CB slang is the distinctive anti-language, argot, or cant which developed among users of Citizens Band radio (CB), especially truck drivers in the United States during the 1970s and early 1980s. [1]
The slang itself is not only cyclical, but also geographical. Through time, certain terms are added or dropped as attitudes toward it change. For example, in the early days of the CB radio, the term "Good Buddy" was widely used. [2]
Nicknames or callsigns given or adopted by CB radio users are known as "handles". [2] [3] Many truck drivers will call each other "Hand," [4] or by the name of the company for which they drive.[ citation needed ]
CB and its distinctive language started in the United States but was then exported to other countries including Mexico, Germany, and Canada.
| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| Baby Bear | Rookie police officer. |
| Bear | A police officer. (See "Smokey" below) |
| Bear bite/Invitation | Speeding ticket |
| Bear cave/Bear's den | Police station. |
| Bear in the air | Police officer in some form of aircraft. (See "Eye in the Sky") |
| Bear rolling discos | A speeding police car with its lights flashing. |
| Bear trap | RADAR or speed trap. |
| Bear with ears | A police officer monitoring the CB airwaves. |
| Blue Light Special | A police vehicle with its blue strobe lights flashing (from the popular Kmart sale gimmick). |
| Checkpoint Charlie | Police checkpoint placed to look for intoxicated drivers, drivers with invalid licenses, etc. (alludes to the former border crossing between East and West Berlin). |
| Chicken Coop/Chicken House | A scale house (truck scale), or the weigh station where they are found. |
| Cop-ulating | A collaborative task force of multiple agencies and/or jurisdictions conducting a checkpoint, speed enforcement or other targeted “sting” operation. |
| County Mountie | A county sheriff or deputy. |
| DOT | Department of Transportation enforcement vehicle. |
| Eaten by a bear | A truck driver caught by a police officer for speeding or some safety infraction. |
| Evel Knievel | Police officer on a motorcycle (refers to the popular motorcycle stuntman). |
| Eye in The Sky | Police aircraft, airplane or helicopter. |
| Flying doughnut | A police helicopter. |
| Fox in the hen house/Smokey in a plain wrapper | Unmarked police vehicle. |
| Full-grown bear | State police trooper. |
| Gumball machine/Bubble gum machine | Police vehicle, especially one with the older-style, dome-shaped red rotating/strobe light commonly mounted on the roof of police cars, which resembles a traditional "penny" gumball machine. |
| Hitting the jackpot | A driver pulled over for a traffic stop by law enforcement. Refers to the siren lights on top of a police cruiser, resembling the bright lights on a casino slot machine. |
| Kojak with a Kodak | Police officer running radar. |
| Local yokel | A local city police officer. |
| Mama Bear | A less derogatory term for a female police officer. |
| Miss Piggy | A female police officer (refers to the Muppet character, derived from the pejorative term "pig" for police officers). |
| Mountie Mountie | Member of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police |
| Papa Bear | A male police officer or police supervisor such as Sergeant or higher rank. |
| Polar bear | A white unmarked police vehicle. |
| Smokey | A police officer (refers to Smokey Bear, known for wearing a campaign hat very similar to that included in many highway patrol uniforms in the United States; origin of Smokey and the Bandit movie title). |
| Smokey with a Customer | Driver getting busted by a police officer and being given a ticket |
| Starsky and Hutch | Police officers (refers to the to the 1970s American action television series Starsky & Hutch ). |
| Sunoco Special | New York State Trooper |
| Super trooper | State police trooper. |
| Taco stand | Border patrol stations on the Mexico–United States border. |
| Wall-to-wall bears | A large number of police vehicles, especially when on a chase. |
| Term | Description |
|---|---|
| 18/18 wheeler | A truck with a total of 18 tire/wheels. It can also be used for any truck usually with a fifth-wheel hitch and a semi-trailer even if the vehicle doesn't have dual wheels, or tandem axles. |
| Aircraft carrier | Tractor/trailer carrying a disassembled aircraft, helicopter or a small plane. |
| Angry kangaroo | A truck with one (or both) of its headlights out. |
| Big Truck | Generally a truck able to pull a semi-trailer, usually with the trailer and not bob-tail. It can mean any vehicle Class 7 or heavier. |
| Blinkin winkin/Kiddie car | School bus. |
| Bulldog | A Mack road tractor, noted for its trademark bulldog hood ornament (origin in World War I when British soldiers called the Mack AC "The Bulldog", giving the name and trademark hood ornament to Mack). |
| Bullfrog | An ABF truck. |
| Bull hauler | A livestock hauler that is empty (for a loaded one see Go Go Girls) |
| Bobtail rig/Bobtail | Road tractor driving without a trailer. |
| Buster Brown | UPS truck. |
| Cab-over | A truck where the cab sits directly over the engine. Much less common in North America since the overall length law changed in 1976. |
| Cash box | A toll booth. |
| Chicken Truck | A dressed up and fancy truck. Usually means extra chrome, wide front bumper, extra light, etc. Can also mean a fast truck. Does not mean a truck hauling chickens. |
| Coal bucket | Truck with a trailer for hauling coal, especially an end-dump trailer. |
| Container | An intermodal shipping container. Refers to a cargo container that goes overseas, get loaded onto a train, or get placed on a truck chassis. |
| Corn flake | A Consolidated Freightways truck. |
| Cornbinder/Thirteen Letter Shit Spreader | A Navistar International or International Harvester truck. |
| Covered Wagon | A Tarp Trailer |
| Doubles | Refers to a double set of trailers |
| Draggin Wagon | A tow truck also called A Wrecker. |
| Dry Van | A Trailer without a refrigeration unit or insulation. |
| Drop and Hook | The process of dropping off a trailer a then picking up a replacement trailer at a destination. |
| Dung Beetle | A Volkswagen Beetle with a male driver. |
| Fender Bender | An accident (now widely used among the general public). |
| Freightshaker | A Freightliner truck. |
| Four Wheeler/Four-wheeler | Any vehicle with only four wheels. Most often used for personal cars/vans/SUVs. |
| Go-Go Girls (on the dance floor) | A Livestock Truck preferably hauling pigs or cows |
| Green Machine | A Military vehicle |
| Hood | A conventional road tractor, with the engine in front of the cab. |
| Jimmy | A GMC road tractor. |
| Juice Box | A tanker hauling perishable liquids preferably juice concentrate to a processing plant. |
| K-Whopper | A Kenworth road tractor. |
| Louisville | A Ford L-Series truck. |
| Meat Wagon | An ambulance. |
| Milk Bottle | A Milk Tanker. |
| Boiler/Pete/Petercar | A Peterbilt road tractor. |
| Pigtails | The cables that supply air and power to a trailer. |
| Piggy back | A truck towing another truck. |
| Piggy Bank | An armored car. |
| Portable Barn | A Livestock Truck. |
| Portable parking lot/Rolling parking lot | A tractor/trailer loaded with new or used cars, a car transporter. |
| Pregnant roller skate | A Volkswagen Beetle. |
| Pumpkin/Pumpkin roller | A Schneider National tractor/trailer. |
| Reefer | A refrigerated trailer or flatbed trailer hauling a refrigerated container. |
| Rolling refinery | A tanker truck, typically carrying fuel. |
| Salt shaker | Highway department truck for spreading ice melt chemicals on the road, traditionally salt. |
| Scanny | A Scania AB truck. There are around 500 in the United States[ clarification needed ]. It is very rare, so it is used only in social media (truck pages in Facebook, YouTube, etc.). |
| Skateboard | A straight, flatbed trailer. |
| Star Car/Big W | A Western Star road tractor. |
| Super Chickens | YRC tractor/trailer. |
| Thermos Bottle | A road tractor with a chemical trailer. |
| Turkey hearse | A truck with a load of turkeys headed for slaughter. |
| Wiggle Wagon | A road tractor with more than one trailer. |
| Yard dog, yard goat, yard horse or mule | Terminal tractor used to move trailers in a shipping/freight yard. |
| Term: | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Beantown | Boston, Massachusetts (now widely used among the general public). |
| Beer Town | Milwaukee, Wisconsin |
| Berta | Alberta. |
| Big Apple | New York, New York (now widely used among the general public). |
| Bingo or Bingotown | Binghamton, New York. |
| Big D / Emerald City | Dallas, Texas (now widely used among the general public in "North Texas") |
| The Bubbly | Champaign, Illinois. |
| Chocolate Town | Hershey, Pennsylvania (reference to Hershey's Chocolate's; now widely used among the general public) |
| Choo Choo Town/Tow City/ Chatty | Chattanooga, Tennessee (After the song “Chattanooga Choo-Choo”) (in reference to Miller Industries and being the birthplace of the Tow Truck) |
| Corn patch | The Midwest. |
| Cow Town | Fort Worth, Texas. Or Calgary, Alberta. |
| Crashville | Nashville, Tennessee. |
| Derby City/Derby Town | Louisville, Kentucky. |
| The Dime | Interstate 10 |
| Disney Town | Anaheim, California. |
| Flagtown | Flagstaff, Arizona. |
| Flower City | Rochester, New York |
| Flying Hook | Flying J Truckstop chain |
| Fort God | Memphis, Tennessee. |
| Gateway/Arch Town/The Big Arch | St. Louis, Missouri. |
| Ghost Town | Casper, Wyoming |
| Guitar Town | Nashville, Tennessee. |
| Gunspoint | Greenspoint (an area of Houston, Texas). |
| Hippie Haven / Bat City / Waterloo | Austin, Texas. |
| Hog Town | Toronto, Ontario. |
| Hotlanta | Atlanta, Georgia (now widely used among the general public). |
| Space City/H-Town/Astrodome/The Oil Patch | Houston, Texas. (reference to the oil industry, Johnson Space Center, and the Houston Astrodome) |
| Indy 500/Indy 5 | Indianapolis, Indiana (reference to Indianapolis Motor Speedway home of the Indy 500) |
| Idiot Island | California. |
| The Ike Highway | Interstate 80 California, Nevada, Utah, and Wyoming, Interstate 25 from Cheyenne to Denver,and Interstate 70 from Denver to Baltimore as shown on signs saying Dwight D. Eisenhower Highway. |
| Job Town | Clinton, New Jersey. |
| Little Cuba | Miami, Florida |
| Lost Wages/Sin City/Dice Town/Gimbaling Town | Las Vegas, Nevada. |
| Mardi Gras/Crescent City | New Orleans, Louisiana. |
| Mickey Mouse | Orlando, Florida (a reference to Walt Disney World resort). |
| Mile High | Denver, Colorado (now widely used among the general public as "The Mile High City"). |
| Monkey Town | Montgomery, Alabama ('Monkey' being diminutive form of 'Montgomery'). |
| Motor City | Detroit, Michigan (now widely used among the general public). |
| Nickel Road | Interstate 5 |
| The Pokey | Pocatello, Idaho |
| Queen City | Charlotte, North Carolina; Cincinnati, Ohio; or Buffalo, New York. |
| Quarterback | Interstate 25 |
| Red Stick | Baton Rouge, Louisiana. |
| Rhymes with Fun | Regina, Saskatchewan. |
| Ripoff Griffin's | Rip Griffin's, a well known truck stop outside Dallas. |
| Rock City | Little Rock, Arkansas. |
| Salty | Salt Lake City, Utah (a reference to the Great Salt Lake) |
| Shakey City or Shakeytown | Los Angeles, California, California (a reference to earthquakes). |
| Silly Circle | The Capital Beltway, a beltway around Washington, D.C., running through Virginia and Maryland. |
| Stack of Bricks | A house or home ("I'm heading back to my stack of bricks"). |
| Steam Town | Scranton, Pennsylvania. |
| Steel City | Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (now widely used among the general public). |
| The Sticker Patch | Phoenix, Arizona (a reference to the cacti in the area). |
| Spud Town | Boise, Idaho. |
| T Town | Texarkana, Texas/Arkansas or Tulsa, Oklahoma. |
| Tonto | Toronto, Ontario. |
| Taco Town / Alamo City | San Antonio, Texas. |
| UFO Central | Roswell, New Mexico, Nevada State Route 375, and Area 51 or any area where UFOs have been sighted. |
| Windy City | Chicago, Illinois (now widely used among the general public). |
| Term | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 4-10 | A reversal of the ten code "10-4," when asking if someone agrees with something said or if one's transmission was received. ("That was a nasty wreck. Four-ten?") |
| 5 by 5 | Indicates that another CB user can be heard clearly (see "Wall to wall and treetop tall" below). |
| 10-4 | Acknowledged; can also be used to denote or emphasize an agreement ("That's a big 10-4."). |
| 10-6 | Busy; stand by. [5] |
| 10-7 | Signing off. |
| 10-8 | En route. ("I'm 10-8 to your location.") |
| 10-9 | Last transmission not received; repeat your last transmission. |
| 10-10 | CB user will cease broadcasting but will continue to listen. ("I'm 10-10 on the side.") |
| 10-20 | Denotes location, as in identifying one's location ("My 20 is on Main Street and First"), asking the receiver what their current location or immediate destination is ("What's your 20?"), or inquiring about the location of a third person ("OK, people, I need a 20 on Little Timmy and fast"). |
| 10-32 | Radio check |
| 10-33 | Emergency traffic, clear the channel. CB code for Mayday for trucks and police cars. |
| 3s and 8s | Well wishes to a fellow driver. Borrowed from amateur radio telegraphy codes "73" (best regards) and "88" (hugs and kisses). |
| 10-36 | Correct time ("Can I get a 10-36?") |
| 10-41 | Driver is signing on or changing the channel on their radio |
| 10-42 | An accident |
| 10 in the wind | Listening to the CB while driving (also known as "10-10 in the wind"). |
| 10-70 | Report a fire |
| 10-100 | Restroom break. |
| 10-200 | Police needed at ________. (In the trucking-themed movie Smokey and the Bandit, a character jokingly plays off this usage, saying that 10-100 is better than 10-200, meaning that 10-100 was peeing and 10-200 was doing a #2.) |
| 20 | Abbreviation of "10-20" seen above. |
| Affirmative | Yes. [6] |
| Alabama chrome | Duct tape. |
| Alligator Station | A user who talks constantly and seldom listens (comic reference to an alligator - all mouth and no ears). Someone who will not shut up. Frequently refers to a powerful local base station transmitting to mobile CBers, often on channel 19. Similar to Bucket mouth/Linear lungs, but a base station rather than a mobile. Sometimes, though rarely, used to refer to a very loud mobile user. |
| Aye-firmative | Variant of Affirmative. |
| Back Door | The rearmost vehicle driver in a group that watches for police officers approaching from behind and gives warning to the others in the group to slow down when speeding. See also Front Door and Rocking Chair. |
| Back it Down | Reduce driving speed to the speed limit. |
| Back row / Party row | An area of a truck stop, generally located in the back of the property, where prostitutes congregate. |
| Bambi | Wildlife on the road mainly Deer. (from the Disney Movie Bambi) |
| Bear bait | An erratic or speeding driver. [7] |
| Bird-dog | RADAR detector. |
| Bird-dog is Barking | RADAR detector indicating that RADAR is being used. ("My bird-dog is barking."). |
| Billy-Bunn | Funny Driver |
| Bob-tail | Semi-truck traveling without a trailer. |
| Boop Boop/Cluck Cluck Chicken Truck | Ways chicken haulers greet each other |
| Break/Breaker | Informing other CB users that you would like to start a transmission on a channel. May be followed by either the channel number, indicating that anyone may acknowledge (e.g., "Breaker One-niner" refers to channel 19, the most widely used among truck drivers), or by a specific "handle", which is requesting a particular individual to respond. [6] |
| Bucket mouth/Linear lungs | Someone swearing on CB/Someone who will not shut up. Similar to "Alligator Station", but usually refers to a mobile user rather than a base station. |
| CB Rambo | A radio user who brags about his fighting prowess but won't actually fight. |
| Chicken Coop | The Weigh Station also called a Port of Entry or The Scales, Scale House |
| Chicken Lights | Extra marker lights, usually far in excess of what the law requires. The lights on a chicken truck. |
| Choke and puke | A truck stop restaurant, especially one known for its less-than-quality food. |
| Comedian | The median or central reservation of a highway. As in, "A bear taking pictures from the comedian." |
| Copy that/Copy | Acknowledgement "I heard you" or "I understand." |
| Cotton Choppers | Other people as a group who are referred to as being bothersome or annoying. Often used in a comic fashion. Occasionally used in a friendly fashion as a rough term of endearment to refer to others. Sometimes used to refer to other people in general, especially those who do not use CB radios. |
| Cotton-pickin' | Substitution for foul language (now widely used among the general public) |
| Crotch rocket | A very fast motorcycle (now widely used among the general public). |
| Do a flip | Turn around and go the opposite direction. As in, "That county mountie did a flip when the bear bait went by in the hammer lane." |
| Double-nickels | A 55 mph speed zone. |
| Drain the Dragon/ The Double D | Comic reference for a restroom call. |
| Driver | Generally restricted to someone who drives a truck, not just anyone who's driving |
| Eat 'em up | A restaurant. |
| Feeding the bears | Speeding or driving recklessly. |
| Fifty-Dollar Lane | The inside lane (left most lane) in either direction of an eight-lane highway. |
| Fingerprint | The driver has to load, or more commonly, unload the trailer. That is, to put his fingerprints on all the boxes. |
| Flip-flop | Used by truckers to refer to the return trip or traveling back the other way, especially when referring to going home on an outbound run. |
| Four/Foe | Refers to 10-4, dropping the 10; also "Yeah, Four", "Foe", or "Yeah, foe" (slang for "four"). |
| Flag in five-mile wind | A 45-mph speed zone. |
| Flying The Coop | Going though a weigh station without stopping and triggering a port runner. This type of activity is illegal and reckless driving and can result in an arrest. |
| Fox hunt | A direction finding activity using cars and vans fitted with CB radios. The objective of this activity is to use a signal strength meter to triangulate or otherwise locate a hidden transmitter, or "fox". |
| Front Door | The leading vehicle driver in a group that watches for police officers approaching from the front or officers watching oncoming traffic from the side of the road. This driver gives warning to the others in the group to slow down when speeding. See also Back Door and Rocking Chair. |
| Gator, or Alligator | A large piece of tire on the road. From a distance it can resemble an alligator sunning on the road. |
| #handle, Got your ears on? / Anybody/Anyone got their ears on? | Asking if a specific person is listening to a given channel / Asking if anyone is listening to a given channel [8] |
| Green stamp(s) | Cash money (refers to S&H Green Stamps). When used in the singular form, can also refer to a toll road, such as the New Jersey, Ohio, and Pennsylvania Turnpikes which are all denoted by green route markers (also a speeding ticket) |
| Go-go juice | Fuel ("I need to get some fuel.") |
| Groceries | Goods being hauled. |
| Good buddy | In the 1970s, this was the stereotypical term for a friend or acquaintance on the CB airwaves. [9] [10] [6] |
| Good numbers | Well wishes to a fellow driver. |
| Hand | Person, especially a working person like a hired hand. Sometimes used to distinguish a between a driver and one who isn't. ("I talked to a hand who wants to become a driver.") |
| Handle | The nickname a CB user uses in CB transmissions. Other CB users will refer to the user by this nickname. To say "What's your handle?" is to ask another user for their CB nickname. [6] |
| Hammer | Gas pedal/ accelerator |
| Hammer down | Driving at high speed - or trying to with the gas pedal fully depressed. ("He's got the hammer down!", "I put the hammer down, but this is as fast as it goes."; now moderately used among the general public.) |
| Hammer Lane | The passing lane or the "fast lane". Example: "Don't let smokey see you camping out in the hammer lane, buddy." |
| Hot mic | A CB user monopolizes a radio channel. |
| Hundred-mile coffee | Very strong coffee. |
| Jabber/Jabbering idiot/Babble/Babbling idiot | A CB user transmitting in a foreign language. |
| Keep the left door closed | Make time by not stopping. |
| Kicker/Footwarmer | A linear amplifier used to illegally increase CB transmit power. A favorite tool of Alligator Stations, Bucket Mouths and Linear Lungs. Frowned on by most users. |
| Lot lizard | A prostitute in a rest area or who works the parking area of a truck stop. |
| Mud Duck | A cb user that has a weak signal and they keep trying to talk despite the fact that no one can understand them. |
| Nap Trap | A rest area |
| Negatory | No, Negative (often emphatic, like "Hell no") (also 10-77, or 10-double-7) |
| On one's donkey | Following one too close; tailgating. ("You have a sports car 'on your donkey'.") |
| Outdoor TV | A drive-in theatre. |
| Over one's shoulder / Over one's donkey | The road behind that one has just traveled. ("How's it look over your shoulder / over your donkey?") |
| Peanut butter in one's ears | Oblivious to or ignoring CB transmission |
| Pickle park | A rest area. Sometimes one especially known for prostitution. (Also can be used to describe large grassy medians on highways. Example: There's a smokey doing flip flops around the pickle park) |
| Reading the mail | Operator is listening but not actively transmitting. |
| Rocking Chair | The vehicle(s) in a group positioned between the Front Door and Back Door drivers. Called the Rocking Chair because drivers in that position of the group can relax while speeding because the Front Door and Back Door drivers are watching for the police. See also Front Door and Back Door. |
| Rubbernecking/ Rubbernecks/ Rubberneckers | Looking at something on the side of the road, causing a backup. People slowing down to look at something, particularly an accident. |
| Sandbagging | Listening to CB conversation without participating, despite having the capability of speaking. This is not the same as listening in using a simple receiver, as the person sandbagging can transmit using the two-way radio, but chooses not to. [11] [12] It is for the purpose of monitoring CB users for entertainment or for gathering information about the actions of a particular user. Often, CB users "sandbag" to listen to others' responses to their previous input to a conversation, sometimes referred to a "reading the mail". [13] |
| Seat cover | An attractive woman in a vehicle, especially one who is scantily-clad or wearing sexy clothing. |
| Semi-pro | Pickup truck drivers congregating with truckers. |
| Thick Stuff | Bad weather preferably fog caused by rain or heavy snow. |
| Three Sisters | Three large hills on I-80E between Salt Lake City, Utah and Fort Bridger, Wyoming. (Now used by the general public.) May be related to the “three sisters” rogue wave on Lake Superior. |
| Triple Nickel | CB users sometimes migrate to "out of band" channels/frequencies, most famous one being 27.555 MHz also referred to as "triple nickel", well above the 40ch CB standard allowing for a more private conversation and enhanced radio communications. Modified equipment is usually required. |
| Turn and burn | To return from a destination back to the original starting point of a trip, especially in a hurry and/or non-stop so as not to lose time. |
| Turtle race | Two trucks side by side, one trying to pass the other; but both have speed-governors. |
| Suicide jockey | A driver who is hauling dangerous goods, such as explosives. |
| Wall Paper | A traffic citation/ticket (especially a speeding ticket). |
| Wall to wall and treetop tall | An exceptionally clear, strong signal/transmission. |
| Watering Hole | The truck stop |
| Yardstick | A mile marker or mile post |
Internet slang is a non-standard or unofficial form of language used by people on the Internet to communicate to one another. An example of Internet slang is "LOL" meaning "laugh out loud." Since Internet slang is constantly changing, it is difficult to provide a standardized definition. However, it can be understood to be any type of slang that Internet users have popularized, and in many cases, have coined. Such terms often originate with the purpose of saving keystrokes or to compensate for small character limits. Many people use the same abbreviations in texting, instant messaging, and social networking websites. Acronyms, keyboard symbols, and abbreviations are common types of Internet slang. New dialects of slang, such as leet or Lolspeak, develop as ingroup Internet memes rather than time savers. Many people also use Internet slang in face-to-face, real life communication.
Leet, also known as eleet or leetspeak, is a system of modified spellings used primarily on the Internet. It often uses character replacements in ways that play on the similarity of their glyphs via reflection or other resemblance. Additionally, it modifies certain words on the basis of a system of suffixes and alternative meanings. There are many dialects or linguistic varieties in different online communities.
A slang is a vocabulary of an informal register, common in verbal conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-groups in order to establish group identity, exclude outsiders, or both. The word itself came about in the 18th century and has been defined in multiple ways since its conception.
Nadsat is a fictional register or argot used by the teenage gang members in Anthony Burgess's dystopian novel A Clockwork Orange. Burgess was a linguist and he used this background to depict his characters as speaking a form of Russian-influenced English. The name comes from the Russian suffix equivalent of -teen as in thirteen. Nadsat was also used in Stanley Kubrick's film adaptation of the book.
Jargon or technical language is the specialized terminology associated with a particular field or area of activity. Jargon is normally employed in a particular communicative context and may not be well understood outside that context. The context is usually a particular occupation, but any ingroup can have jargon. The key characteristic that distinguishes jargon from the rest of a language is its specialized vocabulary, which includes terms and definitions of words that are unique to the context, and terms used in a narrower and more exact sense than when used in colloquial language. This can lead outgroups to misunderstand communication attempts. Jargon is sometimes understood as a form of technical slang and then distinguished from the official terminology used in a particular field of activity.
Polari is a form of slang or cant used in Britain by some actors, circus and fairground showmen, professional wrestlers, merchant navy sailors, criminals, sex workers, and, particularly, the gay subculture. There is some debate about its origins, but it can be traced to at least the 19th century and possibly as early as the 16th century. There is a long-standing connection with Punch and Judy street puppet performers, who traditionally used Polari to converse.
Citizens band radio is a land mobile radio system, a system allowing short-distance one-to-many bidirectional voice communication among individuals, using two-way radios operating near 27 MHz in the high frequency or shortwave band. Citizens band is distinct from other personal radio service allocations such as FRS, GMRS, MURS, UHF CB and the Amateur Radio Service. In many countries, CB operation does not require a license and may be used for business or personal communications.
Ten-codes, officially known as ten signals, are brevity codes used to represent common phrases in voice communication, particularly by law enforcement and in citizens band (CB) radio transmissions. The police version of ten-codes is officially known as the APCO Project 14 Aural Brevity Code.
A walkie-talkie, more formally known as a handheld transceiver (HT), is a hand-held, portable, two-way radio transceiver. Its development during the Second World War has been variously credited to Donald Hings, radio engineer Alfred J. Gross, Henryk Magnuski and engineering teams at Motorola. First used for infantry, similar designs were created for field artillery and tank units, and after the war, walkie-talkies spread to public safety and eventually commercial and jobsite work.
A cant is the jargon or language of a group, often employed to exclude or mislead people outside the group. It may also be called a cryptolect, argot, pseudo-language, anti-language or secret language. Each term differs slightly in meaning; their uses are inconsistent. Richard Rorty defines cant by saying that "'Cant', in the sense in which Samuel Johnson exclaims, 'Clear your mind of cant,' means, in other words, something like that which 'people usually say without thinking, the standard thing to say, what one normally says'." In Heideggerian terms it is what "das Man" says.
UHF CB is a class-licensed citizen's band radio service authorised by the governments of Australia, New Zealand, Vanuatu, and Malaysia in the UHF 477 MHz band. UHF CB provides 77 channels, including 32 channels allocated to repeater stations. It is similar in concept to the General Mobile Radio Service in the United States.
"Convoy" is a 1975 novelty song performed by C. W. McCall that became a number-one song on both the country and pop charts in the US and is listed 98th among Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Country Songs of All Time. Written by McCall and Chip Davis, the song spent six weeks at number one on the country charts and one week at number one on the pop charts. The song went to number one in Canada as well, hitting the top of the RPM Top Singles Chart on January 24, 1976. "Convoy" also peaked at number two in the UK. The song capitalized on the fad for citizens band (CB) radio. The song was the inspiration for the 1978 Sam Peckinpah film Convoy, for which McCall rerecorded the song to fit the film's storyline.
Handle with Care is a 1977 comedy film directed by Jonathan Demme. It takes place in a small town in Nebraska and is based on the wide popularity of citizens band radio, widely known as CB at the time. The film was originally released as Citizens Band and was later released in an edited version as Handle with Care.
Prison slang is an argot used primarily by criminals and detainees in correctional institutions. It is a form of anti-language. Many of the terms deal with criminal behavior, incarcerated life, legal cases, street life, and different types of inmates. Prison slang varies depending on institution, region, and country. Prison slang can be found in other written forms such as diaries, letters, tattoos, ballads, songs, and poems. Prison slang has existed as long as there have been crime and prisons; in Charles Dickens' time it was known as "thieves' cant". Words from prison slang often eventually migrate into common usage, such as "snitch", "ducking", and "narc". Terms can also lose meaning or become obsolete such as "slammer" and "bull-derm."
Back slang is an English coded language in which the written word is spoken phonetically backwards.
"The White Knight" is a novelty country music song made famous by Jay Huguely, who - recording as Cledus Maggard & The Citizen's Band - enjoyed a brief run of national popularity with the song when it became popular in 1976.
Citizens band radio is a system of short-distance radio communications between individuals on a selection of channels within the 27-MHz band. In India, this frequency band extends from 26.957 MHz to 27.283 MHz. There are several different channel plans in use. Citizens band is distinct from the Family Radio Service, GMRS, Multi-Use Radio Service and amateur radio (Ham). In many countries CB operation does not require a license, and it may be used for business or personal communications. Like many other two-way radio services, any citizens band channel is shared by many users. Only one station may transmit in a channel at a time; other stations must listen and wait for the shared channel to be available. Also, the system works in half-duplex mode, which means we may transmit and receive information, but not both at the same time.
"Twink" is gay slang for a man who is usually in his late teens to twenties whose traits may include a slim to average physique, a youthful appearance, little or no body hair, flamboyancy, and general physical attractiveness. Twink is used both as a neutral descriptor, which can be compared with bear, and as a pejorative.
Truck-driving country or Trucker country is a subgenre of country and western music. It is characterized by lyrical content about trucks, truck drivers or truckers, and the trucking industry experience. This includes, for example, references to truck stops, CB radio, trucker jokes, attractive women, romance, heartbreak, loneliness, stimulants and eugeroics, teamsters, roads and highways, billboards, inclement weather, traffic, ICC, DOT, car accidents, washrooms, etc. In truck-driving country, references to "truck" include the following truck types: 10 wheeler, straight truck, 18 wheeler, tractor (bobtail), semi, tractor-trailer, semi tractor trailer, big rig, and some others. Truck-driving country musicians include Dave Dudley, Red Sovine, Dick Curless, Red Simpson, Del Reeves, the Willis Brothers, Jerry Reed, C. W. McCall, Mac Wiseman, and Cledus Maggard.
Jive talk, also known as Harlem jive or simply Jive, the argot of jazz, jazz jargon, vernacular of the jazz world, slang of jazz, and parlance of hip is an African-American Vernacular English slang or vocabulary that developed in Harlem, where "jive" (jazz) was played and was adopted more widely in African-American society, peaking in the 1940s.