Monday, January 30, 2006


"Urban Dictionary", an otherwise useful resource, has no definition for "dudespeak." There is this, but frankly it's not that helpful.

In fact, I have not found any good entries anywhere on definitions.

This one cartoon is quite useful, but it is simply an introduction. (on the other hand, it does contain the second law of thermodudenamics, so it is a delight: "In all isolated cultural exchanges, irony increases.")

It appears to have a specific meaning. World of Warcraft, for example, specifically bars character or pet names that contain "Leet" or "Dudespeak." (No, don't ask how I know that.) Now, leet is well defined. And Wikipedia has this on "dude". But...not good. And, there is this, too. And this meditation on dudity, from an outside perspective.

Clearly, the language is important. There is already a "Dude to English" lexicon.

What is "dudespeak", and how would one know if a sentence or expression were an example?


janet said...

It seems that these dudespeaks are not really related. There is the spoken kind which is the california surfer type. And then the internet one. But I don't know what the difference between that and Leet is. Maybe they are interchangeable? Whatever this online language is, the middle school kids that I tutor in English use it way too often. I try to deal with this by making them transcribe IM-speak in blogs into plainer English, but I'm not sure who I'm punishing more.

Oh, and a belated welcome back to the blogosphere.

mungowits said...

Thanks, Janet! Good to hear from you....

I bet you are right. Just different things. Most likely DS is just a synonym for Leet, in this context.

And "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" speak in person. Incredibly annoying, in both contexts. And that is presumably the point. Or a desirable side effect. If old people like me get mad, a nice bonus.

Anonymous said...

Rob Schneider has a routine back in the early 90's (I believe) where the entire dialogue was in dudespeak. Various inflections of the word "dude" were used to denote differnt feelings.

JC said...

Leet speak is definitely not the same thing as Dude speak. Leet speak has its origins in the 80s, when computer crackers and phone phreakers would replace regular characters with something else to represent it. For example e -> 3, so it is actually l33t speak. The end result is that l33t sp34k is a cipher, whereas dude speak is more its own language. A subset of modern slang. N.B. however that l33t speak is no longer en vogue with any respectable hackers and you are automatically relegating yourself to the status of "script-kiddie" by using it.

Anonymous said...

Mungo, you will dig this, because ur teh r0x:

Romeo & Juliet for the l33t. Not, repeat not, very work-friendly.

mungowits said...

I may, or may not, b teh r0x.

But that little Romeo and Juliet DOES answer the question. THAT is dudespeak: middle class white punks text messaging like they were genius but ghetto hackers.

Do go to that link:

Thanks, anon. That settles it.

Anonymous said...

I just thought Leet was just a different way of saying Elite on the internet... perhaps i'm wrong though.

Anonymous said...

I do not understand why World of Warcraft would ban leet or dudespeak from character names. If someone wants that in their name, then let them. I made up a nice unique name, that flows well but Blizzard made me change it because it violates their dudespeak terms... I don't even know what that really means since they dont define it.

I guess Blizzard is just a bunch of old 80 year old geezers who dont appreciate the youth who support them.

Anonymous said...

L337 mean to pwn. in other words own. very good. Like my skills are l337 or leet.

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Anonymous said...


Let me clarify - dudespeak and leet aren't REMOTELY related.

Dudespeak is a SPOKEN language, for one, not a text-based language, and typically involves varying uses of the word "dude," as well as slang like grindage (food), and things typically associated with surfers.

Movies containing serious Dudespeak include: Biodome (starring Pauly Shore, who pioneered dudespeak and made it popular as an MTV VJ)
Dude, Where's My Car?
Fast Times at Ridgemont High
BASEketball (including an entire dialoque with characters only using the word DUDE to communicate.)

Hope this helps.