June 1938 in Home and
school "Readers’ Questions"
Secret codes
“A. B. C.” writes: My two children, a girl of eleven and a
boy of nine, are always talking to each other in some sort of gibberish or
secret language which they have invented themselves, and which no-one else can
understand. It seems to amuse them very much, although it is very annoying to
other people who are present. They have a sister of fifteen who gets very
annoyed when the two younger ones are obviously having a lot of fun between
themselves, and I suspect are making rude remarks about her. She suspects it
too and tells them what bad manners they have. I don’t know what it is they
talk about, but they sometimes get quite excited, and of course, the moment
they think that other people are annoyed or puzzled by their talk they do it
all the more. Do you think I ought to stop them, or to punish them for it?”
It is very tantalising for older
children when younger ones have this secret way of communicating, which seems
to be at the expense of others, and many grown-ups too find it very provoking.
It is, however, a common practice just at the age of your two children. Most
children in a family invent some sort of language or code or sign by which they
can express their feelings to each other, and keep the grown-ups at bay.
These code
words are not always worthy of the name of ‘a language’. Sometimes mere tones
of voice will do the trick, or special endings to certain words, or just two or
three words substituted for the real ones in a sentence. But every now and then
a full-blown secret language appears, with its own words and its own rules of
grammar.
With an
intelligent child who is really interested in language, and whose gifts take
this particular bent, you may get quite a rich and varied language, especially
if she has three or four other children who will play the game with her.
It really
is a very harmless way of keeping other people at bay, don’t you think? The
children feel a sense of oneness with those who speak their code. They are able
to give vent to their criticisms or even their spite in a way that does no harm
to the victim. The only thing that your older daughter can really object to is
being shut out of the fun.
A great
many of these secret languages have been collected and studied, and they are
very interesting in many ways. It has even been suggested that the age when the
child naturally invents or joins in these secret languages, from about eight to
eleven or twelve, is the best time for learning a foreign language.
I would
certainly not try to stop your boy and girl amusing themselves in this way. It
is a perfectly normal thing to do at their age; and it will encourage their
interest in language as a whole and their understanding of the structure of the
languages.
Meanwhile,
it is a very harmless outlet for their less friendly feelings about the faults,
and inconsistencies which children of this age are very quick to see in the
behaviour of older people. If the elder sister is very annoyed, I would say
something of all this to her. Perhaps, too, she enjoyed a cipher language at
school, if not at home, when she was about the same age, and can remember the
amusement it gave her.
You could
remind her that things look very different to the eyes of children of nine and
eleven from what they do at fifteen or sixteen. If you enlist her imagination a
little on their behalf, and in a sense ally yourself with her without actually
criticising them, she will probably find it easier not to feel that their fun
is directed against her.
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