Slagging, the Dozens game, and the cultural utility of teasing…

Wednesday, July 19, 2023. The height of an invincible summer in the Berkshires.

What is Slagging?

In European Irish culture, Slagging is a conversational dynamic which ostensibly seems contemptuous and insulting… but nothing could be further from the truth.

Some critics of American culture are amused by our wholesale enforcement of inclusion and polite discourse, especially in a diverse workplace.

On the surface, personal insults are seen as incongruent with affectionate bonds, and compliments.

Americans are somewhat familiar with insult games, such as the Dozens. As a little white boy growing up in Dorchester Massachusetts in the early 60’s I was witness to, and participated in, many neighborhood Dozens game group outings. An ideal Dozens audience is about 8-10 people.

What is the Dozens game?

Ah, the Dozens game! I haven’t thought about the Dozens for such a long time until now. I was so fascinated by it in my childhood. The Dozens game is deeply rooted in urban African American history.

What is the Dozens? It is a proud tradition of verbal sparing, exchanging humorous, fast paced, but with bluntly pointed insults.

It involves two individuals, or teams, engaging in a verbal jousting match, aiming to outwit and outplay their opponent with creative insults and clever comebacks. The audience decides the winner by popular acclaim. Part of the aesthetic is a lively back in forth where dozens of insults are matched with worthy retorts… hence, the Dozens.

The game often revolves around humorous exaggerations, personal flaws, and teasing elements that display their wit and intellect. The goal is not to cause genuine harm, but rather to demonstrate quick thinking and clever wordplay while deeply entertaining the audience. The audience is what matters in the Dozens.

So how can a 9 year old white boy win the Dozens?

But win it I did…

It was the summer of 1962. Roscoe was winding up, but his insults were derivative, lacked imagination, and were too personal.

I was up. I said..Your sister Emmie is so skinny… How skinny is she? She’s so skinny that when she turns sideways the teacher marks her absent!

The hoots and hollers confirmed that I had won.

Poor little Emmie was incredibly skinny. But so was I…and I knew that salient fact made my effort even funnier. I generously offered Roscoe a ready-made avenue for retort to keep the Dozens game going… for our audience and their continued amusement.

I won on my aesthetic, not my wit.

Back to Slagging…

To the Irish, Slagging is an aspect of “Craic,” a term the Irish use to describe light, engaging and enjoyable conversation, and any teasing is understood as good natured, and no harm is meant by what is being said.

And to that extent, Slagging, and the Dozens seem congruent on the surface.

In an American workplace, for example, a boss will dutifully tell his employee how great they’re doing. He’s trained to be polite, inclusive, and specific with his praise.

But in Ireland, that same boss would be far more likely to tell his staff that “we had a good quarter because some of you decided to get off your lazy arses and work for a change!”

Slagging and the Dozens… and the importance of Craic…

As in my early childhood experience of the Dozens, light-heartedness usually wins the day.

Harsh words, employed with humor, and barely tinged off-handed praise, may not be utterly foreign to American society, but the way the European Irish do it with Craic is so profoundly different..

The Irish avoid true landmines of personal sensitivity, I’ve had European Irish clients who’ve complained to me that their American spouses miss the intent of their light-hearted Craic.

Many expressed bewilderment that what they were saying situation quickly escalated with their partner.

Some of these clients were being truthful, they were easy to work with. Gottman is quite specific about the science of marital teasing

But a respectable number were merely passive aggressive men, exploiting an apparent cultural divide. There was no Craic…

This is why cultural competence is such a vital aspect of solid, science-based couples therapy.

Final thoughts on Slagging, Craic, and the Dozens…

• What matters most is how the communication lands… how is it understood? How is the subtext of anxiety in the situation being managed?

• Middle America may struggle to comprehend how creating tension and then diminishing said tension, might have nervous system utility. Slagging remains a recognizable expression of Irish culture, as is the Dozens among inner city Black Americans.. but why?

• Do Slagging and the Dozens function as cultural antidotes to narcissism?

• And what role does having a homogenous societal culture… (where shared meanings are implicitly understood… little to no variation in beliefs exists, and the culture has one primary way of thinking and acting)… have in expressing teasing as a mode of social engagement?

Diversity and meaning…

It’s fair to argue that there are no longer true homogenous societies. Some degree of diversity exists in all nations, but the fundamental factor is the degree of variation in the shared meanings that are found acceptable within a society.

• Perhaps Americans are atomized in a highly narcissistic, defiantly individualistic society. What if as a result, we require self-confidence boosts at regular intervals?

The European Irish, on the other hand, are taught to downplay their achievements. Who the hell do you think you are.. someone special?

Did Slagging and the Dozens evolved as an adaptation to enhance mental resilience in order to better endure a shared existential suffering? …a suffering which comes from being flattened by forces both within and without?

• What Slagging and the Dozens share is social appreciation for skillful displays of wit and camaraderie, but both also recoil from authentic cruelty as a violation of the social compact that makes slagging and the dozens socially acceptable in the first place.

• The rejection of purposeful personal cruelty violates the social aesthetic of the Dozens and Slagging.

• That’s why I call bullsh*t when a spouse complains about cultural confusion with their partner, deciding that “you’re just too sensitive.”

The pseudo-cruelty of Slagging and the Dozens obscures the utility of insult humor to mentally toughen the cohort of an oppressed culture.

What seems on the surface to be a back-handed compliment, or decidedly faint praise… emerges to convey a shared sense of meaning and perspective on common suffering, which is still somewhat beyond the cultural experience of most polarized Americans.

If we lack cultural clarity…let’s keep it kind, please. Thank you, and Godspeed.

REFERENCES:

http://www.independent.ie/lifestyle/slagging-is-so-much-part-of-what-we-do-that-we-find-it-odd-when-someone-objects-26469553.html

http://www.enjoy-irish-culture.com/Irish-customs-of-interacting.html