Friday, 12 October 2012

The quite amazingly obvious link between family, Christmas and swearing


What I found particularly interesting about this week’s topic was the notion of swearing as indicative of backstage interaction. This can particularly be seen in familial relations. This, for me, is especially true.  This post is very personal, pretty offensive and probably exceedingly inappropriate for a university assessment.

Christmas holidays marks the migration of a certain blogger’s family and friends to gather together and celebrate but also marks a transformation of the usually respectable individuals into feral creatures. This transformation is of particular interests of micro-sociologists because this change appears to be void of structural influences but the individuals gradually descend into temporary madness with group legitimisation. Once separated, they seem to return to their original states only to degenerate once again the following Yule time season.

The band of misfits mainly spends their time partaking in a number of breaching experiments designed for their unique entertainment. Characteristically this might involve inappropriate attire, antisocial behaviour and unsuitable and offensive conversations. This has resulted in bottles being thrown at them. Twice. Most indicative of this transformation is the littering of profanities in their language. Each of them embraces of new name which is a combination of a type of coffee and the word ‘slut’ to match the colour of their skin (white slut, caramel slut, mocha slut, cappuccino slut). The offensive nature of this language surpasses them or, indeed, is a source of amusement which is not repeated with outsiders. The notion of inclusion and exclusion is further seen in the constant use of the word ‘cunt’ in both offensive and affectionate ways.  Potential aggressors are cunts but so are group members who shout hot chips and paddle pops. Language is used as a method of solidarity as they share horizontal nodes of authority, power and influence. 

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