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I recently saw 冗談だっつの. What does it っつの mean, or how does it modify the meaning of a sentence?

Louis Waweru
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っつ (sometimes つう) is a slang version of という (or an alternate version like といった, depending on the context). It's extremely informal.

冗談【じょうだん】だっつの。 (＝冗談だ【じょうだん】といったの。) I said I was joking. [Idiomatically: Chill out, I was just kidding.]

彼【かれ】はやめたいっつってんだから、やめさせてやりゃいいじゃん。 (＝彼【かれ】はやめたいといっているんだから、やめさせてやればいいじゃない。) He's saying he wants to quit, so why not let him?

まぁ、なんつうかさ、ちょっとまずいっすね。 (＝まぁ、なんというかさ、ちょっとまずいですね。) Well, it's…what should I say…kind of a bad situation.

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Derek Schaab
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  • I always thought っつって came about by (jokingly) pronouncing the っ in って and inserting new っ along the way: だって → だつて → だっつって. At least that's how I picked it up. :-3 Any evidence for or against that theory? – deceze Jun 16 '11 at 23:08
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    @deceze: って and っつって mean different things, and therefore it is natural to consider that って did _not_ arise by pronouncing the little っ in って (unless further evidence for the theory exists). っつって is a very informal contraction of って言って (which itself is a little informal form of と言って). – Tsuyoshi Ito Jun 17 '11 at 01:57
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    While we're on this subject, it's worth pointing out that the entire いる part of 言っている gets dropped sometimes: なにいってんだ？＝なにをいっているんだ？. This is why っつってん expands to といっているん, as Tsuyoshi mentioned. – Derek Schaab Jun 17 '11 at 13:19
  • I don't see this mentioned here, and unfortunately I'm not sure how to write it, but is this convo related to "なんっつて"?-just kidding!? – yadokari Oct 03 '11 at 15:57
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    @yadokari: I imagine なんつって comes from なんかいって, since it's often used to mark speech without an exact wording. (In English, the best parallel is the slang expression, "He was like, '[statement]'.") The alternate use of なんつって to mean "Just kidding!" might be a masculine version of the somewhat feminine なんていっちゃって, which is shortened to なんちゃって. – Derek Schaab Oct 03 '11 at 16:22
  • sounds about right – yadokari Oct 03 '11 at 16:24