The Verlan

Ikasi   Fri Dec 15, 2006 4:08 pm GMT
This phenomene is it common in english?


Exemple:

Persons
Femme (woman) → meuf
Mec (man) → keum
Pute (whore) → teu-pu
Pétasse (bitch) → tasspé
Frère (brother) → reuf
Sœur (sister) → reus
Mère (mother) → reum
Père (father) → reup
Moi (me) → ouam
Toi (you) → ouat
Parents (parents) → remps
Flic (cop) → keuf
Arabe (Arabic person) → Beur → reubeu
Noir (Black person) → renoi
Celui-la (Him) → La-cui, lawis
Celle-la (Her) → La-celle
Adjectives
Méchant (mean, but also wicked) → chanmé
Gentil (friendly, nice) → tigen
Enervé (angry) → véner
Bête (silly) → tebé
Défoncé (stoned) → fonsdé
Louche (weird) → chelou
Pourri (rotten, corrupt) → ripou
Lourd (heavy, boring) → relou
Bizarre (weird) → zarb/ zarbi
Fou (crazy, insane) → ouf
Comme ça (this way) → kom ass or ça com or ass com or ass meuk
Verbs
Choper (hit on a girl, buy drugs) → pécho
Mater (look at) → téma
Fumer (smoke) → méfu
Vas-y (com’on) → zyva
Carrot’ (being deceived by someone, or something) → rotca
Nouns
Métro (tube) → tromé or trom
Truc (stuff) → keutru
Soirée (party) → réssoi
Cigarette (cigarette) → garetci
Gramme (gram) → meug
Herbe (weed) → beuh
Barette (stick of hash) → retba
Disque (CD) → skeud


You have seen the verlan is upside-down french word forms (verlan=l'envers)
But this new language phenomene is influenced with immigrant languages: arabic particulary, chinese, english, spanish, portuguese... and it become a separated language to the french, the young french people use it, and it is going usual and common (all category), do you think french it's evolving and changing fastly?
Pelasgus   Fri Dec 15, 2006 5:53 pm GMT
Is it a game or quotidian slang types?
Guest   Sat Dec 16, 2006 7:29 am GMT
I think the closest phenomenon to verlan in English is Pig Latin (nix → ixnay, scram → amscray), but it's not very common and has made little impact on the English language.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pig_Latin

In Rioplatense Spanish, the equivalent to verlan is "vesre" (revés):

revés → vesre (reverse)
café → feca (coffee)
caballo → llobaca (horse)
libro → broli (book)
flaco → cofla (thin man; usually a colloquialism for young man)
amigo → gomía (friend)
doctor → tordo (doctor, usually meaning physician but also used for lawyers.
carne → nerca (meat)
pizza → zapi
baño → ñoba (bathroom)
panza → zapán (belly)

And in Tagalog, it's called "binaliktad" (reversed):

pater → erpat (father)
mater → ermat (mother)
pinsan → sanpits (cousin)
pare → erap (male friend)
sigarilyo → yosi (cigarettes)
kotse → tsekot (car)
guwapo → pogi (handsome)
pangit → ngetpa (ugly)
ditto → todits (here)
pwet → wetpaks (buttocks)
ligo → goli (to take a bath)
hindi → dehins (no, not)
let's go → golets
projects → jeproks (casually well-dressed; from the Projects, the name of a middle class residential area in Quezon City)
loob → oblo (inside)
lasing → senglot (drunk)
tigas → astíg (hard, strong)
kita → atík (income)
katulong → longkatuts (maid, helper)
impacto → topaks (acting very strangely, illogically, demonically, from impacto = devil)
talo → olats (lose)
greg   Sat Dec 16, 2006 8:45 am GMT
En fait, il y a des "règles".




La verlanisation des monosyllabiques du type [C¹VC²] (C =consonne ; V = voyelle) se fait comme suit :

[C¹VC²] —> [C²2C¹V] —> [C²9C¹] (en X-Sampa)
[C¹VC²] —> [C²øC¹V] —> [C²œC¹] (en API)

<femme> [fam] —> [m2fa] —> [m9f] <meuf>
<femme> [fam] —> [mœfa] —> [mœf] <meuf>

<mère> [mER] —> [R2me] —> [R9m] <reum>
<mère> [mɛʁ] —> [ʁøme] —> [ʁœm] <reum>

<shit> [Sit] —> [t2Si] —> [t9S] <teuch>
<shit> [Sit] —> [tøʃi] —> [tœʃ] <teuch>

<mec> [mEk] —> [k2me] —> [k9m] <keum>
<mec> [mɛk] —> [køme] —> [kœm] <keum>

<flic> [flik] —> [k2fli] —> [k9f] <keuf>
<flic> [flik] —> [køfli] —> [kœf] <keuf>.





Verlanisation des monosyllabiques du type [CV] (monosyllabiques ouverts) :

[CV¹] —> [V²C]

<chaud> [So] —> [OS] <auch> (X-Sampa)
<chaud> [ʃo] —> [ɔʃ] <auch> (API)

<fu> [fu] —> [uf] <ouf> — ici [V¹] = [V²]

<moi> [mwa] —> [wam] <oim> — le biphonème [wa] fonctionne comme un monophonème.




Verlanisation des dissylabiques terminés par une voyelle :

[S¹S²] —> [S²S¹] (S= syllabe — S² se termine par une voyelle)

<bizarre> [bizaR] —> [zaRbi] <zarbi> (X-Sampa)
<bizarre> [bizaʁ] —> [zaʁbi] <zarbi> (API)
NB : <zarbi> est tronqué en <zarb> ou <zarbe>

<métro> [metRo] —> [tRome] <tromé>
<métro> [metʁo] —> [tʁome] <tromé>

<musique> [myzik] —> [zikmy] <zicmu> <zikmu>
NB : <zicmu>, <zikmu> est recyclé en <zik> ou <zique>.

<vas-y> [vazi] —> [ziva] <ziva>

<comme ça> [kOmsa] —> [sakOm] <sacom>
<comme ça> [kɔmsa] —> [sakɔm] <sacom>