Valley girl is a stereotype depicting a socio-economic class of women characterized by the colloquial California English dialect Valleyspeak and vapid materialism. The term originally referred to an ever increasing swell of semi-affluent and affluent middle-class and upper-middle class girls living in the early 1980s Los Angeles commuter towns of the San Fernando Valley.
In time the traits and behaviors spread across the United States and Canada, metamorphosing into a caricature of unapologetically spoiled "ditzes" and "airheads" more interested in shopping, personal appearance and social status than intellectual development or personal accomplishment.
Sociolect
A sociolect associated with valley girls termed "Valleyspeak" spoke in the San Fernando valley in the 1980s. Qualifiers such as "like", "whatever", "way", "as if!", "totally" and "tubular" (a surfing term) interjected in the middle of phrases and sentences as emphasizers. Narrative sentences were often spoken as if questions using a high rising terminal. Heavily accented words were spoken with high variation in pitch combined with very open or nasal vowel sounds.
In popular culture
The height of the "Valley Girl" period was during 1982-83, with several films, shows and music of the New Wave era embodying the "Valley" atmosphere of the San Fernando Valley during that time.
In 1982, composer Frank Zappa released the single "Valley Girl", with his 14-year old daughter Moon Unit speaking typical "Valley Girl" phrases. Zappa intended to lampoon the image, but after the song's release there was a significant increase in the "Valspeak" slang usage, whether ironically spoken or not.
The 1982-83 CBS TV show Square Pegs featured Tracy Nelson playing Jennifer DeNuccio, a popular Valley Girl at the high school.
The 1983 film "Valley Girl" starring Nicholas Cage centered on a group of "Valley Girl" characters and featured several characterizations associated with their lifestyle (such as going shopping at the mall or "Galleria," suntanning at the beach, and going to parties).
The protagonist of the 1995 film Clueless has been described as a caricature of 1990s "Valley Girls," though she is actually from nearby Beverly Hills.
See also
- Bimbo
- Bobby soxer
- California English
- Chav
- Dumb blonde
- Essex girl
- Fjortis, used to describe similar behavior in Scandinavian youth
- Fresa, the Mexican equivalent, literally translated into English as "strawberry"
- Glamour
- Jewish princess
- Julie Brown, among the performers from the era who personified and popularized the valley girl image
- Kogal and Ganguro, Japanese equivalents
- Paninaro
- Pissis, a Finnish expression for female youth behaving in a similar manner
- Queen bee
- San Fernando Valley
- Sloane Ranger
- Trixie
- Valley Girl, song by Frank Zappa
- Valleyspeak
References
External links
- Janelle Tassone. "Buffy: The Evolution of a Valley Girl" Refractory: A Journal of Entertainment Media 2 (2003):
- Valley Girl - Television Tropes & Idioms
