How to NOT use bad words! Trivia Quiz

Answer: The string of sounds in that word is intrinsically "dirty."

Culture has a lot to do with which words are considered taboo. Words referring to an act that society considers taboo (like sex or excretion) often become taboo. Taboos can develop against using religious words outside of their prescribed religious context (like "taking the Lord's name in vain"). Class bias can create a set of taboo words.

The Norman conquest of England introduced an upper class which used special Latin-derived vocabulary (perspire, expectorate, menstruate, defecate, urinate).

The corresponding "native" English vocabulary subsequently became taboo (sweat, spit, bleed, and so on). The difference persists to this day. A taboo word in one language may be completely innocuous in another. For example, in German and Latin, the word "sex" (spelled "sechs" in German, but pronounced "zex") means "six."

Answer: Any of these.

The Oromo's taboo against speaking the names of relatives is known as "laguu." Some strategies for observing "laguu" are mundane, like naming the person's relationship to the speaker ("my husband"), or describing someone's character or appearance ("the gap toothed one," "the truthful one").

Some strategies are more creative, like describing the person's horse ("owner of a brown horse"), or inventing nonsense words that sound like the person's name ("Sa'daaso" for "Ba'daaso"). The range of "normal" words which may be banned can be quite extensive.

For example, the name "Margaa" would cause the words "sprout like grass" (marguu), the name of a certain plant (magarti), "cause ascarid" (maagessu), and "porridge" (mar'kaa) all to become taboo.

Answer: Fool

Actually, in Hebrew (or Aramaic?) and Greek, it would have been the R-word (rhaka) and the M-word (moros, from which we get our word "moron"). I don't think you're automatically condemned, though -- in Matthew 23:17, Jesus Himself calls the scribes and Pharisees "fools and blind people" (moroi kai tuphloi).

Answer: Bloody

In fact, according to the British scholar Eric Partridge, "much of the interest in the play ["Pygmalion"] was due to the heroine's utterance of this banned word. It was waited for with trembling, heard shudderingly." What were these infamous lines that "startled London and indeed, fluttered the whole Empire"?
"Are you walking across the Park, Miss Doolittle?"
"Walk! Not bloody likely. I am going in a taxi."
"Bloody" was a real shocker in 1910, but nowadays it has lost enough of its power to appear in the "Harry Potter" movies!
It is a mystery how "bloody" became a taboo word. One theory is that it came from an oath involving the "blood of Christ." Another theory is that it refers to menstruation or is associated with childbirth.

Answer: The word has been Latinized. (The poem is written in Middle English and really bad Latin.)

It doesn't take a scholar of Latin or Middle English to figure out what the passage means. That's why I'm not reproducing it here. Of course, the major difficulty in tracing the usage of the word back much farther is simply that the word was not likely to be used in the sort of texts that were written down and preserved. Widespread literacy makes for widespread graffiti, which tends to preserve taboo words (as a visit to any gas station restroom will show), but that, unfortunately, was not the case in the early days of English.

Answer: The Guardian

The "Guardian Style Guide" states:
"First, remember the reader, and respect demands that we should not casually use words that are likely to offend. Second, use such words only when absolutely necessary to the facts of a piece, or to portray a character in an article; there is almost never a case in which we need to use a swearword outside direct quotes. Third, the stronger the swearword, the harder we ought to think about using it. Finally, never use asterisks, which are just a copout."
In the author's not-so-humble opinion, good for them. What good does it do to bleep out or dance around bad words? If it's for the sake of the kids, it's not like they won't be exposed to them elsewhere, and surely it's important that they learn the meanings and connotations of loaded and "dangerous" words well. If it's just to avoid the appearance of bad language, it's a useless copout because ast*r*sks, h-ph-ns, and circumlocutions assume that you can fill in the word. Attempting to avoid a word only marks it as especially important. And, after all, it's not the words that are "dirty," but the thought behind them. If you don't think something is appropriate, don't dance around it-- just don't bring it up. If a politician said something inappropriate, please print it, so his or her constituents can know for themselves how inappropriate it was. If there are "bad words" in a literary work, please print them, because a skillful author would not use such strong and pointed words without good reason. Is it right to sacrifice honesty for misguided prudishness?

Answer: 1680

It comes from a poem entitled "Upon the Author of a Play call'd Sodom" by a certain John Oldham. The poem consists of a series of "comparisons between deprecated writing and various noxious materials" (in the words of Mark Liberman). It is the middle letters of one of these "noxious materials" which have the dubious privilege of being replaced by hyphens.

Answer: God

It is common enough for religions to restrict the use of "powerful" religious words, like Christianity's commandment against taking the Lord's name in vain. We can also agree that this wasn't a case of it! Delta Airlines fixed the mistake fairly quickly. On the other hand, the Quebecois of Montreal use religion extensively for swearing in polite company. As Roger Shuy put it, "Oh tabernacle! What the wafer!"

Answer: True

As soon as the video clip hit YouTube, Allen started backpeddling. A few hours after the misspeak, Allen claimed "the word had no derogatory meaning for him and that he was sorry." Allen said that the word sounded like "mohawk," that was all. Two days later, the story had become that it was a mash-up of "mohawk" and the Spanish word for excrement. The fudging continued. Allen lost the race by 7,000 votes. For the ultimate meaning of this story, I'll turn to Geoffrey K. Pullum, posting on "Language Log":

"If you're a political candidate, then for you to say something on camera that suggests racist attitudes or beliefs is comparable to, oh, something like putting your hand down the back of your pants to scratch your [rear] and then sniffing your finger. Nothing illegal there. But your campaign will take a downswing from the moment that video clip hits YouTube.

"This is not about the mythical political-correctness "word police" of which the right-wingers disingenuously complain. This is about thinking people simply seeing what you do and turning away in disgust. It if were just illegal to say "nigger" or "spic", a politician could perhaps survive it (politicians do survive drunk driving arrests, and surely drunk driving is enormously more serious and dangerous than having negative opinions about some racial group). But it's worse than illegal. It picks you out as someone to stay away from. It identifies you as disgusting and fit only to be shunned. A person who would never be invited to dinner. And you won't survive that in modern American politics."

Answer: He had Wilmore, an African-American man, speak the offending word when Oliver paused.

The exchange went something like this:
Oliver: So, Leroy, you want to ban this word...um... Larry...(points to him)
Wilmore: [The offending word]
Oliver: Thank you. What he said. Ah. Is the word, um,
Wilmore: [The offending word]
Oliver:...offensive to everyone, or just to...
Wilmore: [The offending word]
Oliver: No, nonono, I was just, I was just pointing to ... don't use that term, please!

Of course, Stephen Colbert had to do his version, interviewing Jabari Asim, the author of the book "The N-Word: Who Can Say It, Who Shouldn't, and Why":

Colbert: First question. Did you want to name the book The N-Word and they said, "No, you have to call it The N-Word"? Or, did you say, "I want to name this book The N-Word," and they assumed you meant, you know, The N-Word, when in fact you meant The N-Word?
Asim: I think I suggested calling it The N-Word and they thought it was a good idea to play it safe and call it The N-Word.
Colbert: OK, this actually, this raises another interesting subject to me, is that the N-word has become so anonymous [sic] with the N-word, uh, is saying the N-word pretty much like saying the N-word? Because I would never say the N-word, but I don't want somebody to think I'm saying the N-word by saying the N-word. You know what I mean? Because I would never say that word that begins with the letter after M.

(Transcripts from "Language Log." I would also like to thank the "Language Log" folks for providing an intelligent and engaging stream of taboo vocabulary usage analysis, which inspired this quiz!)