Meaning of nadsat | Babel Free

Definitions

1. Alternative letter-case form of Nadsat.
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2. The Russian-influenced argot used by the teenage protagonists in Anthony Burgess's novel A Clockwork Orange (1962).

Equivalents

Examples

“[…] Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange, narrated by its teenage punk of a protagonist in an argot called nadsat, which is composed (a psychologist in the book explains) of "odd bits of rhyming slang. A bit of gypsy talk, too. But most of its roots are Slav." […] Despite the dazzling tour de force Burgess brings off, l have not included A Clockwork Orange in my discussion for several reasons. First, nadsat is primarily a parody of the exclusiveness and ephemerality of teenage slang: […]”

“Concocted from various sources including rhyming slang, modified Russian and Slavic vocabularies, and a dash of pure invention on Burgess's part, nadsat captivated [David] Bowie, particularly after he had heard it spoken aloud in Stanley Kubrick's celebrated film adaptation. […] Within days of seeing Kubrick's film in January 1972, David had incorporated the nadsat word "droog" (Russian for "friend", and the term given by Alex to his fellow hoodlums) into the lyric of his latest song 'Suffragette City'.”

“[…] Anthony Burgess' A Clockwork Orange, narrated by its teenage punk of a protagonist in an argot called nadsat, which is composed (a psychologist in the book explains) of "odd bits of rhyming slang. A bit of gypsy talk, too. But most of its roots are Slav." […] Despite the dazzling tour de force Burgess brings off, l have not included A Clockwork Orange in my discussion for several reasons. First, nadsat is primarily a parody of the exclusiveness and ephemerality of teenage slang: […]”

“The Iraqi Misinformation Minisiter speaks about ACO in Nadsat!”

“In order to get a full sense of the effect of Burgess's and [Floriana] Bossi's respective Nadsats, it is necessary to examine a complex narrative unit of source and target texts. This will also enable the reader to appreciate the musicality of the original Nadsat.”

“Nadsat has been called many things, such as a constructed language, slang, register, and sociolect. Its definition is not single layered since one could argue in favour of all the cases. In the introduction to the 1996 edition [of A Clockwork Orange], Blake Morrison refers to it as a language: […] However, it can be said that Nadsat is also a register since Alex is capable of speaking standard English when he wants to (with his parents at times, for example) […] Furthermore, Nadsat can also be defined as a 'sociolect' as this term stands for any language spoken by a particular social (sub)group and is based on social, cultural, economic and institutional criteria[…]. Nadsat is spoken (not written) by Alex, his group of friends and by other teenage subgroups; other characters in the novel (the doctors, government officials) use standard English words without Russian transliterations. Moreover, Nadsat can be viewed as slang since its vocabulary and expressions seem to be of inferior value in comparison with standard English.”

CEFR level