Best I recall of twistedchick's original post (and sorry, I don't have the direct link) the original references to jive were from tourist accounts from the 18-somethings in New Orleans, but that was regional usage. It must have migrated along with workers heading north to Detroit, Chicago, and NY, because it got much wider use in the 60's with blaxploitation movies using Detroit or Chicago slang (not sure if Superfly used that term, for instance) but then it was part of hip culture with further translation into mainstream with things like Saturday Night Fever ("jive-talkin" is in one of their lyrics, and it's interesting because the movie about Italian kids facing life in the factories, whether or not you consider them losers or scrubs or what have you.) All of this is years before any of us pale people were aware of rap culture in any way, BTW. I understand that was getting going in some of the really tough slum areas for years before it reached Motown-levels of fame, but only folks seriously into digging up new music knew about it back then. going back to qem-chibati's interesting comment, what you have going on there would be tri-lingual, the formal French at home, the English, and the street-culture pidgins or Creoles. I have the sense that a lot of immigrants in poor neighborhoods across the US similarly navigate those three very different sets of codes. I don't understand a lot of the elusive new slang I'm hearing on transit, for instance, but then they don't intend for me to understand it, I'm not supposed to get it. There's all the multivarious terms for "incapacitated," and by what particular chemical, for instance. I know some of this is coming from mass-culture stuff I don't follow, gangsta rappers etc., and other bits are coming from jail and from gangs who've left LA to come here instead; so in that sense it's being imported from minicultures in other cities. I'm privileged enough that I don't have to, these days. It does become a big deal when your neighbors have drug parties and strange people are constantly wandering around and fights erupt for reasons that are invisible unless you're aware of the dynamics within the groups.
no subject
Date: 31 Jan 2011 03:08 am (UTC)All of this is years before any of us pale people were aware of rap culture in any way, BTW. I understand that was getting going in some of the really tough slum areas for years before it reached Motown-levels of fame, but only folks seriously into digging up new music knew about it back then.
going back to qem-chibati's interesting comment, what you have going on there would be tri-lingual, the formal French at home, the English, and the street-culture pidgins or Creoles. I have the sense that a lot of immigrants in poor neighborhoods across the US similarly navigate those three very different sets of codes.
I don't understand a lot of the elusive new slang I'm hearing on transit, for instance, but then they don't intend for me to understand it, I'm not supposed to get it. There's all the multivarious terms for "incapacitated," and by what particular chemical, for instance. I know some of this is coming from mass-culture stuff I don't follow, gangsta rappers etc., and other bits are coming from jail and from gangs who've left LA to come here instead; so in that sense it's being imported from minicultures in other cities.
I'm privileged enough that I don't have to, these days. It does become a big deal when your neighbors have drug parties and strange people are constantly wandering around and fights erupt for reasons that are invisible unless you're aware of the dynamics within the groups.