verlan

What it means

1. 1.

   The French practice of inverting a word's syllables to create a slang form. Not a single word but a whole productive system, and the single most distinctive feature of French slang.

Examples with translations

• Meuf, keum et relou, c'est du verlan.

  Meuf, keum and relou are all verlan.

• Les jeunes inventent du verlan tous les jours.

  Young people coin new verlan constantly.

Where it comes from

The name is itself verlan: l'envers ('the reverse') becomes verlan. Some words have been reversed twice — beur, verlan for arabe, was re-reversed into rebeu once beur became mainstream. That double inversion is a defence mechanism: verlan exists to stay ahead of outsiders.

First attested: documented from the 19th century; widespread from the 1970s