The significance of what we saw on TV last Saturday did not make itself apparent to us until Monday morning. We’re not talking about the hammering of Hatton – for hecklerspray that seemed an obvious outcome way beforehand.
No, on Monday we realised that we had witnessed a change in linguistic perimeters and that another model of ‘youth speak’ had been officially consigned to the dustbin of common usage.
It was at about 11am on Saturday morning, whilst enjoying a post-Friday cup of tea that it happened. The Hobbit-esque chef Antony Worrall Thompson linked into the upcoming ad break on Saturday Cooks with the phrase:
"See you in a bizzle."
We blame our tiredness for not noticing it sooner but it definitely happened and the more we think about it, the more significant it seems.
Don’t get us wrong, this is in no way the first time someone decidedly uncool has ruined what was trendy by associating themselves with it in the mainstream, and it certainly won’t be the last, but we were excited to have actually witnessed the official death.
The ‘Izzle diction’, as we’ll glibly refer to it, is an American import that has been around since the late ‘70s. It’s basically the same as Yoggish or any of the many other secret languages that children make up to try and alienate adults, collectively known as ‘Pig Latin’.
The rules of the Izzle diction, though not set in stone are that you can add ‘izz’ or ‘izzle’ after a pre-vowel consonant in any word ie:
Computer could be ‘Compizzle’ or ‘computizzle’
You can also put ‘izz’ before any lone vowel ie:
O can be Izzo
A can be Izza
Izzle diction is entirely reliant on context to make sense, for instance Bizzle could be ‘brother’, ‘business’ or any other word beginning with ‘B’.
This is one of the two reasons why this particular strain of ‘Pig Latin’ has made it out from the New York ghettos where it was conceived. Unlike other secret languages that require thought and effort, ie: move the first consonant to the end of the word and replace it with a vowel sound etc, ‘Izzle’ is easy and can mastered by anyone.
The second reason is that this particular strain had celebrity endorsement in the form of perennial hip-hop mischief-maker Snoop Dogg. He wasn’t the first rap artist to commit ‘Izzle’ to acetate; that honour goes to Frankie Smith with Double Dutch in 1981, but he is certainly the most prolific. Snoop first quoted ‘Izzle’ on his debut on Dr Dre’s Chronic album in 1992, where it could have been seen as an act of homage to both New York and Frankie Smith for their influence on hip-hop culture.
However, the cruel may say that Snoop’s full-blooded adoption of Izzle didn't come until he decided to stop making good records in favour of upping his weed intake and directing rubbish porn films. After all, it’s easy to knock out an album a year if all the words in every song end in ‘izzle’!
Through his patronage, Izzle spread over the US and then across the pond, but we think even he would be surprised that it made it all the way to the vocab of a chubby, middle class chef with a double barrel name.
The rules that govern security breaches of youth lingo are of course well documented.
Initial response will be for the original users to feign ignorance of the mainstream trespass to the outside world. Meanwhile behind the scenes, people will be slowly distancing themselves from the leaked area. The artist Lethal Bizzle will go back to being Lethal B, unless he’s seen to be too integral to the Bizzle phenomenon and cast aside. If this is the case AWT will be responsible for killing a career as well as a dialect!
As ‘Izzle’ gets more and more mainstream, the young and funky will deny ever using it in the first place and instantly latch themselves onto something more exclusive and obscure to prove it. The only hint of association that will remain will be the excruciating embarrassment they feel whenever an adult uses the term in future.
And so now hecklerspray waits to see with baited breath the next cool casualty of overuse and what it will be replaced with…
Gordon Brown addressing the right honourable member for the opposition as ‘blud’?
Alan Titchmarsh describing the successful re-development of the Ouze washes as ‘Nang’?
We’re keeping our fingers crozzled!
[story by Matthew Loader]
