ABSTRACT
Slang is a linguistic category that has long defied those who have sought to define it (Dumas and Lighter 1978; Adams 2009). The qualities that make it so difficult to define apply to both its English and Chinese versions.1 Part of the difficulty in identifying specific defining criteria stems from slang’s status as a folk category. Slang is, in a sense, what the speakers of a given language believe it to be, and different speakers have different understandings about what it is.
