Hi! I love your writing, and I consider you very knowledgeable on all things Rocket, so I was wondering how you would describe the way he talks sometimes in the movies, where he makes words bigger, or mashes them with other words. I was also wondering if you write some examples as well, please?
The most I've got so far are 'Communicafiers', instead of 'communicators', and 'Ulteriorative motivizations' instead of 'ulterior motives.'
Thank you!
hey babes! great question. i fucking LOVE "ulteriorative motivizations" — that is 100% a thing he would say. i can literlly hear it rasping out of his grumbly little mouth. amazing, darling.
now, i wasn't completely sure if you were asking me what words i make up for rocket, how i would describe his use of language (in conversation or academically), or how i would describe his use of language in narrative ... so i just decided to answer all three. :)
so here are my thoughts, starting with what i have noticed about the way rocket speaks:
as a child, our space pilot creates a ton of words that aren't standardized in whatever language he's speaking (i tend to assume it's kree, but it could be anything). there are some great examples in his dialogue with the high evolutionary over the faulty evolutionary chambers (transcription here).
he uses the new word suppressaliting as an alternate form of suppressing.
while residual is a "real" adjective, the word he's looking for is the noun form, residue.
we also see a ton of examples of him adding extra "esses" onto plurals: can'ts, saltses, thems, turtleses.
as an adult, we see some use of extraneous plural indicators has persisted, though he doesn't do it as often. also, he has a (possibly new) tendency to add "istics" to his words; notability, vocabulistics in Volume 1 ("well, he don’t know talking good like me and you, so his vocabulistics is limited to I and am and Groot — exclusively in that order") and emotionalistic in Volume 3 ("i got emotionalistic issues").
how i write rocket's speech / dialogue
in general, rocket's language has conformed/standardized to the universe around him. i have a lot of feelings and thoughts about this — but that's a whole different ask. the point is, because he doesn't usually make up whole new words anymore, i don't generally do that in my writing.
if i add an "-istic," it's usually after a word that normally ends in "-al" or "-ally" (eg, sentimentalistic for sentimental and theoreticalistically for theoretically).
if i add an extra "-s" or "-es," it's usually in times of high-stress, since we don't see him do it very often in the movies.
sometimes i make up a new word for him, but it's rare.
how i describe rocket's speech (academic)
technically, these speech-blends are probably close to eggcorns or portmanteau-morph/contamination, where the mis/reinterpretation of certain words still makes sense to both rocket and to his listeners. but i personally think they are best catgeorized as epentheses, and specifically, paragoges.
usually i headcanon that his epentheses are caused by some cognitive difficulty with languages, often related to a sequencing disorder. this is my bias because i have a sequencing disorder lol, but it also makes sense given how good he seems to be at understanding things as a whole (people with sequencing disorders often excel at seeing the "big picture" and knowing when something is wrong/missing, but have a harder time when things have to be done in a particular order, like... spelling, let's say, or grammar). look, that guy's so smart that he's got have some weakness!
however, sometimes (depending on the story), i change that up. a lot of times epentheses (and particularly paragoges) are the result of borrowing from multiple languages, and i do consider rocket to be quite multilingual (i often mention him swearing in miners' patois from knowhere). this isn't necessarily because i am imagining him as being excellent at languages (though that could be argued), but more because i imagine that in spite of the popularity and accessibility of translator chips, the hubs and space stations where rocket spends most of his time are likely very multilingual places.
how i describe rocket's speech (narrative)
i usually just ... don't. i let the words speak for themselves when they randomly show up in his dialogue, and i try not to use them too often because, as mentioned, we don't actually see him do it very often in the movies.
if i mention rocket's use of language directly in the narration, it's usually just because either (1) reader/OC has noticed it, or (2) rocket himself is feeling self-conscious. in either case, it's reflected upon in the character's voice, so it's usually not overly clinical! here's an example from birdie, chapter three:
His fur bristles. He tilts his voice — all the last remnants of false levity turning into the kind of fury that he can barely fit between his gritted teeth. “You laughed at me, and now you’re hiding in that bunk — slithering out like a fuckin’ snake when you think I’m sleeping. Too scared to talk to me, to deal with your own frickin’ consequencesses.”
He knows he’s fucked up as soon as the word falls over his lips — too many esses or whatever. He’d meant to keep his taunts calm and cool, but he feels his ears flicker and his tail tuck into his ankle, and the instinctive snarl in his lip as he waits for the mockery — the startled snicker, the inevitable sneer. Can’t you even speak properly? the High Evolutionary would demand at least once every conversation, and now you’ll mock him for that, too—
But you just give him a disinterested shrug. “Sure,” you agree, sounding bored.
anyway, that's it! it may not be the answer you were looking for, but i hope it was helpful and i would love to see more words you or others have made up for rocket!
