The power of youth language to stir the emotions is evident in the comments on newspaper articles about young people’s use of language and in conversations with friends or work colleagues. Among the people around me, the debate reaches its peak every year when the Langenscheidt publishing house announces its Youth Word of the Year.

Opinions are divided. Some see it as linguistic decay, a corruption of “proper” language. Others find the unconventional newly coined words creative and are amused by the terms used by young people – probably, among other things, because they often don’t immediately understand them.

I can allay the fears of the former: linguistic research has shown that the majority of young people are able to adapt the way they express themselves to the context and addressee. In other words, the way they talk to their chemistry teacher is fundamentally different from the way they talk to their classmates. As a University of Zurich research project shows, the same applies to written communication. A group of experts around Professor of German Christa Dürscheid evaluated more than 1,000 texts from 14- to 19-year-old students at all types of schools. They couldn’t find any evidence that the way young people write in private (for example WhatsApp messages) has an influence on the way they write at school. (Quelle: Universität Zürich, 2017: «Was ist von der Jugendsprache zu halten?»; linguistik.uzh.ch/de/easyling/faq/durscheid-jugendsprache.html; 18.01.2022)

At this point, I myself feel obliged to speak up for youth language. It regularly provides me with funny moments and exciting conversations. But more importantly, it shows me how productive and adaptable language is. Language is a substance that can be formed and expanded, on the lexical, syntactical and grammatical levels. This quality is what characterises language, what makes it interesting and alive.

Young people exploit the productive potential of language more than other age groups. They invent new words, use terms from other languages, particularly English, and adapt structures to give what they say more weight. Sometimes they do this consciously to set themselves apart. Sometimes it happens unconsciously, because language reflects young people’s reality and daily lives.

As adults we don’t have to like everything that young people do with their language. Neither do we have to actively use this language. However, we should maintain a certain openness towards new creations, grammatical variations and foreign language influences. Otherwise it’s easy to forget what a versatile asset our language is.