Understanding the Followers - Codes and Slang

Communicating on Twitter requires one to be creative because tweets themselves are limited to 140 characters. Tweeters have to be creative in how they write posts and often use abbreviations as a way to maximize their real estate. It’s important to understand what the common abbreviations are, so you can understand what people are writing about. Let me just show you a few of the terms found in the Twitosphere.  

RT: Re-Tweet, as it you’re posting it on your own feed.
DM: Direct Message. Kind of lime email on Twitter.
FML: F*ck My Life
SMH: Shaking My Head
NSFW: Not Safe For Work

Truthfully, a lot of the general Twitter slang and abbreviations make sense. I mean, I like to pretend SMH means So Much Hate, but OVERALL, in general, I can figure them out.

There are also references to Shadowhunters in general. For instance, if you leave this blog today with nothing else other than the term Malec, I’ve done my job.

The biggest thing to know is the Mash-ups or Portmanteaus of characters.

Malec – mash-up of Magnus and Alec.
Clace –Clary and Jace.
Climon –Clary and Simon.
Sizzy – Simon and Izzy
Rizzy – Raphael and Izzy
Jimon – Jace and Simon.

Now, here comes the most important part. The slang terms that I have obviously been missing out on.
You should memorize these.

SHIP – Ship is my FAVORITE term right now. It’s a desire by fans for two people to be together in a relationship. Shipping a relationship shows that you are emotionally involved with the characters and have an affinity for them to stay together. Personally, I use it as a way to say I support a relationship – it’s a good pairing.

Curiously, I think this term has evolved a bit.
Let me explain.
One of my college students told me I couldn’t ship real people. That wasn’t cool. It was only for fictional characters.
But, I cross-checked with my 16 year old niece.
Okay, almost 17.
She said I could TOTALLY ship friends.
I mean, I feel like I trust my niece to know how these things work because she’s still a teen.

For example, I ship Malec.
See how easy that was? And how few characters it takes?

CANON – This term means true to the series. In relation to Shadowhunters, if Cassie Clare 

wrote a relationship into the book, that that’s canon. There are some liberties you can take with this – it’s acceptable with fan fiction to change up pairings. I mean, unless it’s Malec. No one messes with Malec.

OTP – One True Pairing. If you real love a particular pairing, they are your OTP.

Okay, and just to make this legit.
Malec is my OTP.

NoTP – Not a True Pairing. Use this to refer to your least favorite couple. These are two people who should not be with each other.

I’m going to say that, to me, Rizzy is my NoTP. 

BROTP – This stands for a couple you like as friends, but not as a couple.

Climon is my brotp. They shouldn’t date, but should legit be friends always. 

STAN – This terms is a portmanteau of the words “Stalker” and “Fan.” 

WHO KNEW?
Actually, the Internet did.
You use this term to describe your avid fanaticism for a celebrity, film group, etc,.
To the level of being obsessed!
I think I might stan Shadowhunters.
I’m kinda torn. I also stan Doctor Who.
Anyway, if you just want to call someone out for being obsessed with something, you can use the word stan.

Someone's TRASH – This term is not to be confused with calling someone trash. If I call someone trash, that means I don’t like them. That makes sense.
No, this term is about saying you’re someone trash.
Apparently this means that you admire the person you mention so much that, comparatively, you are trash. It’s supposed to be a compliment to the person.
Many Shadowhunter fans are Matthew Daddario’s trash.
There actually was this time when Matt asked about this term on Twitter. For a "friend."

I’m not going to say these are ALL of the slang terms out there. Just the ones I have encountered recently.

Hopefully you’ve learned something and picked up a few pointers.

And whatever you do, just remember, no one messes with Malec.