Michaela Hradilová, 15. 3. 2012
WHAT IS ACADEMIC SLANG??
•SLANG: words or expressions that are informal and are not
considered suitable for more formal situations. Some slang is used
only by particular group of people
•ACADEMIC: relating to education, especially education in colleges
and universities
•ACADEMIC SLANG: slang from the academic grounds, used on
campus
Source: Macmillan Online Dictionary (http://www.macmillandictionary.com/)
TWO SIDES OF ACADEMIC SLANG
- related to education, schooling itself
- used by teachers as well as by students
- connected with subjects, degrees, abbreviations of institutions, grading
X
- college slang
- used by students, not necessarily related to schooling (sport, parties)
- adjectives of description, abbreviations (in texting, mailing), idioms
A: SLANG (JARGON) RELATED TO EDUCATION, ACADEMIA
University Degrees: B.A.; B.S.; M.A.; M.S.; M.F.A.; M.B.A. etc.
Subjects:
major/minor; cognates; course load; core/electives; prerequisite/ corequisite;
section; mid-term/finals
Grading:
A,B,C,D, E/F (whether a school uses E or F to indicate failing grade typically
depends on time and geography); B+, B-, C+, C-, D+, D-; I = incomplete
Academic life:
Greeks –fraternity/sorority (from the Latin words frater and soror,
"brother" and "sister")
Greek alphabet – e.g. Alpha Phi Omega; Phi Sigma Pi; Alpha Delta
Pledge and Rush Week
Stages of study:
Freshmen (1st year)
Sophomore (2nd year)
Junior (3rd year)
Senior (4th year)
Abbreviations of institutions:
HBCU: historically black college or university
SLAC: small liberal-arts college
STEM: science, technology, engineering, and mathematics
Other: alumni; convocation; extracurricural
B: COLLEGE SLANG
= oral, informal, highly
expressive language that is
created and used primarily
by students as part of
undergraduate life
Classifying nouns:
Athletes: jocks, muscleheads, no necks
Party people: party animal, party hound,
party monster, fun bunch, mad-men
Less inteligent people: clueless, dork,
slow leak, bonehead, knob, loonie
Attractive girl: snapper, hot chick, rocket
Handsome boy: calendar boy, chunk,
flash, PDM (potential date material)
Verbs:
Go stag = go alone to a dance
Sack out, pad out, turn in = go to bed
Goof off, mess around, shoot the breeze = to kill time
Campus sb = deprive a student of campus privileges
Boot = vomit
Adjectives :
Intoxicated state of sb: wasted, crunk, baked, trashed, fried, toasted,
stoned, hammered, plastered..
Acronyms, abbreviations (used in mails, texts, IM): BTW; LOL; BRB;
BYOB, FYI; CYA; GTG; BF/GF; ILY; OMG …
Course nicknames: anthro; English lit.; comp; psych;
THANK YOU FOR YOUR ATTENTION, HAVE A NICE (ACADEMIC) DAY 
SOURCES:
JSTOR: College Slang Revisited: Language, Culture, and Undergraduate
Life. David M. Hummon. Journal of Higher Education. Vol.65.
1994.
What Is College Slang?. Henry Kratz. American Speech. 1964.
Wikipedia (wikipedia.org)
The Chronicle of Higher Education (chronicle.com)
University of Florida International Centre (ufic.ufl.edu)
The Student Magazine of Marquet University (marquettejournal.org)
Macmillan Online Dictionary (macmillandictionary.com)
USA Education Guides (usaeducationguides.com)
McMicken College of Art and Sciences (artsci.uc.edu)