Slayer knowledge?

[Chasing Cordy]

Maybe this has been brought up before...

Something has been bothering me about the vamps and the slayers.
If vampires were mortals and mortals are not supposed to know about slayers, then how do the vampires have such knowledge of the slayer? Is there an underground school or something?
You don't know about slayers while alive, but you just now come out of the ground and the first thing you say when you see Buffy or Faith is "Slayer..."

Makes no sense.

 

[nerd4hire]

I'm racking my brain. I can't think of the specific scene you're talking about where a vampire "comes out of the ground and the first thing he says when he sees Buffy or Faith is 'Slayer...' "

There's the one in Lessons where Buffy says to the newly arisen vampire something like "You don't want to mess with me, I'm the slayer. Try her." nodding to Dawn.

Then there's the one where Willow and Buffy are in the cemetery waiting for the vamp to arise, complaining about the wait. He does so behind their backs, sees the bag of vampire killing stuff, and takes off.

Spike doesn't know about slayers until Angelus tells him.

Here's an exchange between Buffy and newly risen vampire Holden Webster from Conversations With Dead People.

HOLDEN
Oh, so I'm a vampire. (laughs) How weird is that?

BUFFY
Sorry.

HOLDEN
No, no. Feels great. Strong. Like I'm connected to a powerful all-consuming evil that's gonna suck the world into a firey oblivion. How 'bout you?

BUFFY
Not so much connected. (stands and walks away, he follows)

HOLDEN
No, no. I mean, with the stake and the cross—you do this kind of thing a lot?

BUFFY
(stops walking, turns to face him) I'm the slayer. It's sort of a thing.

HOLDEN
So, what—you like fight vampires professionally? Or—

BUFFY
Oh, I don't get paid. It's more like a calling. Since—even in school.

 

[Tranquillity]

I think Buffy got to be known by the local vampire community because she was around for such a long time, so word spread on the demon grapevine. Thats why they sometimes know who she is (like the van halen vamp in Fool for Love - [i think] he knows who she is but maybe Buffy told him, she does seem to like them to know who's doing the staking). I've always thougth that the method in the madness of the whole 'one girl in all the world' concept was that if a slayer got called, she then lives a short, brutal life and then the next one is called thus keeping the demons and vamps on theri toes because they never know when the next one is likely to pop up and in turn keeps her identity secret. Buffy's longevity puts this system in jepardy and increases her recognisability.

 

[Shadow Weaver]

The answer is that newly arisen vampires don't know about Slayers. They learn about them from other vampires at some point in their immortal lives. At the end of Season 5 Buffy actually meets a vampire who doesn't know who she is and has never heard of the Slayer. She responds by saying it's been a while since she met a vamp who didn't know her. The fact of the matter is that, as the seasons progress, Buffy's reputation grows. More and more vamps come to learn of her. She is the one who killed the local vampire king and took out Angelus, after all. Heck, even a fair number of humans seem to know who and what she is in later season - like some of Buffy's former classmates, for instance. But getting back to the question at hand, vampires do not automatically know who or what the Slayer is. This is acquired knowledge.

 

[white avenger]

Spike didn't know about Slayers until Angel told him about then, and the Psych major vamp who Spike sired in Season 7 didn't either, so it's safe to assume that at least some vampires have no initial knowledge of Slayers. If we assume that at least most of the Slayer/vampire encounters result in vamp dust it would be fairly safe to assume that vampires learn about Slayers by word of mouth throughout the demon community.