Boyno Polari

Polari adjectives include well-known terms such as ‘bona’, ‘naff’ and ‘bijou’. In this lesson, a number of common Polari adjectives will be taught, as well as providing information on how they can be conjugated and used in a sentence.

Below are 8 common Polari adjectives, alongside an audio recording and an example sentence for each. With this basic information, you can then continue to expand your knowledge of Polari adjectives if you wish using the dictionary on this website, as well apply your knowledge of Polari adjective conjugations to other Polari adjectives. Be sure to also refer to the ‘key vocabulary’ section of this lesson so that you understand the example sentences.

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Key Vocabulary

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Now that these 8 adjectives have been introduced, the conjugation of Polari adjectives will be briefly elaborated. As many would expect, the way adjectives in Polari are conjugated mirror English. Using the word ‘naff’ as an example, below are the negative, comparative and superlative forms of ‘naff’.

nanti naff       not bad

naffer          badder

naffest         baddest

As seen above, the word ‘nanti’ negates the following adjective. ‘Nanti’ means ‘not’ or ‘don’t’ in Polari. With the comparative and superlative, the suffixes ‘er’ and ‘est’ can be added in many cases. In other cases, this may sound unnatural (e.g. ‘meshigener-er’), however. Otherwise, adding ‘more’ or ‘most’ (e.g. ‘more meshigener’ and ‘the most meshigener’) could also be done.

As a lot of information was covered in this lesson, you may wish to test your knowledge. For this reason, you can use the quiz below to see if you have remembered the vocabulary in this lesson.