May
11th
2017
Writing Slang · 5:32pm May 11th, 2017
I've found myself in a position where more and more my characters are going to be speaking casually, as in using slang and slurred words, and I want to be consistent.
For example, I have a southern sounding character. She says "Ah" instead of "I", "mahself" instead of "myself" and "sayin'" instead of "saying." I put apostrophes in place of the "g" to indicate that's how the words are intended to be. But there's one thing that's throwing me for a loop.
"Chya"
What'chya want? Nice ta meet ch'ya.
How is this written and do you have any other suggestions for other common slang?
From what I've seen, it's written like "meetcha, whatcha," stuff like that. Occasionally there's an apostrophe (what'cha, meet'cha) but that's more often used by British writers than American writers.
Some other slang that might be worthwhile would be y'all (you all), ain't (are not), yea (yes), jes' (just), don' (don't), dunno (don't know) and of course the ever-popular y'ain't (you all are not).
4528714 Interesting. Also, I've been writing "jus'" instead of "jes'".
4528722 It can be both, really.
4528722 So lets take a look at the meetcha/meetchya slang. So what happens here is that the word end in a 't' and then transitions into a slang of you. So [meet you] becomes the extremely informal and familiar slang of [meetcha/meetchya] It really isn't a contraction, so much as it's a butchered amalgamation of [meet you] The 'Cha' or 'Chya' (I personally favor the one without the y added in) pulls of the 'ya' of the informal familiarized slang of [you] Hence, [meet you] becomes the familiar informal slang of [meetcha] Since no letters are being omitted from the slang word, then I wouldn't use apostrophes ['] as they're typically a marker to indicate that a letter or series of letters are being omitted. [Can't] is [Cannot] so the apostrophe indicates that an n and o are omitted from the contracted form. Even more letters are indicated as [Celestia] in a familiar, contracted form becomes, 'Tia. You're dropping five letters preceeding [Celes]tia's proper name to use a far more personal and familiar shortened form of her name.
ain't for "am not," and incorrectly for other conjugations.
ya or yew for "you," depending on emphasis,
y'all for you all,
yonder for "way over there"- used to be normally used, now only in the Southern US.
ole, or ol' for "old"
'n' for "and"
4529050 How academic. Thank you.
4529244 Good list, but can y'all have the apostrophe after the 'a' instead of before? Ya'll.
4529563 It really depends on how you contract it. Traditionally it has been contracted as [y'all] since you're dropping the ou letters from y'ou' and then joining it with the word all to form [y'all]. You can contract the word as ya'll if you're using the familiar slang form of [you] as ya and then dropping the 'a' in 'a'll and then joining them together. It's not as traditional, and some people may comment on it because it isn't the popularized form, but then you can just link them to this explanation here to clarify why you chose to go with a non-traditional form.
4529625 I'll think on it.
4529563
y'all for you all,
ya'll for you will, maybe, but might confuse people.
4529244
You sure it's not 'n or some other variation? Example: Ah don't mean ta sound ungrateful 'n all, but..."
4537563
'n is short for in.
'n' is short for and.
4537572 Alright.
4529050
Not sure if we covered this before. What are you: "Whatchya'll"?
4738394
I would suggest having the ya'll stand separate . Or if it absolutely has to be one word , then hyphenate it so that readers can tell that the two separate words are conjoined . So it would either look like whatcha ya'll or whatcha-ya'll .
4738394
And actually it would be whatcha or whatcha'll. Because this slang form drops the are and implies it. Because the -cha suffix is the slang form of -ya or you, so whatcha is the slang form of what (are) you (doing).
4738410
I think I'll go with "whatcha'll"
4738410
Young one: young'n's?