Flash Flash Revolution - Tryna Step (a short)

Tryna step?

It’s a fascinating idiom. Its most face-value aspect of note is that it’s a complete interrogative sentence composed entirely of slang—and truncated slang, at that. I would imagine step to be an abbreviated form of step up, or some variation therein: simple and confrontational, suggestive of the common phrase to rise to the challenge.

Tryna, however, is the more intriguing component: it’s a contraction, but a dense one, and with a novel semantic purpose. The subject and linking verb are eschewn altogether—Are you is merely implied—leaving only the participle trying and the to segment of the infinitive to step—which are elegantly merged. I suppose it could be argued that this merger is, in a way, simply dialectal, and fabricated by myself. It lacks formal, scholarly acknowledgment and could very easily be written Trying to step? with little, to no confusion.

And yet you must hear the way it rolls from the tongue of an especially abraded speaker: remarkably fluid—there is no second hard T. It could be written no other way.

These things were going through my head as I was being vigorously pummeled by the first African American man I met in college. And all I was trying to do was explain the sociolinguistic evolution of the word nigger to him.

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PS. i politely request to not be banned for two weeks because of the use of a certain word is LiTeRaRy in this instance and targets the subtle, pandering sort of racism typical of unwitting pedants