Is Gen Z talking about you behind your back? Youngsters have started using ... trends now
From 'beef' to 'bare', it's safe to say that many members of Generation Z have their own language.
Now, a Harvard-trained linguistics expert has revealed how Gen Z (those born in the late 1990s and early 2000s) have started to use video game terms.
Just as previous generations have used sports metaphors as part of everyday language, video games are now becoming part of how young people understand the world, according to Adam Aleksic.
So whether you're being called an NPC, getting asked 'where we dropping?', or doing sidequests, it turns out that Gen Z could be talking about you behind your back.
Thankfully, help is at hand, as we've compiled a list of some of the most common video game terms - and what they mean in Gen Z's modern dictionary.
A Harvard-trained linguistics expert has revealed how Gen Z (those born in the late 1990s and early 2000s) have started to use video game terms (stock image)
Mr Aleksic, who posts under the name Etymology Nerd, says that Gen Z's use of video game terms in real life is actually a new type of etymological category.
In the video, he explains: 'It's kind of like all the sports metaphors we've built up over time.'
Terms like 'swing and a miss' or 'coming out of left field' all originate in the game of baseball but have now taken on more serious or abstract meanings.
'Now we're in a whole new ball game of people having a shared cultural knowledge of video games, so we've started drawing on that as a way to express our reality,' Mr Aleksic explains.
This is not a new phenomenon, with our use of gaming metaphors stretching all the way back to the 12th and 15th centuries with the importance of chess.
Mr Aleksic says: 'We started drawing on chess terms like "pawn" or "gambit" to describe non-chess situations.'
Even the term "check" evolved from the literal attack on the king in chess to mean stop and consider as we use it today.
While video game terms might be used mainly by Gen Z today, Mr Aleksic says they could become much more important in the future.
NerfIf you've spoken to members of Gen Z or spent much time playing online games you've certainly heard someone say the classic refrain: 'PLS Nerf'.
Nerf is one of those video gaming terms that has taken a convoluted path to its final meaning.
The term originates with the Nerf foam darts and swords that became popular in the 1990s.
From there, the term appears to make the jump into video games in the 1997 MMORPG Ultima Online.
When the game's developers released an update which massively reduced the strength of swords, some players complained that it was like using 'Nerf swords'.
The term has now spread everywhere to mean any big reduction in strength, power, capacity or ability.
Someone might call something 'nerfed' to mean it's been made a lot worse or complain that something needs to get 'nerfed' for fairness.
Nerf is also the flip side to the term 'buff' which means to make something stronger or generally better.
The term nerf, meaning to make weaker or worse, appears to originate from the 1997 game Ultima Online (pictured) where players complained that weak weapons felt like using 'nerf
