Ore pronoun choice for children?

Hello, and thanks for looking.

Recently I was watching the Japanese dub of the American show �gSouth Park�h, and I noticed that some of the elementary school characters use the personal pronoun �gore�h. I have never heard children so young use this pronoun before, except maybe sometimes in anime when they�fre tough country kids trying to sound cool.

This made me curious as to what the particular connotation behind a child using �gore�h might be. Is it supposed to be funny, endearing, etc? Is it indicative of personality (eg. trying to seem cool), or more of upbringing/accent (for example, in English, one of the South Park characters who uses it has a strong Southern accent, and I thought it could be partially a way to translate that)? Could it be any/a combination of these things?

Thank you so much again for taking the time to read my question. My reason for asking is simple curiosity, so apologies if this topic seems a little strange or meaningless. I�fve noticed while studying that there are lots of little nuances in Japanese in the way particular things are said or written by particular people, and though I may be jumping ahead trying to understand it as a beginner still, it always intrigues me!

I am not familiar with that show so I cannot say anything about that, but �gore�h would be, yes, a kid trying to act tough/cool. Is there was one �gbully�h in class, he might use that. To adults that would look a bit like hey that little brat is already trying to sound tough, huh.

One thing to note is that in Japanese there isn�ft as much �gstrong language�h as in (at least as far as I know in American) English, so that if the character is of the type who drops some strong language once in a while, to keep the character �gconsistent�h and also the personality stand out clearer against others, they might have chosen to let this character use the tougher pronoun �gore�h to differentiate among the characters.

And I wonder if the Admin could move this thread to �gLanguage�h section. Thanks.

That show is meant for adults and there is lots of swearing and violence, though comical in nature. It's not for kids.

As far as I know, the most commonly used first-person pronoun in a casual situation for elementary school boys in Greater Tokyo is probably "ore". I have a (grown) son, if that helps, and he was never really the "tough" type. Of course, when he was in Kindergarten, every boy was using "ora" like Crayon Shin-chan.

Oh Uco-san, I was not aware of that.! In my time at elementary school, what I recall is �gBoku.�h Maybe things have changed.

AK-san, I'm sure you either went to a nicer school or boys treated you like a princess ;) But seriously, my boy attended an ordinary public school in a nice part of an ordinary town in Yokohama City. In any case, I've never felt that "ore" is an age thing, except that I do admit that when you're little, you tend to do what your mommy tells you to do. But the minute you start school, you pretty much begin to build your own identity.

It is about levels of politeness - "ore" being bottom of the stack for males, and some people never use it (I wouldn't) as it is just too coarse/rude. "boku" would be the better informal term. I understand the term is used occasionally by girls (again, in informal situations) and in some songs.
There was a discussion in the Japan Times a few months back where it was mentioned as well. The parent of his bi-lingual kindergarten son was curious where he picked up the rough term (from the other kids of course) and disappointed. Rather he should have been happy his kid could speak two languages.

I'm not a big South Park Fan but...

Yes, they are supposed to live somewhere Exurban. It's not quite full on suburb because it's too far a commute from the city easily, but it's not truly rural like you can find other places in the US. (i.e. my in-laws live 27 km to the nearest grocery store and they don't even consider themselves truly rural.)

They're all supposed to be in 4th grade so ~ 10. They're all rude and crass and one of them is a bully. They curse all the time. I would have been shocked to hear any of them use "boku."