A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Award of the Degree "Licence en langue et littérature Anglaises".

Résume,

The present work deals with a sociolinguistic study of the jargon spoken by the students of Mutanga Campus. It consists of finding out the motivation of using that particular language. In fact, many people wonder how and why students on the Mutanga campus use a coded language. They are also inquisitive about the domains from which they draw words and expressions that compose it as well as its word-formation processes. This was the problem that accounted for the present study.

After realizing the presence of a coded language, a pilot study was conducted. This one proved to the researcher that there was enough material to be studied. Then, the methodology to collect the data was chosen : the questionnaires, the interview and observation are the procedures that were used for the data collection. As for the population and sampling procedure, a stratified random sampling was used. It consisted of breaking down the big number of students in order to remain with a manageable sample.

After analyzing the data, the researcher found out that students , on the mutanga campus use words and expressions from four domains such as the social, academic, sexual and corporeal domains. Also, the literal and social meanings of some of the words exhibit some similarities which mainly hold on the shape, size feeling; action, usefulness, etc. In addition, the main word-formation processes of that particular language are derivation, borrowing, acronymy and clipping. As result, this language is not understood by outsiders. Finally, the need of secrecy, social identification, fun, professionalism and technicity are the main reasons for the students to use jargon