Encyclopedia > Pig latin

  Article Content

Pig latin

Pig Latin is a language game that can be created from, i.e., based on, any language, although it is most commonly based on the English language. The rules are roughly:

  • For words that begin with consonants, move the leading consonant(s) to the end of the word and add "ay." Thus, "ball" becomes "all-bay"; "button" becomes "utton-bay"; "star" becomes "ar-stay"; "three" becomes "ee-thray";
  • for words beginning with "qu," move the "qu" to the end of the word and add ay. Thus "question" becomes "estion-quay"; and
  • for words that begin with vowels, simply add "way" to the end of the word. Thus, "a" becomes "a-way"; "at" becomes "at-way"; "ermine" becomes "ermine-way." This rule tends to get varied a lot, with some variants using instead "h" (thus, "at" becomes "at-hay"), or some just using the bare syllable "ay" ("at" becomes "at-ay").

A Pig Latin example text follows:

Is-thay is-way an-way example-way of-way Ig-pay Atin-lay. As-way ou-yay an-cay ee-say, its-way illy-say, ut-bay ots-lay of-way un-fay or-fay ildren-chay.

Certain Pig-Latin translations, most notably ixnay, have been incorporated into English slang.



All Wikipedia text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License

 
  Search Encyclopedia

Search over one million articles, find something about almost anything!
 
 
  
  Featured Article
Bullying

... basis of authority. The first to have the title of "Tyrant" was Pisistratus in 560 BC. In modern times Tyrant has come to mean a dictator who rules with ...

 
 
 
This page was created in 39.4 ms