What would you wear to an ABC party? Hint: the letters stand for “Anything But Clothes.” Any guesses what you’d wear to a tight-and-bright party? Martha gives a taste of the college party terminology from a slang collection compiled by Penn State student Emily Grier. This is part of a complete episode.
Transcript of “ABC Party”
You’re listening to A Way with Words. I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
I’ve never been to an ABC party, but, you know, Grant, I’m tempted to throw one just to see what everybody would wear.
ABC party?
Yeah. You know what I’m talking about?
I don’t actually know what that is.
This is a term, ABC party, which means anything but clothes.
So you go to the party and you wear anything but clothes.
So maybe duct tape or, I don’t know, Monopoly money, candy bar wrappers.
Wouldn’t it be great to throw an ABC party?
Yeah, maybe, as long as it wasn’t all Saran wrap.
Who uses this language?
Apparently college kids.
Really?
I was just reading online.
There’s an article by Emily Greer.
She’s a sophomore at Penn State University.
And she was just collecting some college slang from her peers for incoming freshmen.
And one of the terms is ABC party, where you wear anything but clothes.
Oh, cool.
And apparently there are a lot of different kinds of parties in college.
Yes, there are.
Who would have thought?
I know that was a long time ago, Martha, but yes, they still party in college.
Well, in my day, they didn’t have tight and bright parties.
I hesitate to ask.
Well, you just have to wear clothes that are really bright and really tight.
Oh.
And she says that apparently in lieu of toga parties, which was more my era, now you have highlighter parties.
And those are when you wear clothes that would show up really well under a black light.
And you can take highlighters and write on each other’s clothes.
And it’s just, you know, a good time is had by all.
Sounds great.
Lots of party language.
Lots of party language.
And another one that I was really interested in was the term sexiled.
But that’s not party language.
Well, it’s a party for two.
Well, yeah.
Being sexiled means that you’re not able to stay in your dorm room because your roommate is entertaining for a bit.
Oh, I see.
You remember those days?
Yeah.
Yeah.
-huh.
Yeah.
So anyway, just a little glimpse into college, and probably that’s the sound of parents shuddering across the nation.
And so that’s an article by Emily Greer.
Yeah.
Yeah, online.
On hercampus.com.
We’ll link to that on the website.
Yeah.
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