Why is a person called a 'Duffus' when they do something stupid?
‘Doofus’, coined c. 1960, appears to be a descendant of the much earlier Scots word ‘doof’, meaning a fool. ‘Doof’ itself may well be linked to the German adj. ‘doof’: dense, stupid, dull-witted. There is, despite this, no Yiddish origin, although some etymologists have suggested that there might be. There may also be a link to the earlier (1910s) ‘goofus’, which also means fool and which itself comes from ‘goof’, another Scots word, meaning simpleton, clumsy fool or silly person. (Google)
Is it racist for a white guy to call a black guy bro?
Well, etymologists believe that the word has been used as far back as the 1660s (https://www.etymonline.com/word/bro), which suggests that there is a long history of white people “bro-ing” one another.More to the point, current usage appears to have deracialized the term; it can be used as an informal address to any male-type person. More, it’s become a quirky building block for cheeky new words. Cf bromance, curl-bro, bro-hug. It’s enough to bring a smile to any word-satirist’s face. Even the mightiest of all of them, one Ambrose Bierce.Here’s a lively article about the all-powerful new brocabulary you will no doubt be forced to hear in the years ahead: https://blog.oxforddictionaries.... .
Why do Atheist act like know-it-all's?
I love all the Atheist amateur etymologists -- Folks Huxley coined the word Agnostic, if you bother to read what he said he explains everything about it's invention. The early Gnostic church was known for assuming they knew what existence was all about, they were really unbearable know-it-all's. Today we might compare them to the Westboro Baptist Church, Phelps family assuming they understand everything about how we came to exist. Huxley compared Theist and Atheist alike to the Gnostic's, while he saw himself as a A-gnostic or as being against people who act like they know everything, or --- Anti-know-it-all. That's right Atheist, Huxley was making fun of you, Victorian style.
Why is New York City called the big apple?
In 1803 or 1804 a French woman named Evelyn Claudine de Saint-Évremond moved to New York. She is said to have been beautiful and quite respected among elite New York society. She was even supposed to marry John Hamilton, the son of famous lawyer and Revolutionary Alexander Hamilton. For some reason the marriage was called off, and Evelyn went into business. The women who worked for her, who were known for their elegance and beauty, were paid to entertain wealthy men. When New Yorkers shortened Evelyn's name to Eve (like Eve in the bible who ate the infamous apple), she started calling the women who worked for her "my irresistible apples." Soon, Eve's male customers started calling her employees "Eve's apples," and the phrase began to stick. A reference to New York women as apples was used publicly in an 1870 New York City "gentleman's directory," and again in a speech by lawyer William Jennings Bryan in 1892. Bryan called New York a "rotten apple," referring to the city's corruption. The phrase "big apple," or "the apple," was used again in a 1907 guidebook in a phrase "some may think the apple is losing some of its sap." John J. Fitz Gerald popularized the term Big Apple in the racing form that printed his column, and Barry Popik has no explanation as to the origin that the stable hands got this term from, so this is the story I’m gonna go with.
Where did the saying Olly Olly Oxen Free come from?
When I played hide-and-seek, the phrase was All The Outs In Free ... meaning anyone that hadn't already been found was free to come in. Not terribly great English - but it worked for us kids. Olly Olly Oxen Free sounds like a Mondegreen to me.
What is the origin of the word 'Movie'?
Most etymologists assume that "movies" is a shortened form of the 1896 usage "moving pictures."From the onlne etymology: movie (n.) 1912 (perhaps 1908), shortened form of moving picture in the cinematographic sense (1896). As an adjective from 1913. Movie star attested from 1913. Another early name for it was photoplay.
Where did the slang term wop for itallians come from?
I never knew and i cant figure it out . i know kyke is becouse they came to sign with a o instead of an x due to religious reasons. and i know nips for japanese is from nippon. but i cant seem to find wop, ( im not advocating it- just want the history)
What is the origin of the term "bullshit"?
Etymologists’ citation of “first attested use” to illuminate the origins of slang terms, such as bullshit, meaning something incorrect, is often just that. Linguistics professor Mark Liberman, in Bullshit: invented by T.S. Eliot in 1910?, gently called bullshit on the term’s alleged origin in old European languages, and cast a doubting eye on coinage by T.S. Eliot or Ezra Pound. Liberman cited a 2005 New Yorker piece by Jim Holt, SAY ANYTHING, which stated:… It was only in the twentieth century that the use of “bull” to mean pretentious, deceitful, jejune language became semantically attached to the male of the bovine species—or, more particularly, to the excrement therefrom. Today, it is generally, albeit erroneously, thought to have arisen as a euphemistic shortening of “bullshit,” a term that came into currency, dictionaries tell us, around 1915.Liberman wrote, “Holt also neglects to tell us that the OED's two earliest citations for bullshit are from Wyndham Lewis and E.E. Cummings:”c1915 WYNDHAM LEWIS Let. (1963) 66 Eliot has sent me Bullshit and the Ballad for Big Louise. They are excellent bits of scholarly ribaldry. 1928 E. E. CUMMINGS Enormous Room vii. 194 When we asked him once what he thought about the war, he replied, ‘I t'ink lotta bullsh--t.’But the first citation is self-debunking, since it refers to the title of something written earlier! And indeed, according to this paper (Loretta Johnson, "T.S. Eliot's Bawdy Verse: Lulu, Bolo and More Ties", Journal of Modern Literature 27.1 (2003) 14-25), the letter in question was sent to Ezra Pound and refers to some poems that Eliot had written earlier:On February 2, 1915, Lewis wrote to Pound, "Eliot has sent me Bullshit & the Ballad for Big Louise." …I think a literary conversation and shared Western antecedents of Wyndham Lewis (a Canadian) and Pound (from Wyoming) may be more indicative of bullshit’s origin than anything else we’ve seen. It is much more likely, more believable, that the English term bullshit had its origin in 1850s western America, as a Mondegreen or Eggcorn misunderstanding and adoption of Chinese laborers’ rejection of a statement or assertion as contrary to fact. It’s a very small leap from a very basic and frequently-used exclamatory Chinese term 不是 (Bùshì = is not, not so, not possible, not necessary, not right, etc.) to an unlettered Westerner’s misinterpretation of it as bullshit!
What does ollie ollie oxen free mean?
"Come out, come out, wherever you are" would be my guess.
Why do ghetto people call eachother homies?
It's the plural of ''Homo''