Re: [MLUG - DISCUSSION] etymology of 'geek', 'nerd', etc.

[Michael <EMAIL:PROTECTED>]

Call me what you want... 'Slashdot. News for ***NERDS***. Stuff that
matters.' :) I think that says it all. ;>

Actually though I don't think any of the words have that many negative
meanings at this point. Maybe in elementary school they still do but most
of us are probably older than that (I am unless you count my mental
age!) so it hardly matters. I'm a gerk, nerd, lesbian nazi abducted by
aliens and forced into a weight loss clinic, or whatever you wanna call
being fairly smart and somewhat weird (compared to what I call
'mortals'). Maybe it's just me -- not many people like to pick on such a
big nerd. But hey I can sing along w/ the Revenge of the Nerds title
song and be proud! :)

*^*^*^*
Have the courage to take your own thoughts seriously, for they will shape
you. -- Albert Einstein

On Wed, 21 Feb 2001, Jonathan King wrote:

> On Wed, 21 Feb 2001, Mike Miller wrote:
> 
> > On Wed, 21 Feb 2001, rwd7ec wrote:
> > 
> > > NO, No, no! I had a discussion about this with a co-worker the
> > > otherday. We are not nerds. GEEKS is more like it...computer geeks to
> > > be exact. We came up with the conclusion that Nerds are Geeks without
> > > the intellectual bonus (For all you math geeks, NERD= GEEK - INT ie
> > > other engineering majors) We also came to the conclusion that Dorks
> > > are just more socially inept nerds (again, DORK= pr0n(Nerd - BOOTY) ).
> > 
> > I was just remembering another thing from my early years in engineering
> > school (at WPI in Worcester, MA).  Of course there were many 'geeks'
> > around, but we didn't call them that.  We called them "gweeps."  Now this
> > is going back 25 years, but apparently the term is still in use:
> > 
> > http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/jargon/html/entry/gweep.html
> 
> Hmm.  There were (and are) actually a lot of terms that cover the broad
> spectrum of geekiness in various ways.  "gweep" is news to me as a term
> for a person.  Where I grew up in eastern Massachusetts, "gweep" was
> the sound you would sometimes use in the sense that people now use
> use the phrase "Bzzzt! Thank you for playing".  And that fits in with
> the "alarm beep sound" that Mike cites.  It's not that far a stretch 
> to extend this to a person who in a variety of contexts.
> 
> Interestingly, many of these words were similar to each other in that they
> had a long "ee" sound in them.  This is possibly somebody's idea of sound
> symbolism given that geeks are/were presumed to have high-pitched or whiny
> voices.  Or that there is something repulsive or rodent-like about them
> ("eek!" "eeeuw").  So we have:
> 
> geek   -- what we're discussing
> 
> gleek  -- basically "yuck" or "rats" or something like that, only with a
>           long e in it
> 
> phrene -- (pejorative) a brainiac
> 
> pheeb  -- (also "feeb"; pejorative)  emphasizes whininess, I think.
> 
> dweeb  -- emphasizes (I think) the lack of a life.
>  
> > The word 'geek' is in the dictionary.  It's a carnival performer who
> > bites the heads off of chickens for money.  This generalized to
> > Definition 2: "any strange or eccentric person."  How 'geek' came to
> > refer specifically to computer enthusiasts is a little mysterious (I
> > know we're strange and eccentric), but I wonder if there is any
> > connection with the term 'gweep.' 'Geek' and 'gweep' were both
> > definitely pejorative, so maybe there is a connection.
> 
> But that's just the point; geek is not really pejorative any more, since
> it's the term used inside the Community.  It has become a "pride" term, if
> you will.  When I hear it, "nerd" is more pejorative, especially when used
> by a non-geek in the phrase "computer nerd".  Same thing with the related
> adjectives, even inside the Community, "that's pretty nerdy" could
> basically never be positive, while "that's pretty geeky" just might be.
> 
> > 'Nerd' is also in the dictionary.  According to my dictionary, the term
> > 'nerd' was first used in the early 1960s.  Definition 2 is "a person
> > dedicated to a nonsocial pursuit: a computer nerd."  It seems like 'nerd'
> > has fallen out of fashion somewhat and 'geek' is taking its place.
> 
> I think it is more the case that "nerd" is the term used more often by the
> kind of lusrs who think "debugging" is what happens when you call the
> exterminator, while "geek" is the term used by people who have religious
> crusades over which is the One True Debugger.
> 
> jking
> 
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