language

[deeplove]

I love how language interacts with life. I hear so much from friends about their preferences for terms. Some people hate top and bottom because they feel descriptive of nothing. Some people hate dom and sub because they don't catch the dynamic well enough. Some people like top and bottom because they don't like dom and sub. Some people don't like SM because the pleasure and/or sensation doesn't seem to made explicit by those terms.

The thing that interests me about it is that from person to person the reasons are so different. And it helps me understand others' kink in a deeper way.

So I'm interested to hear more opinions about it. And if you've had to make up your own words, and what they are, and why they fit.

[TwstdKittie]

i think it just kind of depends. The language is more for other people's benefit than my own. i actually think the BDSM acronym, while complicated and often misconstrued, is fairly all-encompassing, so that's a good one. And i prefer to use sub and dom just because it is more about the attitudes than the actions of the moment. That's just me tho.

[Twisted32]

I like Master/slave in my opinion and I also use BDSM as well.

[deekay]

For me my Master uses the term "Toy" simply because it puts a certain implied control over me that i don't tend to feel other wise. I am his "Toy" to play with as He sees fit, my pleasure is in giving him pleasure. A "Toy" just is it does not question or talk back.

I know it kinda sounds like i am just rambling on but i hope i answered your question for you.

[Emerson]

I am fascinated by language, myself. I tend to run the gamut when refering to my sub. Sometimes she's "slave," sometimes "kajira." When describing her to others I'll use "submissive" or just "sub," and in written communication I tend to just use "j," the first letter of her name. I feel like the importance of language in bdsm, however, goes well beyond the names we call each other (or even the capitalization rules we tend to use). Between any two lovers there's a private language, but between j and I there's so much innuendo and inflection that, regardless of where we are, it's always clear between us that she is mine.

That said, a lot of the framework for the words and insinuations we use was laid well before we became "lifestyle" bdsmers. Really, the process of taking that formidable step is, above all, a linguistic one. Our actual interaction is barely distinguishable now from what it has always been - especially to the uninformed eyes of (most of our) friends - but we have learned to describe our interaction in a more meaningful, accurate way. I think that's a big part of any bdsm interaction; after all, bdsm is an incredibly vocal and communicative kind of sexual play.