The Expanding Domains of Sheng: The Use of a Sheng-based Slang in Kenyan Secondary Schools

Abstract

Sheng, an urban youth spoken in Kenya, has continually expanded its domains of usage. It is now used in political discussions, advertising, creative and performing arts, mass communication, broadcasting, and other forms of communication. Using data collected from secondary schools students in three counties in Kenya, this article argues that high school students are using Sheng-based slang, an indication of the Sheng expansion. It is argued that high school students use this Sheng-based slang to talk about matters pertaining to schools. Word lists questionnaires containing words pertaining to school matters were translated by purposively selected male and female students from five schools in three counties in Kenya. The analysis shows that the high school slang exhibits word formation features associated with Sheng, such as lexical and morpho-phonological manipulations known in Sheng such as truncations, semantic extensions, hypocorisms, coinages, and others.