Coming into Town with the --

Been thinking about dirty words lately, in the context of the late unpleasantness. (Or one of the late unpleasantnesses, anyway.) Not in the sense of whether I like 'curse words or not. I do like 'em. Shit, I LOVE the little fuckers. And for good or ill, they're a part of the voice that works for me online, for whatever reason. No, I'm thinking instead about what curse words, or otherwise loaded words, actually do.

When the issue of "bad words" comes up the immediate question is typically the morality of the use of the words or word. Is it right to say "cocksucker" or not? How about "cunt"? Or "nigger"?

And that's fine. But what usually isn't considered is the nature of curses and slurs and "bad words" in and of themselves. What makes a curse a curse? What makes one word OK for referring to a certain ethnic group OK, and what makes another a slur? Why is "vagina" good and "cunt" bad?

Let us explore the subject of bad words coldly and analytically, for a moment. What are they? What are these bad words that make us so unhappy?

I have a theory, you see, you benighted gobshites. And yes, this will be on the final.

1. We need to concede upfront that  bad words usually lack concrete referents. When I say "fuck you, Jonah Goldberg," I am not expressing on any level a desire to have sex with Jonah Goldberg. Neither am I considering in any way Mr. Goldberg's sexuality, a perfectly disgusting topic best left to people in white coats with stainless steel implements and excellent mental health coverage. Rather, I am expressing utter contempt for his silly "ideas" and "essays," and indeed literally wishing that he would "go and get his head stuck in a birdhouse."

Likewise, when I say "that David Brooks column is full of shit," I do not mean that when you open up the NY Times to his effusions, a pound or so of feces will fall on your lap. While that would, admittedly, be an improvement, it is not really the case that his writings are manure, which after all serves a useful function.

2. "Bad words" always vary in time and place. In other words, the worst of curses decades or centuries ago are as nothing now. "Egad" and "zounds" are pretty good examples of this --  and so is  "bloody," a word with a fascinating history.

This suggests that the "badness" quotient of a certain word depends heavily on who says it and in what context, and what cultural values predominate in the world of its expression. Fall into the wrong time portal and say "zounds!" when you emerge, and the natives may skin you. Say "fuckboogers" and they might laugh. And THEN kill you. And who could blame them?

3. What 1 and 2 suggest is that curse words serve a social and political function of inclusion and exclusion, more than anything else. What a curse word, or a bad word (distinctions coming) really does is to define who is in and who is out.

My favorite illustration of this point is from professional baseball, where we consider the function of the "magic word," as Jim Bouton called it: "motherfucker," the word that would get you automatically chucked. Say "motherfucker" and you were "out of the game." Nobody's mother's vagina was being penetrated by anyone's penis -- but the word would get you "thrown out."

And this is how it goes, no? Use a bad word, and you're "out," in some worlds; use the same word in other worlds, and you're "in." It's a game. Here's a fun sketch: a law firm, 11AM. In one office, a job interview is being conducted. The candidate forgets herself and says "crap." The committee frowns. At exactly the same instant, not 35 feet away, a senior partner says "shitballs," and her colleague giggles. The one wall and the marginal physical gulf between the two utterances is nothing next to the vastness of the corresponding social gulf. And literal poop has nothing to do with it.

4. To grasp the full meaning of a particular "bad" expression in a particular utterance of same, what matters is the position of the speaker within the wider linguistic marketplace, a space of competing interests and valences. Which I know sounds like dirty water being squirted from an old rubber ball. But still.

It's not such a strange concept. Here's the easiest metaphor: money. In the example of the law firm above, what matters is the amount of linguistic capital possessed by the partner as opposed to the interviewee. To be blunt, the partner can afford to say "shit" while the interviewee cannot afford to say "crap." What's changed is not anyone's attitude towards feces, but the position and resources of the speaker.

5. So when we're talking about bad words, we're talking about political and social power. And you know, that's about it. 

Pierre Bourdieu argues that the struggle within any specific social field is to establish the dominant definition of legitimate discourse. And he's right, motherfuckers. Bad words shift in social valence when their social as opposed to literal valence shifts. Nobody's going to defend or champion feces, so the taboos on that remain relatively stable. Not so the value placed on slurs referring to God, or blacks, or gays.

I have more of a point, but now I'm sleepy. Come back tomorrow!

Comments

[Ripley]

I've had this discussion with a friend, and my base theory is that Society needs words that are taboo, so we can separate the good people from the bad people, so to speak.

Also, I think some words provide a linguistic litmus test for people's emotions - as in 'I'm so angry I'll actually say "fuck" this time'. Somebody I knew in college once broke it down into 'barnyard language' vs. 'real profanity'.

Excellent fucking post, ya bastard!

[SPIIDERWEB™]

FWIW and its worth exactly what you're paying for it, I told my sons they can say anything they want such as fuck, shit, asshole, etc, but I would not tolerate real dirty words such as nigger, kike, spic.

Those are the really dirty, ugly words out there and they hurt far more than mere profanity.

Interestingly enough, my sons don't swear much at all. Maybe the fucking apples do fall far from the son-of-a-bitchin' tree.

[flory]

it is not really the case that his writings are manure, which after all serves a useful function.

Fishwrap and birdcage liner are useful functions, no?

As for social capital...do you curse in class? Bet not. At least, not like you do here. And doesn't the teacher have *all* the social capital in a classroom setting?

There's something more going on than just who's more or less powerful or more or less "in". I wouldn't have dreamed of cursing around my mother, and I won't do it around my nephews - much. I don't think that has much to do with social capital.

[Thers]

Flory -- sure it does! The relationship is just different, that's all, because the social setting is different. If you didn't value your relationship with your mother, you'd curse in her presence all the time. But you do, so curses are too expensive for you to utter near her. They would place you "out" when you want to be "in."

I do curse in class, when I give the lecture version of this post. When I say "motherfucker" from my position as a perfesser, I assert my right to use the word in my capacity as perfesser -- I can "own" that word and others by virtue of my social position. I do it in the context of an academic discussion on curses, sure, but that's the point, that curses get their power from the social value with which they're invested, and that this value is always contested.

[flory]

I don't think you can include cursing as part of a discussion of cursing as an example. That'd be like trying to have a discussion on the collected works of Jeff Goldstein and not using the word "pasty".

If you don't curse, as a general rule, in the classroom its because there are social reasons why that setting makes cursing inappropriate. Everybody in your classroom knows that everybody else in your classroom curses -- when not in the classroom. But nobody curses *in* the classroom. You have the same social capital outside the classroom that you do inside, but I bet you curse more freely outside -- even to the same students. The social value of the curses haven't changed, but the setting has...

Maybe I'm not understanding what you mean by social and political value, but I think there's more going on.

[NYMary]

I cannot believe you didn't mention the split between the Latinate and the Anglo-Saxon after 1066.

[Righteous Bubba]

The social value of the curses haven't changed, but the setting has...

Sure they have. I maintain my position at my workplace partially through controlling my potty-mouth. Just as my dollar gets me more in Mexico, dirty words go further in the workplace.

[Phila]

Interestingly enough, my sons don't swear much at all. Maybe the fucking apples do fall far from the son-of-a-bitchin' tree.

Sounds like you raised the fuckers right!

[flory]

The social value of the curses haven't changed, but the setting has...

Sure they have

Bubba:
Mebbe its more accurate to say that the social value of the cursing is dependent on setting. So mebbe I'm agreeing with Thers?

[Thers]

Flory -- yes. Setting, or "field." The point is that curses work in the context of social hierarchies. Thjat's why they're so emotionally charged.

[flory]

I hope this is an open book final.....

[Snow]

I had a similar discussion with myself over at my place. I said words are not bad, actions are. And then I agreed with myself.

[Phila]

Well, it's tomorrow. Where's the beef?

Also, you have mail. Urgent mail, of a time-sensitive, mission-critical, customer-centric nature.

[flory]

Are you still thinking of dirty words?

Don't you have grades to post or presents to wrap or sumthin'?

[fourlegsgood]

Hey, fuck you!

Oh wait. I meant, fuck Ntodd!! And that is the totality of my contribution to the subject this evening.

[Dave]

When I read a Trex post on FDL, I have a twitchy reaction that feels like [shite. shitefuck. horrortwat mungdrip thefuckyousay ass pustule! syphilitic cockhate! O pestilential deity end the fuckfuck titswat now! Please!] But, that's just me.

[Echidne]

Very interesting. I don't use many cursewords, because so many of them imply things about my own sweet self as stinky goods. Well, not really stinky as I shower every day, but metaphorically stinky. And "fuck" has the big problem that it's such wonderful fun, yet the use of it in swearing implies a semi-violent interpretation.

[Danny Guam]

I think what you wrote in your post is a bunch of piffle.

There, I said it.

[Reprobate]

In the immortal words of Eric Cartman, "fuckity fuckity fuck fuck fuck".

That is all.

.

[Snow]

And I see everyone here agrees with me as well.

I am so smart. Yea me!