Polari

Seemingly welded to our apps today, it’s easy to forget that, within living memory, Polari was used by some gay men as a coded way to talk, flirt, gossip, warn each other and stay one step ahead.

Before profile grids, blue ticks and men calling themselves “discreet” like it’s a personality, there was coded speech.

Polari was not just camp decoration. It was gossip, camouflage, warning system, flirtation, theatre, bitchery and survival kit.

Polari is a magpie mix of slang, dialect, theatre talk, fairground language, back slang, rhyming slang and words borrowed from Italian, French, Lingua Franca and elsewhere, usually dropped into English grammar and syntax. Even today, you may have brushed against Polari if you’ve had a few bevvies, zhooshed up your bijou flat, or said something is a bit naff.

It was never fixed, neat or standardised. Spellings shifted, meanings changed, people invented their own bits, and half the point was that outsiders were left blinking politely while the real conversation happened underneath.

Before sex between men was partially decriminalised in England and Wales, Polari helped some gay men talk more freely in public and signal to each other without immediately attracting unwanted attention, including from undercover charpering omis, or policemen. Unless you were in the know, you might only half-understand what was being said and miss the incriminating bits.

It didn’t make danger disappear. It just gave people a way to move through it with a bit more wit and warning.

As gay liberation, changing law and changing attitudes arrived, Polari became less necessary, and for some, a bit naff. Then, because culture loves a comeback, it started being rediscovered as history, art and identity.

If you want to hear what it sounds like rather than just stare at a word list like a sad little linguist, start here.

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