tv). Adams writes: "[w]hether your culture is popular or elite, Buffy has influenced it, and because Buffy is so linguistically potent, its cultural influence amounts, in part, to influence on American speech- (p11). In essence, the language used in this program practically begs to be broken down, studied, and discussed.
Slayer Slang is that medium; Adams thoroughly dissects, analyzes, and explains the language in almost excruciating detail. He begins with slayer jargon, differentiating it from the slang by associating it with general terms used on the show like: Slayer, Watcher, Hellmouth, Bronze, stake, undead, etc. He says that "jargon is necessarily precise, it's language about a job used to get the job done, and a loosening of reference or lexical adaptation interferes with precision- (p14). That does not mean slang cannot develop from the jargon, as it most certainly does on this program, but the jargon must stay consistent. .
The slang born from this show is a completely different matter, however, as new words and phrases, or variations of them, are introduced in nearly every episode. "Buffy the Vampire Slayer not only invents slang, but intends to do so- (p22). Not all of the slang terms used on the program are products of the creative writers; scripts are also intermingled with familiar slang, creating a colorful snapshot of current American teen slang. For instance, deal, hottie, (get) down, chill (out), etc. are words often used by average teenagers, but unmad, twelve-steppy, Scareapalooza, and freaksome are most certainly Buffy originals (the red, squiggly spell-check underlines are also a dead giveaway.) The most impressive words from the Buffy Lexicon, though, are those which morph normal, everyday words into completely new ones.
If there is a way to describe this word transformation process, it would have to be massive suffix and prefix annexation. The script writers consistently introduce unique versions and uses for words most would deem in bad keeping with good grammar.
