“Peak Times” – Youth Cultural Identity and English

by Ben Greenhalgh (August 2013)

Youth Culture is one of the driving forces of language change but why does youth culture have such a profound effect on our language and why does it suffer the most critique?

Then the bottom fell out. Aside from the gearbox and a rattle of the ageing engine, oh and the boot needing the skill of a safecracker to open, my little Ford was doing remarkably well in its time and mile worn age. However, as I had feared in the past few weeks, it was sick and the final straw was the overly angled speed bump coming into the council centre car park.

One of the students at the centre was lingering outside the door, a cigarette of possibly exotic quality clamped between his thin lips. I waited for a second for the engine to stop ticking over and took the time to compose myself mentally so I was able to brush off the joyous grin from the young man outside who, no doubt, had something witty and amusing to say.

Working in a provision for those who have been expelled from mainstream school I find myself sitting in the front seat in one of the many vehicles of language change. Youth Culture.

Young people bear the brunt of this attitude mainly because youth culture is viewed by many to be a counter culture, a culture with active hostility towards the more dominant forms of English which is seemingly reflected in their language choices.

The student with the wry smile follows me to a laptop at the end of the day. He waits for his taxi and sits with me while we scroll through the range on Auto trader.

As I scroll through page after page I am reminded of the vast variety of cars and what each has to offer in relation to the next.

In this respect, language variation and change should not be deprecated but encouraged and celebrated. Much like natural selection, language requires variety in order to survive. If the traditional prescriptivist mentality of a fortress is to be used then it needs to be rebuilt and altered if it is to survive. It needs new stone in the form of new phrases, words and spellings and it is youth cultural influence and rebellion which provides this. It needs to be able to reflect and explain cultural changes and values. It must simply make sure it keeps up with us and is not left to crumble.

I find a great deal of personal joy in the creativity within every new small but impressive phrase from the young adults around me and I admire that each one helps to keep the English language as powerful as it is.

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