Tag Archives: Slang

Learning Dartmouth Slang

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General Information

Informant: MC

Place: Dartmouth College

Date: October 21st, 2021

Form of Folklore: Verbal Folklore

Title: Dartmouth Dictionary 

Collector: Maria Angelino

Informant Data

The informant is in the 2024 graduating class at Dartmouth and participates in a variety of clubs on campus- including FORT and ABS. She is majoring in Psychology and is looking to do pre-med. She was born and raised in Georgia. She has a little sister and is very close with her family. 

Contextual Data

Social Data: The folklore was collected through an interview with the informant. Throughout her first term at Dartmouth, she learned different abbreviations or made-up words that Dartmouth students used to shorten the title of different buildings, materials, or events. “Dartmouth Slang” is usually learned throughout one’s first term on campus by interacting and having conversations with upperclassmen. The folklore is conducted all the time, in normal conversation or over social media platforms. 

Cultural Data: Dartmouth is located in the very rural, secluded town of Hanover, New Hampshire. The undergraduate population is usually around 4,000 students, and these students normally do not leave the campus often. The nearest big city is Boston, MA, which is two hours away. For this reason, students have created their own bubble within the Dartmouth community and over the years developed a language of their own. 

Transcript: 

Collector: “Are there any other traditions we haven’t discussed that you think are important to fall of freshman year at Dartmouth ?”

Informant: “The thing I will never forget about my freshman fall is hearing words that I’ve heard before. I could tell they were abbreviations for things, but I would always have to ask what they meant. BEMA, FFB, FOCO, Frackets, Tails, Lines (for pong), Flitz, Blobby- those were just a few of the many different words Dartmouth students used in casual conversation. Once I learned them, I felt like I had to use them when I was referencing that building or item because that is how everyone else talked about it. I remember talking with family and friends at home about Dartmouth and frequently used the slang, and they would have no idea what I was talking about. They would make fun of it- saying it was a classic “Ivy League Student move”- but I think it is kinda cool that we’ve created our own bubble here. The slang is just one tradition of the many that makes this place so unique. “

Collector’s Comment:

The creation of verbal folklore by the Dartmouth students illustrates a lot about the culture on campus. The small, close-knit community of students developed their own way to talk about their surroundings and things that are specific to life as a Dartmouth student.

Good Sam

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General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: LG

         Date Collected: 11/4/2021

         Location Collected: Dorm Room over a FaceTime Call

Informant Data: LG is a ’23 from Maui, Hawaii. She is 20 years old, and a Government and Geography double major. She is a member of the equestrian team.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: Good sam is used when someone is under the influence to the point that medical assistance is required. It is rarely used by people on campus, as people rarely drink to the point where they need to go to the hospital. All of campus knows this word.

Cultural Context: Good sam is a program used by Dartmouth to encourage safety. If you good sam someone you are exempt from getting into any trouble for underage drinking. Dartmouth students often use this in a joking manner, saying things such as “slow down we don’t want to have to good sam you”. Most students learn this early on during their freshman year, as it is a matter of safety stressed by the college. It has a negative connotation, and can often be a source of shame if you are “good sam’ed”.

Item: Good Sam: To call 911 and request medical assistance for someone who has had too much to drink or is otherwise incapacitated. Example: “John had too much to drink last night so we had to good sam him”.

Associated File: Notable quotes

“Good sam means to call the hospital for someone who has had too much to drink at a party or a night out”.

“Yeah the term is often used when someone is drinking a lot and we want to tell them to slow down, saying something like ‘don’t want to have to good sam you'”.

Informant’s Comments: LG said she has luckily never had to use this word herself on campus.

Collector’s Comments: I have never had any experience with using good sam directly, but friends of mine have. It is certainly a negative word, and people talk about others getting good sam’ed and spread rumors about it.

Collector’s Name: Ben Ryan

Dark Side/Light Side (Harry Grigorian)

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Title: Dark Side/ Light Side

General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: JS

         Date Collected: 11/2/2021

         Location Collected: Dorm Room

Informant Data: JS is a member of the Class of 2023 at Dartmouth. He is from Providence, Rhode Island and rows on the Varsity Men’s Lightweight Crew Team. JS is a Government major and enjoys spending time with his dog and riding his bike.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: These are among the two most commonly used phrases at Dartmouth. Student can use them in person or over text, and they are ubiquitous in all class years and across campus. Its usage certainly spikes around meal times as student plan where to meet friends.

Cultural Context: As there is only one dining hall, students are very familiar with it. It does have two separate eating areas, and one is lighter with white paint and tables while one is darker with brown paint and tables. Students coordinate where they want to sit by texting their friends before a meal asking if they are going light or dark side. It has a neutral connotation.

Item: Dark and Light Side; the two eating areas at Foco, one of which is darker and one of which is lighter. Example: I was sitting at Dark Side, but it was too depressing today so I moved to Light Side.

Quotes from Informant: “In foco,” these two terms describe “two places you can at in Foco on opposite sides of the building.” In a phrase, he could say “I would prefer to eat on dark side over light side today.” He learned this phrase “freshman fall, right at the start of school from a person who had already been here.” “All of Dartmouth knows dark side vs light side.” This slang came to be “because it’s a description of a place and dark side is a lot darker. It’s much easier to describe.”

Informant’s Comments: Everyone on campus knows this word and uses it frequently. Sports teams eat on Dark Side usually, especially JS’s crew team. “It’s nice because whole teams can sit together at the longer tables and not have to split up,” JS said.

Collector’s Comments: This slang feels very unique to Dartmouth. As we are all so familiar with Foco, it is cool that we can create slang (Dark and Light Side) within other slang (Foco). That’s pretty cool!

Collector’s Name: Harry Grigorian

Need ___

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General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: CR ’23

         Date Collected: 11/4/2021

         Location Collected: New Hamp Dorm Room

Informant Data: CR is a ’23 from Orinda, California. He is 20 years old, and a philosophy and environmental science double major. On campus he plays club soccer.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: The phrase “need ___” is used when asking people to do an activity with you. It is most frequently used in group chats, often in large group chats for clubs or greek organizations. Common uses of “need” are when people want to play pong, get a meal, or go somewhere off campus. It is often texted out, and then people will respond in a specific manner to indicate that they are interested.

Cultural Context: Dartmouth students have a unique way of talking, and like to shorten and simplify words. The phrase “need” is a simple, efficient way of asking people to do something and saying how many people are needed. This phrase is especially useful for pong, a game that is fairly unique to Dartmouth. It has a fairly neutral connotation.

Item: “Need ___”: Need is a way to express that you want people to do something with you, so you say need followed by the number of people needed and the activity you want to do. Example: “Need 3 for pong”

Associated File: Notable quotes

“Need is an easy text to send when you need a certain number of people to do something with you.”

“I mostly use ‘need’ when I want to play pong, and I usually text out in our fraternity group chat, as that is where I usually get the quickest responses.”

Informant’s Comments:  CR said he uses this word mostly for pong, although he mentioned that his freshman floor group chat used it a lot for meals and other activities. He also started using it more frequently once joining a fraternity.

Collector’s Comments: I started using this word a lot more once I joined a greek organization. It is an easy way to communicate to a large group of people and helps me find people to do activities with.

Collector’s Name: Ben Ryan

Warm Cut (Harry Grigorian)

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General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: AK

         Date Collected: 11/5/2021

         Location Collected: Dorm Room

Informant Data: AK is a member of the Class of 2023 at Dartmouth College. She is a Creative Writing major and Computer Science minor, and she rows for the Women’s Crew team. AK is from San Francisco, California, and enjoys running and hanging out with friends

Contextual Data:

Social Context: This slang is used typically when describing a route to get from one place to another. It is not usually used over text, but is said in person when two or more people are discussing. This phrase is used often among members of the women’s crew team, and is probably used more during cold weather.

Cultural Context: Hanover, especially in the winter, is extremely cold. Dartmouth also has many clusters of buildings that can impede travel. Therefore, in the cold, it makes sense for students to cut through buildings while moving around campus. Its connotation is neutral.

Item: Warm cut; an indoor travel route that avoids the cold weather outside. Example: Sorry I was a second late, I took a warm cut through Robinson Hall.

Quotes from Informant: The warm cut definition is “walking through a warm building you normally wouldn’t enter when it’s cold outside to stay warmer. An example is “I walk through the library on the way to class.” She learned it “Freshman year from a teammate who would beep us into her dorm as a warm cut.” She’s “not sure” who uses it, but “definitely [her] whole sports team.” She said it developed “Because it’s a spin on the word short cut but it’s warm.”

Informant’s Comments: AK said she likes this word because it is unique to Dartmouth students and fits the small campus nature. She learned this phrase freshman year.

Collector’s Comments: I know this word and also really like it. Hearing it now reminds me of the beautiful winter time. It is also a word that people outside of Dartmouth would not understand, so I enjoy the uniqueness. It is also definitely used by way more people than just her sports team. Probably the whole campus uses it.

Collector’s Name: Harry Grigorian

NARP

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General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: JC ’24

         Date Collected: 11/2/2021

         Location Collected: First Floor Baker Library

Informant Data: JC is a ’24 at Dartmouth College, and is a 21 year old male from Singapore. He is a sophomore at Dartmouth college, and is not an athlete. He is a Economics major.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: I collected this information and word from Jihwan on the first floor of Baker library. NARP is used to delineate a social divide on campus between athletes and non-athletes. It is often a key piece of information used to describe someone. It can cause divides in social settings such as greek life, as athletes tend to belong to certain fraternities and sororities and narps belong mostly to others.It can be used with both a negative or positive connotation, depending on the situation. Some people are very proud to be narps, while occasionally athletes look down on narps and use the word in a mean way.

Cultural Context: Dartmouth students often shorten words or phrases to make them easier to remember and create a more unique culture. Non-athlete is an awkward way to refer to someone, so the word NARP was created to make things easier. Given the unusually high percentage of Dartmouth students that are athletes, this term is useful when talking about people on campus.

Item: NARP (Non-Athletic Regular Person): Example: “Joe used to play on the soccer team but he quit, so now he is a narp.”

Associated File:

“NARP stands for non-athletic regular person, so its like anyone who’s not an athlete.”

“I learned it freshman year because a couple guys on my floor were athletes, and some older guys referred to other people on our floor using this word”.

Informant’s Comments: JC said he was asked if he was a narp fairly frequently during his first few weeks at Dartmouth. He also noted that the word fosters a sense of division between athletes and non-athletes that can be seen in various social situations.

Collector’s Comments: This term was created as an easy way to refer to non-athletes. It is an abbreviation and thus is more efficient and easy to remember. I don’t frequently use this word, but when I do I use the word to describe individuals or friend groups.

Collector’s Name: Ben Ryan

Colly P (Harry Grigorian)

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General Information:

         Verbal Lore, Slang

         Language: English

         Country of Origin: United States

         Informant: GG

         Date Collected: 10/19/2021

         Location Collected: Dorm Room

Informant Data: GG is a graduate of Dartmouth College in the Class of 2017. She majored in Chemistry and was pre-med. She is from Bethesda, Maryland, and she is working as an assistant at a medical facility before going to medical school next year.

Contextual Data:

Social Context: This word developed around a friend group that GG was a part of during her later years at Dartmouth. The group used the word among themselves, and occassionally would mention it to others outside the group, even though those people sometimes did not understand the meaning. Scenarios under which the word might be used are over text message or in person.

Cultural Context: Dartmouth students frequently try to shorten longer phrases or expressions using shortened words. This is a common practice, and it can be applied to almost any existing word. She believes most people on campus have not heard of this slang, but may understand it if they hear it. The term is neutral.

Item: Colly P; Pasta from Collis Student Center. Example: You want to grab some Colly P after class?

Quotes from Informant: GG said “Colly P stands for Collis Pasta. I think only like three people say it,” she said, adding that “it’s very niche. I think one of my friend groups made it up.” She believes that “it encapsulates that Dartmouth loves creating shortcuts for things that don’t even need them. It’s like people just make them for fun and to add twists to normally mundane things.”

Informant’s Comments: GG said this was one of her favorite words that she used at Dartmouth. GG really like this word and still enjoys saying it after Dartmouth, even though no one knows what she is talking about.

Collector’s Comments: I had never heard of this word despite the fact that the informant is my sister. It seems a little unnecessary to shorten the already short “Collis Pasta,” but this slang shows how Dartmouth students will stop at nothing to save time.

Collector’s Name: Harry Grigorian

Dartmouth Slang

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Collectors & Items Collected

Claire Azar: Blobby, Shmob, Fracket, Lines, Tails, Droco, Flitz, Class Year (’22, ’23, etc.), Trippees, Drillees

Dylan Bienstock: FFB, Flair, Sklodge

Harry Grigorian: Warm Cut, Dark Side/ Light Side, Colly P

Annie Revers: 3FB, Foco, Lou’s Challenge, Ledyard Challenge

Nathan Zhang: Blitz, BEMA, Bequest

Collin Kearns: Facetimey, Layup, The Fifty

Ben Ryan: NARP, Need, Good Sam

What are we collecting?

For our folklore collection project, we decided to investigate slang at Dartmouth. Whether it is acronyms for locations on campus or creative ways to refer to students or emails, Dartmouth students have a unique vocabulary. Slang is a pervasive part of campus culture and something students depend upon during their time here. Since slang is such an important part of daily life at Dartmouth, our group decided to take a poll of our friends, family members, teammates, and strangers in order to gain a better understanding of Dartmouth slang. While our informants come from diverse backgrounds and experiences, all are united by one common attribute: being past or present Dartmouth students.

What is the significance?

  • This project is significant because it offers an analysis of slang used by the Dartmouth community to signal belonging to a group. If you are not familiar with these terms it can become fairly obvious that you are not part of the Dartmouth community. This is why so many of these words are learned freshman year as the new class is assimilating to Dartmouth’s culture.
  • Slang allows us to easily communicate with one another and create a shared language 
  • This shared language: 
    • Allows students to connect members of their community (current students, professors, and alumni)
    • Provides Freshman an easier transition into Dartmouth by allowing them to feel quickly connected and a part of the community
  • This shared language is vital to everyday communication on Dartmouth campus and thus students often feel forced to participate in this shared experience or often feel left out if they are not aware of the culture terms

Questions we asked:

  • What is a phrase of Dartmouth slang that you have picked up?
  • Where/when do you think you first learned it?
  • What group knows/uses this word (a club? all of Dartmouth? members of a sports team?)?
  • Why do you think this slang came to be? Is it a shortened phrase, a description of a place, or something else?
  • Can you tell me anything else interesting about this slang?

Informants:

We collected from 23 informants for this project. To ensure that our sample of informants would help us achieve our goal of digging deeper into the origins and meanings of Dartmouth Slang, we chose students and alumni who we thought would be extremely involved on Dartmouth’s campus. We chose students from many different backgrounds and interest groups, so that we could get a variety of perspectives on Dartmouth Slang. Though, one thing that units all of our informants is that they were all once part of the folk group of Dartmouth students, and therefore are very acquainted with Dartmouth slang.

Informant Demographics:

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Overall observations from our collections:

  • Majority of terms were learned by people during their freshman year
  • Certain words are almost always learned on Trips, making trips serve as something of a facilitator for the language. 
    • Words like trippees obviously, but also basic words like layup or foco that are essential to becoming a Dartmouth student
  • Majority of other words are learned as students are exposed to new social situations
    • Biggest steps would be picking classes, going to the library, beginning to “go out”, and the frat ban ending
    • Words are learned in specific situations
      • For example, going to the library means you will learn FFB, while beginning to go to fraternities means you will learn words like lines and fracket

“Chicory”

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Chicory
Informant info: (Left to Right) Sadhana Puri, age 20, Jessica Link, age 20, Alex Ledoux, age 21 all from New Orleans, LA.  Collected May 15, 2016 via iPhone.
Verbal Lore: Slang/ Material Lore: Drink
Language: English, French
Country of Origin: The Caribbean, France
Social / Cultural Context: This is a caffeinated root which is ground up and added to coffee for a stronger flavor and increase the amount of caffeine in the beverage.  It is one of the many French influences in New Orleans.

 

 

Transcript:

“Sadhana: Chicory

Jessoca: I was about to say Coffee and chicory.  Is a thing.

Sadhana: What exactly is chicory.

Jessica: Chicory-

Alex: Is it a root?

Sadhana: Yeah it’s like a root.

Jessica: Yeah it’s like a root.  The myth is that the reason we started using chicory is because during the civil war during the union blockade when the union soldiers came and blocked New Orleans off so we couldn’t trade or whatever anymore.  People could grow chicory in new Orleans even though we couldn’t really grow coffee beans, I guess.  So people started using chicory because it has caffeine and it kinda tastes like coffee so they use that to make coffee.  But in reality what it was, was like French people even in the 1700s and 1800s were also using chicory, like I don’t know from- it grew in the Caribbean and stuff so they brought it back to France which brought it to New Orleans.  New Orleans people were already drinking chicory with their coffee before the civil war.  But during the civil war when it was harder to get coffee they drank even more chicory with their coffee. I think that’s it, I remember reading that somewhere.  Cause that’s like a misconception.  But the point is we still make, like some places still put chicory in their coffee, like Café Dumont which is where everyone goes to get beignets.  And it’s super famous.

Sadhana: Alex you have chicory blocks in your room right.

Jessica: Well it’s coffee and chicory.  You can’t get just chicory by itself.

Alex:  Well it’s coffee.  So like the coffee from Café- Well I think maybe you can (get chicory itself), I don’t think you could just make coffee with that.

Jessica: I feel it would taste gross.

Alex:  Yeah that’d be really gross.

Sadhana: It’s pretty bitter.

Jessica:  It’s extremely bold.

Alex: It’s super strong.

Sadhana: it’s an acquired taste.

Alex:  Like for me it’s really funny because I can drink like black regular coffee, because I am so used to drinking CDM which is Café Dumont coffee with Chicory ad um it’s super strong.

Sadhana: How much chicory do they put in it, do you think?  Like probably just.

Alex: *shrugs*

Sadhana: I like it.

Alex:  I don’t know it’s just ground up, it looks like regular coffee grinds I put in my thing.

Katelyn: So you drink pure chicory?

Sadhana: Sorry I was confusing.

Alex: No, no it has coffee and chicory the chicory just makes it a stronger coffee.

Sadhana:  Yeah it give s it a slightly bitter.

Jessica: Yeah like a super strong flavor.

Alex: It’s like dark dark, like probably the darkest roast coffee you could have.

Sadhana: It’s not real coffee though.

Aex: The chicory isn’t.

Sadhana: Oh no, but the taste is of coffee”

Collector’s comments:  This word again shows off New Orleans French roots while also giving the chance to tell a myth about the origins of Chicory.  The word can be considered slang because of it’s specific use in New Orleans and this one item that is not used much elsewhere.  It is also most likely that the French pronunciation of the word is different which adds to the slang aspects of the word.

Tags/Keywords: Chicory, caffeine, food, material lore, verbal lore, café du monde, New Orleans.

 

“Cafe au’ Lait”

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Cafe Au’ Lait

Informant Info: Libby Flint, age 59, New Orleans resident of 36 years, originally from Upstate New York and Vermont. Collected May 22, 2016 via iphone.

Verbal Lore: Folk Speech, slang- associated with material food lore

English/ French

United States of America

Context: coffee with steamed milk, otherwise known as a latte in the rest of the US

 

 

Transcript:

“people  here drink Café au’laits rather then lattes”

Collector Commentary: The Cafe Au’ Lait  is the common term in NO for coffe with steamed milk. it is originally a french term and is used in french speaking canade and France as well as New Orleans. As a slang word it is not uniqe to NO within the world sphere, but it is unique to NO within contemporary American (United States of America) folk speech.

Keywords: coffee, latte, cafe au’ lait