Word: slanging
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GOLDMAN'S justification is even harder to take as the writing often employs a strange mixture of slang and cliche, stream-of-consciousness and narration that strains to mimic on-the-street realism. Goldman was way over his head in trying to reproduce the voices of Black men. "Basketball is both pastime and narcotic in the ghetto, the cheapest high on the street," or "James Bonner wasn't no fictional bad-ass like Stackolee or Sudden Death. James Bonner was the real thing," are but some of the most glaring examples. The writing improves as the story develops, and fortunately...
...though he were able to follow his characters into slang or thought disorder not because he identifies with their madness or participates in their emotion, but because he is such a knowledgeable and transparent narrator. From moment to moment, on the level of detail, DeLillo lets the reader understand, but he refuses to feel the material or to give it a larger meaning...
...many of you guys think I'm smarter than you?" he asks. Half the wards raise their hands. "I ain't smarter than anyone here, man," says Olmos, suddenly injecting street slang into his normally impeccable English. "I may have developed my brain a little more in high school, but I think we're pretty equal. I grew up in East L.A., just a few miles from here. You might say I was lucky. And I was. But I made a choice. I chose to start acting. I didn't come out of my mother's womb saying...
Only in the past ten years, though, has Spanglish begun to turn into a national slang. Its popularity has grown with the explosive increases in U.S. immigration from Latin American countries. English has increasingly collided with Spanish in retail stores, offices and classrooms, in pop music and on street corners. Anglos whose ancestors picked up such Spanish words as rancho, bronco, tornado and incommunicado, for instance, now freely use such Spanish words as gracias, bueno, amigo and por favor...
...skills on a grand backyard ramp or in a special park, but a downtown sidewalk will do just as nicely. The action is fast, furious and decidedly funky. Uniforms are not required, but style is vital, and the available styles are great. You can talk about it in resonant slang whose references to half pipes and acid drops, crackin' Ollies and catchin' air can be as arcane as a Rosicrucian oath. You can do it in the country or city, by a beach or across some asphalt. It's risky but not all that dangerous. And the cops...