NEW YORK FOLKLORE QUARTERLY
Vol. IV, No. 1, Spring 1948

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SERVICE LORE: ARMY VOCABULARY
Joseph B. Roulier

FROM ALL that has been said of the need for readjustment when a serviceman returns to civilian status, it is evident that the Army style of living is quite different from the civilian’s lot. It takes only a little reflection to figure out why and how this difference comes about. Ordinary individuals are taken from the usual sheltered home environment and thrust into a vast, uniformed organization where even one’s personal habits feel the effects of an implacable, twenty-four-hour authority overhead. Living conditions are decidedly communal and, what is probably even more significant, completely masculine. No longer is the soft feminine touch around to serve as an unconscious check on man’s essentially plain and unpolished personality.

Thus the Army is not exactly the ideal setting for a normal existence and the pursuit of happiness via ordinary channels. It is in its way as foreign to the program of most mortals as were the conceptions of living dreamed up by such groups as the Mormons, Shakers, and the like. It features such comparable principles as community living apart from the rest of society and an oversuppression of individual liberty for the supposed benefit of all.

Just as those groups were bound to develop cultural aspects somewhat divergent from our own, so has the Army produced forms of speech, manners, and traditions peculiar to itself. No one will deny the distinctiveness of the military mode of oral expression. The more liberal-minded may even find it amusing. Also interesting are the attitudes and façons d’agir that develop from the soldier’s overcompensation mentally for his subjugation physically: his unconscious elation at evading a work detail; his self-righteous outlook on passing the buck; his inner satisfaction when he thwarts authority with impunity. Many curious customs have arisen in the Army associated directly with the necessity for co-operation, the standardization of living, the caste system of rank, and the revision of civilian conventions. To the student of unwritten traditions of the people, the Army offers a unique fie1d.

When one first enters the Army, he finds himself continually being startled by the vocabulary and sayings of the more seasoned soldiers around him. At first it sounds like an affectation or a deliberate attempt to be different. Then one realizes that these things are said because they are so conveniently expressive, often because of the lack of a good civilian equivalent. Soon the words become perfectly familiar and gradually the new recruit unconsciously merges them with his existing verbal repertory. Perhaps his background influences his usage so that a new interpretation or different flavor is added. Thus the War Department’s philological archives are enriched....

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