The Eighties in America - Salem Press (2009)

teens in the San Fernando Valley in California, nor
necessarily only to females. Much of what came to
be called “valspeak” was typical of many teenagers
around North America and exhibited traits that had
been common among youth for decades. However,
the speech patterns associated with Valley girls were
the focus of a hit single by Frank Zappa and his
daughter Moon Unit Zappa, “Valley Girl.” As a re-
sult, the California sociolect (that is, a language vari-
ation based on social group rather than region) be-
came famous and provided a name for the speech
pattern. Although some phrases from “valspeak”
became infamous (including “Gag me with a spoon”
and “As if!”), the distinctive aspect of the speech
pattern was its intonation—a vaguely Southwestern
twang and a tendency to raise the voice at the end of
every utterance, as if asking a question.

Impact As with much linguistic innovation, most of
the slang and slogans of the 1980’s disappeared after
a few years. However, certain trends of the era con-
tinued in the speech of young people in following
decades, especially the tendency toward clipping
(“ex” for ex-partner or spouse, for example) and the
upraised inflection at the ends of statements.

Further Reading
Bryson, Bill.Made in America. New York: Perennial,

1994. Highly accessible and thorough history of
      American English.
      In the 1980’s. http://inthe80’s.com/glossary.shtml.
      Excellent on-line compendium of 1980’s slang.
      Morris, William, and Mary Morris.Harper Dictionar y
      of Contemporar y Usage. New York: Harper & Row,


1995. Usage dictionary from the 1980’s that re-
      flects attitudes toward language change at the
      time.
      Thomas Du Bose

See also Advertising; AIDS epidemic; Biological
clock; Glass ceiling; Infomercials; Just Say No cam-
paign; Mommy track; Mr. T; Peller, Clara; Political
correctness; Post office shootings; Reaganomics;
Science and technology;Terminator, The; Valley girls;
Yuppies.

Smith, Samantha

Identification Ten-year-old American girl who

wrote a letter to Soviet leader Yuri Andropov in

1982

Born June 29, 1972; Houlton, Maine

Died August 25, 1985; Lewiston-Auburn, Maine

The correspondence between American Smith and the leader

of the Soviet Union became a well-publicized symbol of at-

tempts to improve relations between the two countries.

In 1982, young Samantha Smith, afraid of nuclear

war, asked her mother to write a letter to the new

leader of the Soviet Union, Yuri Andropov. Her

mother, Jane Smith, replied that Samantha should

be the one to write the letter. In December, there-

fore, Smith wrote to Andropov, congratulating him

on becoming the head of the Soviet Union and ask-

ing him if he wanted nuclear war and why he wanted

882
Smith, Samantha The Eighties in America

A 1985 Soviet stamp commemorating Samantha Smith.