Understanding the Language of Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Created | Updated Feb 28, 2007
Apart from its huge cult following, one other thing that Buffy the Vampire Slayer has created is its own unique language, often referred to as Slayer Slang or Buffy-isms. Each character has their own way of speaking; this is evident in many of the quotes.
e.g. A simple two word quote from Willow is 'Bored now!' One not only knows this as a Willow phrase, but that it is only used when she becomes evil, either as Vampire Willow1 or Evil Willow2.
'When the apocolypse comes, beep me' - Buffy
'Party in my eyesocket and everyone's invited... Sometimes I shouldn't say words' - Xander
Creating the Language
However, the problem was how do you get so many characters to become so distinctive? Well, Joss Whedon3 devised the perfect solution; you just create a whole new language. Of course the problem then becomes - How do you go about creating the language of Buffy? It’s really quite simple. A lot of the Buffy-isms used within the show were already in existence, such as 'flake' meaning someone who behaves oddly. 'Bad' used in context to mean mistake, an example coming from the 1995 film, 'Clueless'4, 'Oops! My bad'.
The most common of all Buffy-isms were created for the show by using a very simple system, take an everyday word and expand on it, by adding ...ness, ...age or the letter 'y' or 'ey' at the end of a word. An example would be the word 'research' this would be expanded on to become researchy, or the word 'fling' would become flingage. Some more examples are badness, sparkage or rampagy.
'You don't hide! You're bait. Go act baity!' - Xander
'I hate being obvious. All fangy and Grr.' - Spike
Pop Culture
Of course you can't invent an entire language for a show such as Buffy the Vampire Slayer without creating a few new words, such as Slayerpalooza meaning 'the celebration of Slayer', Ewanage meaning exposure to 'Ewan McGregor' or Otherwhere, a different twist to 'elsewhere'.
One of the key aspects to the language was the use of 'pop culture' references; lines, characters, song/film titles or even quotes from films:
The references to 'pop culture' were used to describe feelings, a look and many, many other situations.
'The count of three isn't a plan, it's Sesame Street'7 - Buffy
'I'm the one getting Single White Female'd8 here' - Buffy
Condensed Buffy-isms
Another aspect of the language was condensing information, after all, Buffy and The Scoobies9 were often in life or death situations, they didn't always have time to be all long winded.
eg. We might say; 'We aren't at the stage in our relationship where we send each other flowers.' the Buffy-ism would be: 'We're definitely pre-posey'.
This can be used in any situation and by any person, like when Principal Snyder was interviewing Buffy on her return to school:
Buffy - 'So let me get this straight. I'm really allowed back into school because the school board over ruled you. Wow! That's like having your whole ability to do this job called into question when you think about it!'
Joyce then turns this into a condensing Buffy-ism with:
'I think what my daughter is trying to say is, nah! nah! n-nah! nah!''Fire bad. Tree pretty.' - Quoted by Buffy in the last episode of season 3. Basically meaning that she is tired and unable to think clearly.
And Finally...
... There's Joss Whedon's own contribution to the language. The quip, pun, the hint of sarcasm that really helped to make the show as enjoyable as it was.
'Great, we're not even married yet and already you've stopped listening to me.' - Xander
'One of these days you'll wake up in a coma.' - Cordelia
'No, I'm a rebel, you're an idiot.' - Spike
'I laugh in the face of danger. Then I hide until it goes away.' - Xander
'It's a big rock. I can't wait to tell my friends. They don't have a rock this big!.' - Spike
'Harmony's a vampire? She must be dying without a reflection.' - Buffy
Now that you have the basic idea of how to speak Buffy, why not try it yourself?
