To Verlan or Not to Verlan? Decrypting French Slang
I often hear foreign students in Paris complain about how needlessly complicated the French language is. Guessing the gender of nouns, learning words with letters that we hardly know when, why, and how to pronounce (or not to pronounce), deciphering rules about pronouns that change depending on their position in the sentence or the teacher's mood…
Learning Molière’s language sometimes feels like trying to unravel an Agatha Christie mystery novel. And just when you think you've figured out what's going on, there’s a new plot twist: the French youth decided to adopt verlan as a way of communicating.
For those who don't know, verlan is a cryptic French slang that flips the syllables of words in order to create new ones, without changing their original meaning. In a familiar context, for example, a young French person may say ci-mer instead of mer-ci. The same logic applies to other words: chien → iench, méchant → chan-mé.
If you haven’t guessed, the word verlan itself is the inversion of the word l'envers, which means ‘back-to-front’: l'en-vers → vers-l'en → verlan. Got it?
I can almost see you rolling your eyes and thinking: “Yeah… As if learning classical French isn’t confusing enough…You expect me to speak it backwards now?"
My objective here is not to teach you verlan but to help you understand the logic and history behind it — and hopefully minimize some of the confusion. But I warn you in advance that much like classical French, the rules of verlan are inconsistent and confusing. Because who doesn't love a good linguistic puzzle to solve while trying to order their coffee?
You may also have noticed from some of the examples above, that in verlan, not only do we invert the syllables of a word, but we also reserve the right to change its spelling. It's like playing a game of Scrabble, but you have to unscramble the letters to figure out what the word even is.
And to make matters worse, there is also something called ‘double verlan’, when verlan words are ‘verlanized’ again. It's like a never-ending cycle of confusion. For example: femme → e mmef → meuf → femeu.
The origins and evolution of verlan
If you are a bit lost, you’re not alone. Verlan was deliberately invented to create confusion and break rules. It was a way for the youth to rebel against the rigidity of classical French — and also a way to protest against the oppression of the ruling class.
But ironically, as the creators of verlan are inherently French at heart, they have also made the alternative language needlessly complex.
Verlan is an old tradition in France that dates back several centuries, but its modern version was popularized in urban peripheries, starting in the 1960s and especially in the 1980s.
For young people from these neighborhoods (often populated by the working class and immigrants), verlan carried a sense of identity and rebellion at the same. It was a way of belonging to a group through a language that, for once, the elites and the older generation could not understand.
To verlan or not to verlan?
At this point, you may be wondering: “But what about foreign students? Is verlan meant to confuse us as well?”
Here's the thing… at its core, verlan is meant to give its users a sense of pride and exclusivity. Like a French club, where only the ‘cool kids’ are allowed in. So much so that if a foreign student, an older person, or let’s say a politician tries to use the language without mastering it, they will be ridiculed.
In 1987, the main French railway company (SNCF) tried to appeal to the youth with its slogan C'est ble-ssi-po! (taken from C'est po-ssi-ble). Ouch! Not only did the word not exist in verlan, but it immediately became a running gag for several years.
As a foreign student, there are some exceptions that you might get away with. This is the case with ouf (the inversion of fou), which means ‘crazy’ or ‘incredible’ and now transcends age and social class.
Some of these most popular words are now part of the classical French dictionary. In contrast, other verlan words have become outdated, such as zic-mu (mu-sic → zic-mu). Yes, you read that right. Sometimes we flip English words too.
So if you are still trying to get your head around classical French, you probably shouldn’t worry much about learning verlan.
Sure, knowing a few slang words might help you better understand some of the dialogues in your favorite French movie or series on Netflix. But in your daily life, you probably won’t be using or hearing it. Most French speakers will avoid using verlan when speaking to a foreigner.
So, there you have it. Whether this article made you appreciate or despise the French language more, I hope I've given you a little insight into our love for complicating things.
Cimer !
Jeanne
P.S. I want to thank my colleague , who had the daunting task of translating and adapting this article which was originally written in French.
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