Meaning & use
argot
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Meaning
nouncountable or uncountableformal
The special words and expressions used by a particular group, such as thieves or students, which outsiders often cannot understand.
Grammar: Usually uncountable for the style of speech: prison argot; countable for one specific variety: the argots of different gangs.
Patterns
- the argot of something
- in the argot of something
The novel is full of the argot of London pickpockets.
Teenagers develop their own argot to keep parents guessing.
In the argot of sailors, a landlubber is someone who stays ashore.
Word forms
| plural | argots |
|---|
Common combinations
- criminal argot
- Detectives had to learn the criminal argot to follow the recorded calls.
- prison argot
- The writer captured prison argot with great accuracy.
- in the argot of
- In the argot of the trade, a rookie is a 'greenhorn.'
- secret argot
- The smugglers used a secret argot nobody else understood.
- street argot
- His rap lyrics are rich in street argot.
Synonyms and how they differ
- jargon
- Jargon is the technical vocabulary of a profession and is not secret, while argot often hides meaning from outsiders.
- slang
- Slang is informal vocabulary used widely by many people, whereas argot belongs to one closed group.
- cant
- Cant is old-fashioned speech of thieves or beggars, similar to argot but more dated.
- lingo
- Lingo is an informal word for any group's speech, with less sense of secrecy than argot.
Opposites
Word family
Commonly confused: argot or jargon?
argot vs jargon
Jargon is the professional vocabulary of a field such as law or computing, while argot is the speech of a closed or secretive group.
Practice
The detective needed an expert to translate the gang's ______, which was designed so that police could not follow their phone calls.
Choose one answer.
Argot is the private vocabulary of a group that outsiders cannot easily follow. Accent concerns pronunciation and would not hide the meaning of words.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “argot”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.