Generations, Do we even speak the same language?

This year at Thanksgiving our family decided to mix it up a little bit, rather than playing the mechanical catch-phrase game after eating, as is tradition, we decided to try playing a new, electronic version of the game. It was while playing this game that I noticed just how much the English language has changed in a generation, especially in communication between the two most recent generations. Now obviously an issue lies in the two generations use of examples to explain a word, I found myself often in the conundrum of trying to decipher a word from shows like “Happy Days,” “Gilligan’s Island,” and “Cheers,” amongst many others, most of which I have never seen and often not even heard of. However, I found that words that had changed their meanings were the largest problem. One perfect example was the term “Ace,” seems like an obvious word, the highest value card in many card games, but rather than that, my aunt described it as something “being cool or awesome.” Now I am left to assume that the term “ace” was used in this way when she was younger. My personal favorite term that came up was “doobie” which a parent described as a joint, I of course would have made a Scooby Doo reference but I guess joints can work too. I find myself really curious just how much the English language will change between our generation and the next, what new slang terms will we struggle to understand, and what will come of the slang we use today.