I think you've hit the nail on the head. Incidentally, a colleague who is in her 60s has an eMail address that is slapper.insertname@somewhere.co.uk. I don't think she'd have been as happy with slag.insertname@somewhere.co.uk
I think "slag" may be more of a London thing, but it can quite regularly get thrown into fairly benign conversations.
The thing is that slag and slapper suggest someone is promiscuous. Slut and hooker suggest someone has sex in exchange for money. I can't remember hearing the latter two words getting used outside of some swaggering adolescent nonsense or a genuine intention to insult.
"Slut" doesn't have any connection to sex for money where I live. We don't use either "slag" or "slapper" here, but based on what I'm reading, I think they'd be rough synonyms for the way we use "slut". Or, preferably, the way we don't use it.
Ooh yeah, when I was doing archaeology at university we went out on digs and frequently found lumps of slag. It was quite pretty actually, but handing a piece to someone became a bit of an in joke.
You're right but it's more commonly a nasty name for a promiscuous woman. Same goes for Bastard. Is it: a) a swear word ... b) the name for a fatherless child ... c) the name of a file used in metalwork ... d) all of the above ... ?
Add term of endearment to that list. Reminds me of the first time my then future wife met my dad. The look on her face when I introduced him as "the old bastard" was classic. As she was native Hawaiian it was something they would never do. Back to slag or slapper, you could always use trollop.
The give away was the big smirk on my dad's face, fortunately she became too used to it and I evolved into the old bastard.
LOL. Back in Jane Austen's time, "sluttish" meant someone was a lousy housekeeper and dressed herself poorly. (See also "slatternly".)
"Slapper" is a term I was unaware of, till moving here to Scotland from the USA. It's nearly always paired with "old," as in "old slapper." I think it denotes a long-time promiscuous lifestyle and sloppy, over-sexualised appearance, perhaps akin to 'mutton dressed as lamb' with a sexual connotation. Dyed hair, heavy makeup and cheap, garish clothing seems standard.
Both have similar connotations, however, I would put slag as harder hitting insult. Slapper has a slightly comic overtone, which slag does not. Plus, slag is the de facto word of choice for anyone wishing to slag anyone else off.
