Army slang: history of appearance, features of use, meanings of words

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:42

Army is an isolated system. It is hardly possible to understand what is happening there without going through it. As a rule, newcomers, having just found themselves in a military environment, are in shock. And it greatly hinders the understanding of army jargon and vocabulary. Sometimes it is impossible to guess what some words mean that experienced people in a military unit constantly pour in.

What is this

Slang is a set of words that have a completely new meaning in a certain social environment. Otherwise, such words are called jargon. They are found, as a rule, in a professional or isolated environment. So, slang can be youth, medical and so on. Army slang has been formed from the names of weapons for centuries. It reflected hazing between the military. The history of army jargon is rooted in antiquity. Specific words and tendencies to call things by new names in the military environment originated at the dawn of Russian statehood, and some expressions came from there.

Features

Dealing withmodern army slang, it must be borne in mind that, despite globalization, it will greatly depend on the area in which the unit is located. In different parts, the same words will have different meanings. Influences the army slang and what nationalities, from which regions of the country the local composition has crept up. As a rule, each fighter brings a couple of words from his area, which are quite capable of becoming common among colleagues. And so it is with people from many regions.

Throughout history

In the specific words that the servicemen used when communicating with each other, processes that took place in their historical era were manifested at all times. So, in the 1960s, many convicted men were driven into the Soviet army. At that moment, army slang was quickly replenished with words from the criminal environment.

Traces of this process are still clearly visible. In the 1990s, many drug addicts were drafted into the army. And this was also reflected in the language in which the soldiers communicated with each other. The slang was passed down from generation to generation, and the imprint of drug addicts has remained in the army to this day.

Role

It is noteworthy that in some cases slang plays a completely understandable and important role. In the course of hostilities, it was precisely by possession of it, by the knowledge of specific words used in Russian units, that they determined whether one or another went into radio contact. There is evidence that this was actively used by Soviet soldiers in the Afghan war.

Official studies of army slang actuallyhave never been produced. He lives in oral form, being transmitted in the military environment from "grandfathers" to "spirits". Almost the only major attempt to explore this slang in a scientific work was made by V. P. Korovushkin in 2000. He compiled a dictionary of non-standard army vocabulary, which included 8000 words. Information about the military slang used in different historical eras is preserved in the memoirs of service people.

Oksana Zakharchuk's classification is also known. She divided the specific words used by the military into groups: those related to weapons, ranks, and everyday life. In the course of this work, she revealed that, in fact, the creation of army slang was provoked by the desire of servicemen to bring the military objects and weapons around them closer to the atmosphere of civilian life, peaceful life, thereby smoothing out their own terrible impression of what was happening.

Examples

Definitions of words may differ from part to part, but, as a rule, their general meaning is approximately the same. As a rule, one of the first jargon that a recruit encounters is associated with the division of soldiers by service life.

"Spirits incorporeal", "spirits" are called only those who entered the service. Usually these are those who take the course of a young fighter. These names are common to all types of troops.

"Elephant" in army slang is a soldier in the first 6 months of service. It is also called "salaga", "siskin", "goose". Not always used in army jargon "elephant" - it will depend on the location of the unit, its traditions. TotalThere are more than 20 names of this category of employees. Some of them are:

1. "Cauldrons", "scoops", "pheasants" were traditionally called those who served from a year to 1.5 years.
2. “Grandfathers”, “old men” and “demobilization” are those who served 1.5–2 years. After the reform, which reduced the term of service to 1 year, the term of service required to obtain such a non-statutory “title” was also reduced accordingly.
3. "Demobilization chord" in army slang is something that must be done by demobilization before the final departure from the military unit at the end of the service life. As a rule, this is something useful for the company.
4. "Chest" in army jargon is an ensign or midshipman in the navy. This is a rather old jargon that appeared in ancient times. It is known that in the 1960s it already existed and was actively used.

Armaments

It is customary in the military environment to designate existing weapons in a special way. Often, names that were not easy to remember or pronounce for a long time were abbreviated or given a nickname, highlighting a special feature of the technique.

It is known that in the Afghan war "Black Tulip" denoted the An-12 aircraft. It was he who transported the bodies of the fallen soldiers:

1. "Behoi" was also called BMP and similar vehicles.
2. "Box" - armored vehicles, including the T-80. Jargon was actively used during the Chechen campaign.
3. Shaitan Pipe is an RPG.
4. "Zinc" - a box of cartridges or a "zinc coffin" in which the body was transported.
5. "Cheerful" - that was the name of the MiG-21. According to the survivingaccording to information, he received such a nickname for flying up quickly.
6. The MiG-25 was called the "Alcohol carrier". So he was nicknamed for the fact that at least 200 liters of alcohol were poured into him in order for the anti-icing system to work.
7. "Pill" - an ambulance.

Impact on daily life

It is noteworthy that the jargon used in the military environment passed into civilian life after leaving the service of the army. And some of them are very tightly integrated into everyday life. For example, "cargo-200" came from the military environment. Initially, this was the name of the body in an official document - an order of the Ministry of Defense, which introduced a new procedure for transporting dead soldiers. The order number was 200.

After his approval, this is how the bodies of the military began to be called, the privates in the Afghan campaign began to use this expression very actively so that the enemy could not understand them. They broadcast over the radio: “I’m carrying cargo-200.”

It must be taken into account that many words that are used in a separate unit may simply be unknown to representatives of other military units. For example, there is no army jargon “in pantyhose” in any dictionary - no one noted such words. At the same time, there are statistics of requests for this word on the Internet. That is, someone from those who heard this word in their military unit tried to find out what its meaning is. And this is a great example of local slang that exists only in oral form in a particular part or area.

Uniforms

Uniforms, correctits donning is an essential part of military use. Therefore, the soldiers could not ignore the names of objects from this side of life, but gave nicknames to objects from this sphere:

1. "Sand" - fabric or clothes from "hebe". Named for sandy shades.
2. "Hebe" is a cotton fabric, the word came from the abbreviation "cotton".
3. "Pesha" is a word produced in exactly the same way, but from the abbreviation "p / w" - "semi-woolen".
4. "Snot" - lychka.
5. "Cabbage" - buttonholes.
6. "Brakes" - a special ribbon sewn on the bottom of the trousers. It is passed under the foot, used to pull the pants down.

Additional words

1. "Zelenka" - green spaces, as they were often called in the war. These are thickets of bushes.
2. "Guba" is a guardhouse where fighters and officers are serving their sentences. It is a separate place, a closed chamber.
3. "Chmo" is a very common word in the army. Denotes "a person who has morally fallen." This jargon is an imprint of the presence in the army of many people from the criminal environment - it came from there, from places of detention.
4. "Cigar" - the name of the missiles. It was widely used in Afghanistan so that the enemy did not understand what was at stake.
5. "Thread" - the column of equipment was called according to the same principle.
6. "Kefir" - fuel during the Afghan campaign.

It is noteworthy that a large part of the army slang is spelled completely differently, the pronunciation can also vary. Some jargon in this environment arises anddie, their use depends on the current weapons in the military unit, the contingent of the assembled soldiers.

At paratroopers

Slang paratroopers formed in the Soviet era. Many jargons that appeared here were not used in other branches of the military. At the same time, the chauvinism of the paratroopers is clearly noted. They always sought to demonstrate their own superiority over the rest of the troops. This is due to the history of the Airborne Forces and manifested itself in a variety of eras.

Thus, during the war in Afghanistan, the paratroopers gave the rest of the military branches offensive nicknames. The motto of the Airborne Forces sounds like: "No one but us." Already there is a message in it, implying that they could, and the rest did not. In the online paratrooper slang dictionary compiled by paratrooper Vadim Grachev, there are words for all letters except "I". The reason is simple - in the Airborne Forces there is no such thing as “I”, there is only “we”:

1. "VeDes" - in the language of the paratroopers, this is an officer of the Airborne Forces.
2. "Berdanka", "kladets" - a Kalashnikov assault rifle.

At the same time, in this environment there was a common slang for any servicemen. The Airborne Forces also have "spirits" and "grandfathers". A few more jargon words:

1. “Raiders” are colleagues who became heroes of a hazing situation, which necessarily violates the charter and entails punishment from the officers who caught the fighters in violation.
2. "Hemorrhoids" - in the language of the Airborne Forces, these are signalmen.
3. "Quarantine" is a place where recruits gather to move away from the horror experienced during the first time in the military unit. They don't gather herethose who have already served for some time, officers do not come here, and here you can take a breath.
4. "Dolphinarium" - sink in the dining room.
5. "Smell" - time before the oath.
6. "Subscription" - registration for contract service.

It is noteworthy that the division by type of troops is generally characteristic of army slang. Each branch of the military has some words used in this sense only in it. Also, army slang is necessarily part of the folklore and moralizing tales that the army environment is always overgrown with.

Conclusion

Thus, at the moment, the jargon of the military environment is the product of a mixture of criminal, youth and historical service slang. In addition, it includes words from the local slang of people who arrived in the unit from various regions of the country to serve.