsla and Vifsla appearing in the valley of the Moomins use an amazing language known only to Tofslam and Wifslam: “Onsla lures nael”, “Samsla you rat!”, “Morra istesla”! (T. Janson "The Wizard's Hat"). But not only the Hemulen could understand their language.

Education. Usually secret languages ​​are formed by adding special affixes (endings, prefixes and suffixes) to ordinary words. Such is the “language of zu”: read - chitatsu, mother - mother, etc. The above example from T. Janson's book also characterizes a similar secret language, the type of education of which can be considered the most common.

Varieties. Sometimes familiar words are divided into approximately equal parts, introductory or superscripted syllables are placed between them in the prescribed sequence.

There are also other varieties of children's languages. A group of circulating (reverse) languages ​​is known, where a more complex rearrangement occurs (by an equal number of syllables or by rearranging sounds). Usually such a process takes place in a professional environment, then children learn the language invented by adults, but most often in the form of a game. As an example, G.S. Vinogradov cites the Tarabar language (RSF, pp. 730–731). It is based on the replacement of the first ten consonants with the last ten consonants of the alphabet. His appearance G.S. Vinogradov connects with training in the bursa.

In a special group of G.S. Vinogradov singles out bookish languages ​​that arise under the influence of literary works - the book by E. Seton-Thompson "Little Savages", the poem "The Song of Hiawatha" by G. Longfellow, novels by F. Cooper, P.I. Melnikov-Pechersky. However, he considers the main way to preserve children's languages ​​"by inheritance from one generation to another." G.S. Vinogradov gives examples of such transmission throughout the first half of the 19th century, believing that for this, the children's language must meet the following requirements: to be incomprehensible to the uninitiated and "moderately difficult" so that new members of the group can master it. In addition, the language should be comfortable for rapid pronunciation, sonorous and rhythmic.