It did not pay customs fees to establish itself across the Channel: used in France since the 1990s, the expression “Wesh” has become a “linguistic migrant” by recently establishing itself in the conversations of young Londoners , reports France Info.
The French radio site explains that this interjection generally attributed to the French hip-hop world would have been imported to the British capital by the rapper Central Cee, who used it in the song Black racing carfrom Parisian JRK 19 and on which he made a feature.
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“London is experiencing a “WSH pandemic”. Everyone I know uses it. I think I even heard my cat say it the other day! », Testifies Nabeel, a London Tiktoker, in a video which has more than 600,000 views and 80,000 likes.
The word “Wesh” has its etymological roots in Arabic and is mainly used in Algeria, where “Wech rak?” » means “How are you?” “. France Info therefore interviewed the linguist Julien Barret, author of Great Book of Punchlines from Seneca to Nekfeuwhich confirms its origins while qualifying them…
For him, the French rappers of the 1990s also appropriated the “wesh, wesh, yo” of American rap (originally, “Yesh yesh yo” from the American rappers Heltah Skeltah, members of the Fab5, who had used it in 1995 on their title Leflaur Leflah Eshkoshka).
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In any case, it is normal that the expression crossed the Channel because “Words travel and have no borders”, reminds the linguist to France Info; before specifying that rap artists can “pin an expression that flies like a butterfly, fix it on a sound and written medium”.
