A fleek'er of the Queen's English

Remember when “swag” was the coolest word on the block? Well, according to millennials, it’s time to move on from lol, dope, swag, face palm, etc. Youngsters today have come up with new and more happening ways of describing things. Because “tbh” (to be honest), those words have become too basic, ya know?

Trying to understand what these youngsters today are talking about, by calling each other “bae,” (before anybody else) and talking about who they “ship”? They help explain the words, for your better understanding, or alternatively to forget classical language, entirely. “His level of ‘thirst’ is too damn high, doesn’t mean she’s actually thirsty! It mean’s that person is over eager or too desperate!” explains Sona Rajashekhar, a student from the city, of the meaning of — “thirst.”

“We use the terms ‘bae’ and ‘ship,’ to show affection for each other and support couples,” explains the Josephite. In case you were wondering, she wasn’t talking about friendship or babies. ‘Ship’ is the new word that is used to support a romantic relationship between two people, while ‘bae’ technically stands for ‘before anyone else’. “I ‘ship’ Gigi and Zayn together but Harry Styles is ‘bae’,” she says, giving an example.

There are new words they use to describe arrogance and meanness! “Throwing shade,’ is a term used to describe ‘fakeness or arrogance’ while we ‘swerve’ away from people we don’t like,” explains Rakshith Murthy, referring to the term coined by Kanye West.

“‘Fleek’, is also a newly-coined term that means ‘perfection.’ Everybody from the Kardashians to YouTube sensations are using it to describe their make-up and outfits,” says Shalini Aggarwal, another student.

There has also been some contemplation about these words being added in the dictionary, in the near future, because that’s how popular they have become! These words seem to be stemming from social media sites where most of the comments are ‘ELI5’, ‘dipset’ and ‘turnt up’. “These words are all the rage right now. ‘ELI5’ means ‘explain like I’m five’.

‘Dipset’ is usually said to end a conversation because the other person feels it’s too lame to continue and ‘turnt up’ is used to caption most party pictures and stands for ‘hyped up’, meaning it was quite an event,” explains Aishwarya Ravi, commerce student in the city.