I spent many years of my life learning the French language. At the school I attended, foreign language was offered as an elective beginning in middle school, and after introductory courses in basic Latin, Spanish, and French, students could choose to continue with either French or Spanish for the remainder of their academic years.
French came naturally to me, and over the course of four years of high school and an additional two years of college-level French, I eventually learned to speak and write the beautiful language relatively well.
But, the problem with a girl from eastern North Carolina walking around with six years of French language study under her belt and eager to practice her skills was that there weren’t exactly a lot of chance encounters with fellow Francophones in Carlie C’s IGA or Cross Creek Mall. Like any learned skill, if you don’t use it, you lose it.
And so, I became increasingly rusty and, now, some 19 years later, I can barely remember a word of the French that I spent so much time learning.
But as I have come to recently find out, all those years of acquiring new language skills were not for nothing. At almost 40, I’ve had to put those language-learning gears back into motion as a new way of speaking has begun to infiltrate my household.
The place of origin of this language is, if I had to guess, TikTok. Its native speakers are tweens and teens (and, incidentally, their younger siblings who seem to pick it up quite quickly). While my own two children are not on TikTok, they seem to have had no trouble acquiring some fundamental t(w)een-speak from their peers.
The language of which I speak, while technically spoken in English, might as well be foreign to us parents. It requires memorization, learning to put it into the correct context, and a thick skin for the theatrical eye-rolls and “Mooooooms” that ensue if you dare to try to put your limited knowledge of tween/teen slang into practice in the presence of native speakers.
Here’s my best effort at giving you a crash course on a few of the basic terms I have acquired from cohabiting with a tween.
First, there’s “rizz.” A shortened version of the word “charisma,” defined by Oxford University Press as “style, charm or attractiveness.” For example, a real-life application of “rizz”: “Mom, can I please get this new pair of Jordans? My old shoes have NO rizz!”
Then, there’s “bussin’.” An adjective that is used to describe something as “amazing” or “excellent.” My 7-year-old son has incorporated “bussin’” into his vernacular with phrases like, “Do we really have to have leftover meatloaf for dinner again?? I’m craving something more bussin’, like a Wendy’s Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger.”
In the event that you, at almost 40 years old, try to turn the tables on your offspring with, “Guys, come try this flax seed granola I made. It’s totally buss-ing!”, know that your kids will simultaneously laugh like hyenas and blush with embarrassment while telling you that you CANNOT add a “g” on the end, that you have no rizz, and not to be “cringe” (a third tween favorite that means embarrassing and uncool).
Another slang term that gets thrown around a lot at my house is “sus,” short for “suspect” or “suspicious,” and is a young person’s way of dubbing a person or thing as untrustworthy. For instance, in reference to her little brother, my daughter might say, “Mom, can you please make him leave my room? He keeps sneaking in there and he knows where I’m hiding my Skittles. He is so sus!” A theoretical example, of course.
We’ve also learned “no cap,” t(w)een-speak for “no lie” or “for real.” For instance:
“Did you brush your teeth?”
“Yes, Mom.”
“With toothpaste?”
“Yes, Mom. No cap!”
Or, “No cap, this Wendy’s Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger I talked you into is bussin’!”
And then there’s the term that’s strangely become both the bane of my existence and an odd term of endearment in our family. “Bruh.”
I’ve come to realize that there’s no real rhyme or reason as to whom “bruh” should refer. Apparently, it’s basically applicable to anyone, in any situation. I’ve found myself both sternly replying, “I am NOT your bruh!” and, “Aw, I love you too, bruh.”
The list of today’s “Slang-lish” terms and phrases goes on, far exceeding my column’s word limit. If you want a basic working knowledge of what the kids are saying these days, you’ll need to brush up on words like “bet,” “hit the Griddy,” “gucci,” “buggin’,” “delulu,” “dap me up,” “doin’ too much,” “yeet,” “salty,” “slay,” “basic,” “built diffy,” “dog water,” “goated” (to name a select few), and I have a feeling the Merriam-Webster Dictionary is not the place to start.
Just look for anyone between the ages of 8 and 18. You can recognize them by their penchant for wearing white Crocs with high socks, athleisure that costs as much as my car payment, or baggy T-shirts featuring bands they’ve never heard of. They’ll likely be toting a Stanley or have a Venti Starbucks fruity drink in hand. They might be rocking AirPods in their ears while listening to absolutely nothing, or munching on a bag of Takis and guzzling a Prime energy drink like it’s the nectar of the gods.
Converse with these t(w)eens in their native tongue at your own risk. If you’re lucky, they just might think you have some serious rizz. But if we’re being honest, talking like that at our age is just, like, mad cringe, bruh.
Read CityView Magazine’s “The Military Issue” July e-edition here.
