Brian's Language

Rebecca Rainis

English – Ms. Pahomov

Brian’s Language

I have 3 close friends; Taylor, Jade and Brian. They all come from different parts of Philadelphia, and none of them act the same. The way I speak with every one of them individually is the same because I don’t feel the need to monitor my language around different people, unless it’s teachers and elders. I can talk to Taylor, Jade and Brian seriously, goofily, or just normally, but regardless the type of our conversation, my language and speech is the same with all of them, as theirs is with me.

            I’ve experienced Jade and Taylor around other people, and it seems as if they speak the same way they do with me, with others. I believe it’s easiest to have one type of language for all groups of people, because in a way, language shows others who you are.

            Because Brian is one of my best friends, as well as my boyfriend, I’m around him often. During the week, he meets me after school and we hang out together, alone. The way he talks around me when we’re alone is a lot like the way I speak. I speak with proper sentences, and I don’t use much slang. A typical conversation between Brian and I would go like this:

            “Hey Brian.”

            “Hey. What’s up?”

            “Not much, how about you?”

            “Nothing’s really up with me either. How was your day at school?”

            “It was alright; a little bit stressful, but I’ll get through it.”

            “Well that’s good to hear.”

Despite our weekly plans, on the weekends, we usually go to hang out with his friends. Majority of his friends are from the projects, which is a very bad neighborhood. For this reason, Brian’s friends come to a small park outside of the projects to hang out. The way they talk could be referred to as ‘ghetto’. They drag their words, and combine words to make their sentences shorter. Instead of hi or hello, they say yo. Rather than saying “with you”, they say “witchu”. They even abbreviate each other’s names. For instance, a lot of Brian’s friends simply call him B.

When we’re around Brian’s friends, he talks more like they do. It’s as if he has two completely different personalities, because he uses two completely different languages. A typical conversation with Brian and one of his friends would go like this:

“Yo B, wassup?”

“Nut’in, jus chillin’. How you been?”

“I been ard. Did I tell you ‘bout las weekend?”

“Naw cuz, what happened?”

“We got in the whip and drove to a party. It was poppin’!”

“Thas wassup!”

I know this language sounds confusing, but to clarify things, ard means alright; naw means no; cuz is just another slang term meaning friend, similar to homie; a whip is a car; and poppin’ means fun. 

According to James Baldwin, language “…is the most vivid and crucial key to identify: It reveals the private identity, and connects one with, or divorces one from, the larger, public, or communal identity.” He is saying that language is one of the most important things to consider when it comes to identifying someone, and it has the power to join people with or separate people from the public, as well as the identity of a community. Brian’s language around one group of people revealed who he was around them, and his language when him and I were alone revealed who he was when he was with me. It was hard for me to figure out what Brian’s true language was, because he was so different when it came to two groups of people. I agree with James Baldwin, because as Brian and my relationship went on, the differences between Brian’s two languages taught me a lot about him.

When Brian and I first became good friends, I noticed the language he used around his friends and I, and how different they were. I immediately figured that the reason for this was because he wanted to fit in with his friends, but as we grew closer, something changed my mind.

There are times when Brian and I are alone, and he starts to talk like his friends. When he talks to me individually that way, I sometimes get offended, because it seems as though he’s talking to me as if I’m just his friend, when at the same time, I’m also his girlfriend. However, this helped me to understand which language was true to him.

He wasn’t using the language he used around his friends with me because he looked at me as one of his friends; he would slip up and use that language because that was what was true to him. He’s known his friends much longer than he’s known me, and aside from the fact that I would get offended when he used the language he uses with his friends, with me, I assumed that the reason he talked a completely different way with me than with his friends is because his friends and I have two completely different languages. His friends use slang; I don’t. His friends find simple ways to abbreviate words; I spell and speak my words wholly and properly.

Although I was mislead by Brian’s two different types of languages, I appreciate his effort to make me happy in a simple way by speaking the same way that I do when with me. It shows me many things, other than the type of person Brian is. It teaches me that language can define a person, and people can change their language for other people, which is a very valuable thing to know.