For hundreds of years, English has been continuously changing.Words that were unacceptable 300 years ago are now commonplace. Englishhas always had a trademark of being a comfortable language, the language ofthe common people (MacNeil 143). Change in the grammar and diction of alanguage is natural, and English is always confronted with changes. Amongthem are the use of slang, clipped word endings, and new dialects. SomeConservatives do not like changes because they claim that standard Englishis a perfect language; they do not want to corrupt it. Others simply donot like change. Neither group of Conservatives has any new arguments,and nothing to fear from change. Slang worries Conservatives the most because it affects thevocabulary of English. American English, especially, is always adding newwords to its vocabulary for social, scientific, or artistic reasons. Thescientific and artistic words do not bother these people; only the social,or slang, words do. Slang is usually created by children or teens who seeksocial status (Morrow 137). Because kids are the source of new slang, someadults look down on it with the assumption that kids are unintelligent andsimply rebelling against established English grammar and diction. However,most of the adults did the same thing when they were children. Adults havebeen frowning on slang for generations (Crystal 104). Conservatives also look down upon slang because slang is not usedby people of high status. If they hear someone speaking in Jive, they willbe angry because Jive is not the way that high class people speak. Peoplewho do not like slang are usually prejudiced as well. They do not want tohear other ways of talking because it deviates from the way they talk.Also, much slang comes from other languages, of which Conservatives mightalso be prejudiced. The dialect that a person uses may make himcomfortable, but this is not considered. If a language is not comfortable,...
