Caló: A Borderland Dialect
Caló is the latest addition to Marfa Public Radio's programming. Created by Oscar Rodriguez, who sometimes goes by the name "El Marfa," the series honors the Texas borderlands patois commonly called Caló.
Oscar grew up speaking this language in Ojinaga and Odessa. He remembers the unique dialect filling the barrios and countryside of his childhood in West Texas. Each week on Caló, Oscar will feature words and phrases from Caló then explore their meaning with a personal anecdote.
Oscar was born and raised in Ojinaga, West Texas and Southeastern New Mexico. He has lived in and out of Texas since he graduated from Ector High School in Odessa in the late-1970s, including a couple of years in the 1990s when he lived in Marfa and taught at Sul Ross State University. Oscar is also an enrolled member of the Lipan Apache Tribe and an avid researcher of Native history in Texas and New Mexico — specifically in the La Junta region.
He hopes by sharing his knowledge of this colorful language, he can help keep it alive.
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Órale, this of Caló episode features another iconic word, cholo. It comes from the Nahuatl, or Aztec, word for dog. It entered the Mexican lexicon during the Spanish colonial period as a pejorative for Natives. -
Órale, the featured of this episode is toríca. It comes from the word, retórica or rhetoric, and means a quick pitch, a fast explanation or argument. It also means a hollow promise, fact, or declaration. It’s something you say to achieve a reprieve or brief agreement, also when you ask someone out on a first date. The better and faster the toríca, the better the chances you get your way.
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Órale, the featured word this week on Caló is borlo. It’s one of the words suggested by that carnal from Marfa who also contributed two of the Caló words we used last month, tirilongo and clecha. It comes from the Mexican regional Spanish word, likely of Nahuatl or Aztec orgin, borlote. It means fuss, melee, uproar, commotion, or tumult. It’s a noun, but it can also be used as an adjective, as in "he's very borlotero", someone who’s always causing a fuss or uproar. Depending on the context, borlo can also have an almost neutral meaning, as in a big dance or event that may be drawing a lot of attention or visitors.
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Órale, in this episode the featured word is labia. It means gibberish, nonsensical talk. It comes from the latin root word, labium, or lip. In Spanish, the corresponding word is labio. The image it invokes in Caló is that of lips moving with no real or meaningful words coming out.
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Órale, this episode’s about the word placoso(a). It’s a noun that comes from the English and Spanish word, plaque or placa. In Caló today, a placa is commonly understood to be a tattoo. It’s also an adjective—really a pejorative— that generally means gaudy, and it applies as much to someone’s behavior as to an object and tattoo. The image the term placoso evokes is that of somebody with a lot of shiny placas strung—or tattooed— on their neck intended to project importance, success and, perhaps more importantly, high class tastes. The moniker fits influencers who use bling to draw attention to themselves via social media for the purpose of driving their viewers to buy their sponsors’ products. While the products they hawk may be gaudy, that alone doesn’t earn them the label of a placoso(a). Their behavior has to be pretentious and exaggerated, as well as gaudy, to earn that dubious distinction.
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Órale, this is another episode where we feature one of the words contributed by that carnal from Marfa who wrote to suggest some Caló words we hadn’t covered yet. The word this week is tirilongo. It’s a noun and an adjective that means a wannabe, hanger-on, or somebody who otherwise is pretending to be a pachuco or, worse, a vato arranque. You can tell who they are because they have a need to say they’re a “chuco” or “chuca.” But everybody knows, you don’t have to say it if you really are it. Watchas?
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This episode features one of the most iconic words in Caló, pachuco. Its origin is uncertain, as there are competing versions of its genesis, and it stands on another term of uncertain origin, Chuco, which is the Caló word for El Paso-Juarez, where the culture of Caló has always been very strong. One version of the origin of pachuco is that it’s a contraction for the term para el Chuco or pa’chuco, which means to or for el Chuco, as in she’s moving to or becoming like somebody from El Chuco.
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Órale, this episode features a word contributed by one of our listeners. The vato’s from Marfa, and he contributed several words. Thanks, carnal. We’re gonna use them all. The word is clecha. There’s no root for it in either Spanish or English, but it intersects a little with another word we’ve used in the past, trucha, which means “watch out.” Clecha refers to the skill or learned behavior of watching out. You say somebody’s clecha if they’re street smart or, if they’re in the pinta, you use it to mean they’re prison smart. Good advice when somebody’s been torcido is, “you better get clecha fast in here, ese.”
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Órale, this episode starts the summer series where the conversations will be heavily in Caló, drawing from the words we’ve used until now. The featured word of this episode is arranque. In modern Spanish, it’s a noun that means takeoff or launch. In Caló, however, it’s an adjective that means forward-leaning, brave, or fierce. It can be either a personality type or a code of conduct. Indeed, it’s easier to follow the arranque code if you’re already of that personality type than not.
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Órale, this is the the last episode focused on Caló words that are related to dances in the Southside. For the rest of the summer, the focus will turn to conversations carried out entirely in Caló. Meanwhile, the feature of this episode is pichonear. In modern Spanish, pichon means pigeon. In Caló, it means to kiss. When a couple is kissing, it’s said they are pichoneando, which happens a lot in the dances in the Southside.
