The Vernacular of Clubhouse

Social Audio Linguistics

Late to the party, I recently accepted an invite to Clubhouse. From my expansive balcony on warm summer evenings, I have been curiously dropping in and out of culturally different rooms as a substitute for pre-pandemic global travel.

Over time, linguistic patterns materialize. But first…

Basic Taxonomy

Clubhouse is a kind of a modern talk radio, where moderators start rooms (which can be scheduled and also in clubs). In each room, one of the moderators leads the topic-based discussion by speaking. Moderators also promote audience members (who have indicated interest in talking by clicking on the ‘raise hand’ button) to the room stage and then calling on them to ‘unmute’ and speak.

Rooms can and do run for many hours. 4 or more hours is not uncommon.

Audience members can also ‘flash your mikes’ to indicate a desire to speak or to vote on some idea being discussed. This is a ‘popcorn style’ room discussion, where ideas are presented one after another. Audience members who are new to that room have a party hat icon on their profile picture.

General etiquette is that audience members wait to be called on to speak, then unmute, say their name and sometimes their location. Then they present whatever idea or ask a question. In some rooms when an audience member is done speaking they state that fact explicitly, i.e. “My name is Lynn and I am done speaking.” General etiquette in…