Descriptions of the Body: Violence in the Subcultures of Contemporary Romanian Youth

Abstract

For a long time, with few exceptions, Romanian linguistics took no interest in native slang, but after 1990 this has made a dramatic comeback in more than one way. One of the crudest versions of new slang, with touches of violence and licentiousness, turning the unsayable into sayable, is that currently used by young Romanians. It has been justly argued that such linguistic outlet came as a logical consequence, after the demise of communism, of the former censorship and wooden tongue. The paper sets out to put this oft-deplored linguistic phenomenon into perspective and analyse the main linguistic means employed in shaping it up.

Keywords

• slang
• subculture
• violence
• licentiousness