Misplaced Pages

#718281

74-463: " Cunt " ( / k ʌ n t / ) is a vulgar word for the vulva in its primary sense, but it is used in a variety of ways, including as a term of disparagement . "Cunt" is often used as a disparaging and obscene term for a woman in the United States, an unpleasant or objectionable person (regardless of gender) in the United Kingdom and Ireland, or a contemptible man in Australia and New Zealand. In Australia and New Zealand, it can also be

148-492: A Pakistani immigrant as "eating hot buttered toast with cunty fingers", suggestive of hypocrisy and a hidden sordidness or immorality behind the country's quaint façade. This term is attributed to British novelist Henry Green . In the United States, "cunty" is sometimes used in cross-dressing drag ball culture for a drag queen that "projects feminine beauty" and was the title of a hit song by Aviance . A visitor to

222-421: A second language , estimates of the total number of Anglophones vary from 1.5 billion to 2 billion. David Crystal calculated in 2003 that non-native speakers outnumbered native speakers by a ratio of three to one. Besides the major varieties of English — American , British , Canadian , Australian , Irish , New Zealand English —and their sub-varieties, countries such as South Africa , India , Nigeria ,

296-647: A New York drag show tells of the emcee praising a queen with "cunty, cunty, cunty" as she walks past. Rapper Azealia Banks is known for her frequent usage of the word, and her fans are known as the Kunt Brigade. She's said in one interview: "To be cunty is to be feminine and to be, like, aware of yourself. Nobody's fucking with that inner strength and delicateness. The cunts, the gay men, adore that. My friends would say, "Oh you need to cunt it up! You're being too banjee ." Frequency of use varies widely. According to research in 2013 and 2014 by Aston University and

370-505: A broader derogatory term, it is comparable to prick and means "a fool, a dolt, an unpleasant person – of either sex". This sense is common in New Zealand, British, and Australian English, where it is usually applied to men or as referring specifically to "a despicable, contemptible or foolish" man . During the 1971 Oz trial for obscenity, prosecuting counsel asked writer George Melly , "Would you call your 10-year-old daughter

444-485: A cunt on American late night TV show Full Frontal with Samantha Bee . Vulgarism The English word "vulgarism" derives ultimately from Latin vulgus, "the common people", often as a pejorative meaning "the [unwashed] masses, undifferentiated herd, a mob". In classical studies , Vulgar Latin as the Latin of everyday life is conventionally contrasted to Classical Latin , the literary language exemplified by

518-486: A cunt?" Melly replied, "No, because I don't think she is." In the 1975 film One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest , the central character McMurphy , when pressed to explain exactly why he does not like the tyrannical Nurse Ratched, says, "Well, I don't want to break up the meeting or nothing, but she's something of a cunt, ain't she, Doc?" In informal British, Irish, New Zealand, and Australian English, and occasionally but to

592-521: A lesser extent in Canadian English, it can be used with no negative connotations to refer to a (usually male) person. In this sense, it may be modified by a positive qualifier (funny, clever, etc.). For example, "This is my mate Brian. He's a good cunt." It can also be used to refer to something very difficult or unpleasant (as in "a cunt of a job"). In the Survey of English Dialects the word

666-638: A live broadcast, the word has been aired outside editorial control: The first scripted uses of the word on British television occurred in 1979, in the ITV drama No Mama No . In Jerry Springer – The Opera (BBC, 2005), the suggestion that the Christ character might be gay was found more controversial than the chant describing the Devil as "cunting, cunting, cunting, cunting cunt". In July 2007 BBC Three broadcast an hour-long documentary, entitled The 'C' Word , about

740-458: A low or uneducated social class. ... [A vulgarism] is usually a variety of Standard English, but a bad variety. The moral and aesthetic values explicit in such a definition depends on class hierarchy viewed as authoritative. For instance, the "misuse" of aspiration ( H-dropping , such as pronouncing "have" as " 'ave") has been considered a mark of the lower classes in England at least since

814-417: A name which potter Grayson Perry borrowed for one of his early works: "An unglazed piece of modest dimensions, made from terracotta like clay – labia carefully formed with once wet material, about its midriff". Australian artist Greg Taylor's display of scores of white porcelain vulvas, "CUNTS and other conversations" (2009), was deemed controversial for both its title and content, with Australia Post warning

SECTION 10

#1732800812719

888-477: A neutral or positive term when used with a positive qualifier (e.g., "He's a good cunt"). The term has various derivative senses, including adjective and verb uses. The earliest known use of the word, according to the Oxford English Dictionary , was as part of a placename : an Oxford street called Gropecunt Lane , c.  1230 , now by the name of Grove Passage or Magpie Lane. Use of

962-535: A term of affection, it had become "the most offensive insult one man could throw at another" and suggested that the word was "sacred", and "a word of immense power, to be used sparingly". Greer said in 2006 that " 'cunt' is one of the few remaining words in the English language with a genuine power to shock." Cunt has been attested in its anatomical meaning since at least the 13th century. While Francis Grose 's 1785 A Classical Dictionary of The Vulgar Tongue listed

1036-503: A wedge ", (figurative) " to squeeze in "), leading to English words such as cuneiform (" wedge-shaped "). In Middle English , cunt appeared with many spellings, such as coynte , cunte and queynte , which did not always reflect the actual pronunciation of the word. The word, in its modern meaning, is attested in Middle English. Proverbs of Hendyng , a manuscript from some time before 1325, includes

1110-615: A well publicised and violent assault. Meredith gently cautioned the girl to choose her words more carefully. As this was a live broadcast on the East Coast, the slurs already were already broadcast, but the producers removed the audio for the Central, Mountain, and Pacific feeds as well as online. Like the Fonda incident, Vieira issued an apology later in the show. Media Critic Thomas Francis commented on what he perceived to be hypocrisy in

1184-561: Is a movement among feminists that seeks to reclaim cunt not only as acceptable, but as an honorific , in much the same way that queer has been reappropriated by LGBT people and nigger has been by some African-Americans . Proponents include artist Tee Corinne in The Cunt Coloring Book (1975); Eve Ensler in "Reclaiming Cunt" from The Vagina Monologues (1996); and Inga Muscio in her book, Cunt: A Declaration of Independence (1998). Germaine Greer ,

1258-604: Is also the primary native language and English is the primary language of government and education, such as Ireland , Gibraltar , and the Commonwealth Caribbean . While English is also spoken by a majority of people as a second language in a handful of countries such as Denmark , the Netherlands , Norway and Sweden , these countries are not considered part of the English-speaking world as

1332-458: Is more taboo. Some American feminists of the 1970s sought to eliminate disparaging terms for women, including " bitch " and "cunt". In the context of pornography , Catharine MacKinnon argued that use of the word acts to reinforce a dehumanisation of women by reducing them to mere body parts; and in 1979 Andrea Dworkin described the word as reducing women to "the one essential – 'cunt: our essence ... our offence'". Despite criticisms, there

1406-572: Is occasionally used in the titles of works of art, such as Peter Renosa's portrait of the pop singer Madonna , I am the Cunt of Western Civilization , from a 1990 quote by the singer. One of the first works of Gilbert & George was a self-portrait in 1969 entitled "Gilbert the Shit and George the Cunt". The London performance art group the Neo Naturists had a song and an act called "Cunt Power",

1480-525: Is so widely spoken, it has often been called a " world language ", the lingua franca of the modern era, and while it is not an official language in most countries, it is currently the language most often taught as a foreign language . It is, by international treaty, the official language for aeronautical and maritime communications. English is one of the official languages of the United Nations and many other international organizations, including

1554-1108: Is studied most often in the European Union , and the perception of the usefulness of foreign languages among Europeans is 67% in favour of English, ahead of 17% for German and 16% for French (as of 2012 ). In some of the non–English-speaking EU countries, the following percentages of adults claimed to be able to converse in English in 2012: 90% in the Netherlands; 89% in Malta; 86% in Sweden and Denmark; 73% in Cyprus, Croatia, and Austria; 70% in Finland; and over 50% in Greece, Belgium, Luxembourg, Slovenia, and Germany. In 2012, excluding native speakers, 38% of Europeans consider that they can speak English. Books, magazines, and newspapers written in English are available in many countries around

SECTION 20

#1732800812719

1628-667: The Larry Sanders Show in 1992, and a notable use occurred in Sex and the City . In the US, an episode of the NBC TV show 30 Rock , titled " The C Word ", centered around a subordinate calling protagonist Liz Lemon ( Tina Fey ) a "cunt" and her subsequent efforts to regain her staff's favour. Characters in the popular TV series The Sopranos often used the term. Jane Fonda uttered

1702-483: The "Golden Age" canon ( Cicero , Caesar , Vergil , Ovid , among others). This distinction was always an untenable mode of literary criticism , unduly problematizing, for instance, the so-called "Silver Age" novelist Petronius , whose complex and sophisticated prose style in the Satyricon is full of conversational vulgarisms. Vulgarism has been a particular concern of British English traditionalists. In

1776-534: The Anglo-Saxons , originally not an obscenity but rather an ordinary name for the vulva or vagina. Gropecunt Lane was originally a street of prostitution, a red light district . It was normal in the Middle Ages for streets to be named after the goods available for sale therein, hence the prevalence in cities having a medieval history of names such as "Silver Street" and "Fish Street". In some locations,

1850-616: The Anglosphere . Speakers of English are called Anglophones . Early Medieval England was the birthplace of the English language; the modern form of the language has been spread around the world since the 17th century, first by the worldwide influence of England and later the United Kingdom, and then by that of the United States . Through all types of printed and electronic media of these countries, English has become

1924-568: The BBC have guidelines which specify how "cunt" and similar words should be treated. In a survey of 2000 commissioned by the British Broadcasting Standards Commission , Independent Television Commission , BBC and Advertising Standards Authority , "cunt" was regarded as the most offensive word which could be heard, above " motherfucker " and " fuck ". Nevertheless, there have been occasions when, particularly in

1998-561: The Commonwealth of Nations . English is the primary natively spoken language in several countries and territories. Five of the largest of these are sometimes described as the " core Anglosphere "; they are the United Kingdom , the United States , Australia , Canada , and New Zealand . The term "Anglosphere" can sometimes be extended to include other countries and territories where English or an English Creole language

2072-883: The International Olympic Committee . It is also one of two co-official languages for astronauts (besides the Russian language) serving on board the International Space Station . The English language has a particular significance in the Commonwealth of Nations, which developed from the British Empire. English is the medium of inter-Commonwealth relations. The English language as used in the Commonwealth has sometimes been referred to as Commonwealth English , most often interchangeably with British English . English

2146-482: The Philippines , Singapore , Jamaica , and Trinidad and Tobago also have millions of native speakers of dialect continua ranging from English-based creole languages to Standard English . Other countries and territories, such as Ghana , also use English as their primary official language even though it is not the native language of most of the people. English holds official status in numerous countries within

2220-657: The Titanic . In 2018, Canadian comedian Samantha Bee had to apologise after calling Ivanka Trump , a White House official and the daughter of US President Donald Trump , a "feckless cunt". On 6 December 2010 on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme , presenter James Naughtie referred to the British Culture Secretary Jeremy Hunt as "Jeremy Cunt"; he later apologised for what the BBC called

2294-525: The University of South Carolina , based on a corpus of nearly 9 billion words in geotagged tweets , the word was most frequently used in the United States in New England and was least frequently used in the south-eastern states. In Maine, it was the most frequently used "cuss word" after "asshole". James Joyce was one of the first major 20th-century novelists to put the word "cunt" into print. In

Cunt - Misplaced Pages Continue

2368-498: The leading language of international discourse and the lingua franca in many regions and professional fields, such as science , navigation and law . The United States and India have the most total English speakers, with 306 million and 129 million, respectively. These are followed by Pakistan (104 million), the United Kingdom (68 million), and Nigeria (60 million). As of 2022, there were about 400 million native speakers of English. Including people who speak English as

2442-402: The "proper" word vagina , a Latin name meaning "sword-sheath" originally applied by male anatomists to all muscle coverings (see synovial sheath ) – not just because it refers only to the internal canal but also because of the implication that the female body is "simply a receptacle for a weapon". But in 2006, referring to its use as a term of abuse, she said that, though used in some quarters as

2516-417: The 1920s, the English lexicographer Henry Wyld defined "vulgarism" as: a peculiarity which intrudes itself into Standard English , and is of such a nature as to be associated with the speech of vulgar or uneducated speakers. The origin of pure vulgarisms is usually that they are importations, not from a regional but from a class dialect —in this case from a dialect which is not that of a province, but of

2590-430: The 88 countries and territories in which English is an official, administrative, or cultural language. In the early 2000s, between one and two billion people spoke English, making it the largest language by number of speakers , the third largest language by number of native speakers and the most widespread language geographically. The countries in which English is the native language of most people are sometimes termed

2664-468: The BBFC's guidelines at "15" state that "very strong language may be permitted, depending on the manner in which it is used, who is using the language, its frequency within the work as a whole and any special contextual justification". Also directed by Loach, My Name is Joe was given a 15 certificate despite more than one instance of the word. The 2010 Ian Dury biopic Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll

2738-646: The Cuckoo's Nest (1975). Two early films by Martin Scorsese , Mean Streets (1973) and Taxi Driver (1976), use the word in the context of the virgin-whore dichotomy , with characters using it after they were rejected (in Mean Streets ) or after they have slept with the woman (in Taxi Driver ). In notable instances, the word has been edited out. Saturday Night Fever (1977) was released in two versions, "R" (Restricted) and "PG" (Parental Guidance),

2812-863: The Proto-Germanic term is disputed. It may have arisen by Grimm's law operating on the Proto-Indo-European root *gen/gon " create, become " seen in gonads , genital , gamete , genetics , gene , or the Proto-Indo-European root *gʷneh₂/guneh₂ " woman " ( Greek : gunê , seen in gynaecology ). Similarly, its use in England likely evolved from the Latin word cunnus ("vulva"), or one of its derivatives French con , Spanish coño , and Portuguese cona . Other Latin words related to cunnus are cuneus (" wedge ") and its derivative cunēre (" to fasten with

2886-561: The advice: Ȝeue þi cunte to cunnig and craue affetir wedding. (Give your cunt wisely and make [your] demands after the wedding.) The word cunt is generally regarded in English-speaking countries as profanity and unsuitable for normal public discourse. It has been described as "the most heavily tabooed word of all English words", although John Ayto, editor of the Oxford Dictionary of Slang , says " nigger "

2960-463: The artist that the publicity postcards were illegal. Theatre censorship was effectively abolished in the UK in 1968 ; prior to that, all theatrical productions had to be vetted by Lord Chamberlain's Office . English stand-up comedian Roy "Chubby" Brown claims that he was the first person to say the word on stage in the United Kingdom. Broadcast media is regulated for content, and media providers such as

3034-543: The context of one of the central characters in Ulysses (1922), Leopold Bloom , Joyce refers to the Dead Sea and to ... the oldest people. Wandered far away over all the earth, captivity to captivity, multiplying, dying, being born everywhere. It lay there now. Now it could bear no more. Dead: an old woman's: the grey sunken cunt of the world. Joyce uses the word figuratively rather than literally; but while Joyce used

Cunt - Misplaced Pages Continue

3108-413: The feminist writer and professor of English who once published a magazine article entitled "Lady, Love Your Cunt" (anthologised in 1986), discussed the origins, usage and power of the word in the BBC series Balderdash and Piffle , explaining how her views had developed over time. In the 1970s she had "championed" the use of the word for the female genitalia, thinking it "shouldn't be abusive"; she rejected

3182-555: The film edited for television the word is dubbed with the word scent . The 2010 film Kick-Ass caused a controversy when the word was used by Hit-Girl because the actress playing the part, Chloë Grace Moretz , was 11 years old at the time of filming. In Britain, use of the word "cunt" may result in an "18" rating from the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC), and this happened to Ken Loach 's film Sweet Sixteen , because of an estimated twenty uses of "cunt". Still,

3256-721: The former name has been bowdlerised , as in the City of York, to the more acceptable " Grape Lane ". The somewhat similar word 'queynte' appears several times in Chaucer 's Canterbury Tales (c. 1390), in bawdy contexts, but since it is used openly, does not appear to have been considered obscene at that time. A notable use is from the " Miller's Tale ": "Pryvely he caught her by the queynte." The Wife of Bath also uses this term, "For certeyn, olde dotard, by your leave/You shall have queynte right enough at eve .... What aileth you to grouche thus and groan?/Is it for ye would have my queynte alone?" In modernised versions of these passages

3330-472: The inadvertent use of "an offensive four-letter word". In the programme following, about an hour later, Andrew Marr referred to the incident during Start the Week where it was said that "we won't repeat the mistake" whereupon Marr slipped up in the same way as Naughtie had. In the United States, the word's first appearance was in graffiti on a wall in the 1969 film Bronco Bullfrog . The first spoken use of

3404-536: The language is still viewed primarily as a foreign tongue and does not serve an important cultural role in society. English is an official language ( de facto or de jure ) of the following countries and territories. Although not official, English is also an important language in some former colonies and protectorates of the British Empire where it is used as an administrative language , namely Brunei , Malaysia , and Sri Lanka . Because English

3478-723: The late 18th century, as dramatized in My Fair Lady . Because linguistic vulgarism betrayed social class, its avoidance became an aspect of etiquette . In 19th-century England, books such as The Vulgarisms and Improprieties of the English Language (1833) by W. H. Savage, reflected upper-middle-class anxieties about "correctness and good breeding". Vulgarisms in a literary work may be used deliberately to further characterization , by use of " eye dialect " or simply by vocabulary choice. English-speaking countries The English-speaking world comprises

3552-598: The latter omitting or replacing dialogue such as Tony Manero ( John Travolta )'s comment to Annette ( Donna Pescow ), "It's a decision a girl's gotta make early in life, if she's gonna be a nice girl or a cunt". This differential persists, and in The Silence of the Lambs (1991), Agent Starling ( Jodie Foster ) meets Dr. Hannibal Lecter ( Anthony Hopkins ) for the first time and passes the cell of "Multiple Miggs", who says to Starling: "I can smell your cunt." In versions of

3626-592: The list of the seven dirty words that could not, at that time, be said on American broadcast television, a routine that led to a U.S. Supreme Court decision. While some of the original seven are now heard on US broadcast television from time to time, "cunt" remains generally taboo except on premium paid subscription cable channels like HBO or Showtime. Comedian Louis C.K. uses the term frequently in his stage act as well as on his television show Louie on FX network, which bleeps it out. In 2018, Canadian comedian Samantha Bee had to apologise after calling Ivanka Trump

3700-414: The media industry: Isn't it interesting how the national media licks its chops over this story, delighting in every gory detail, only to caution a 13-year-old girl to be "careful about our language"? Why should she be careful, Meredith? Because there are 13-year-old girls in the audience? There's so much violence and vulgarity in modern American culture, words like cunt are like so many deck chairs on

3774-419: The obscene meaning of the word without being explicit in his poem The Good-Morrow , referring to sucking on "country pleasures". The 1675 Restoration comedy The Country Wife also features such word play, even in its title. By the 17th century, a softer form of the word, "cunny", came into use. A well-known use of this derivation can be found in the 25 October 1668 entry of the diary of Samuel Pepys . He

SECTION 50

#1732800812719

3848-620: The origin of the Proto-Germanic form itself. There are cognates in most Germanic languages, most of which also have the same meaning as the English cunt, such as the Swedish, Faroese and Nynorsk kunta ; West Frisian and Middle Low German kunte ; another Middle Low German kutte ; Middle High German kotze (meaning " prostitute "); modern German kott ; Middle Dutch conte ; modern Dutch words kut (same meaning) and kont ("butt", "arse"); and perhaps Old English cot . The etymology of

3922-665: The origins, use and evolution of the word from the early 1900s to the present day. Presented by British comedian Will Smith , viewers were taken to a street in Oxford once called Gropecunt Lane and presented with examples of the acceptability of "cunt" as a word. (Note that "the C-word" is also a long-standing euphemism for cancer; Lisa Lynch 's book led to a BBC1 drama, both with that title.) The Attitudes to potentially offensive language and gestures on TV and radio report by Ofcom , based on research conducted by Ipsos MORI , categorised

3996-467: The point that the accent is definitely on the first syllable of country , Shakespeare has Hamlet say, "That's a fair thought, to lie between maids' legs." In Twelfth Night (Act II, Scene V) the puritanical Malvolio believes he recognises his employer's handwriting in an anonymous letter, commenting "There be her very Cs, her Us, and her Ts: and thus makes she her great Ps", unwittingly punning on "cunt" and "piss", and while it has also been argued that

4070-435: The same term for a cat. ( Philip Massinger (1583–1640) : "A pox upon your Christian cockatrices ! They cry, like poulterers' wives, 'No money, no coney.'") Because of this slang use as a synonym for a taboo term, the word "coney", when it was used in its original sense to refer to rabbits, came to be pronounced as / ˈ k oʊ n i / (rhymes with "phoney"), instead of the original /ˈkʌni/ (rhymes with "honey"). Eventually,

4144-642: The slang term "cut" is intended, Pauline Kiernan writes that Shakespeare ridicules "prissy puritanical party-poopers" by having "a Puritan spell out the word 'cunt' on a public stage". A related scene occurs in Henry V : when Katherine is learning English, she is appalled at the gros, et impudique words "foot" and "gown", which her teacher has mispronounced as coun . It is usually argued that Shakespeare intends to suggest that she has misheard "foot" as foutre (French, "fuck") and "coun" as con (French "cunt", also used to mean "idiot"). Similarly, John Donne alludes to

4218-433: The taboo association led to the word "coney" becoming deprecated entirely and replaced by the word "rabbit". Robert Burns (1759–1796) used the word in his Merry Muses of Caledonia , a collection of bawdy verses which he kept to himself and were not publicly available until the mid-1960s. In "Yon, Yon, Yon, Lassie", this couplet appears: "For ilka birss upon her cunt, Was worth a ryal ransom" ("For every hair upon her cunt

4292-405: The usage of the word 'cunt' as a highly unacceptable pre- watershed , but generally acceptable post-watershed, along with 'fuck' and 'motherfucker'. Discriminatory words were generally considered as more offensive than the most offensive non-discriminatory words such as 'cunt' by the UK public, with discriminatory words being more regulated as a result. The first scripted use on US television was on

4366-519: The word queynte seems to be used with meaning comparable to the modern "quaint" (curious or old-fashioned, but nevertheless appealing). This ambiguity was still being exploited by the 17th century; Andrew Marvell 's ... then worms shall try / That long preserved virginity, / And your quaint honour turn to dust, / And into ashes all my lust in To His Coy Mistress depends on a pun on these two senses of "quaint". By Shakespeare's day,

4440-460: The word "queynte" is usually translated simply as "cunt". However, in Chaucer's usage there seems to be an overlap between the words "cunt" and "quaint" (possibly derived from the Latin for "known"). "Quaint" was probably pronounced in Middle English in much the same way as "cunt". It is sometimes unclear whether the two words were thought of as distinct from one another. Elsewhere in Chaucer's work

4514-548: The word as "C**T: a nasty name for a nasty thing", it did not appear in any major English dictionary from 1795 to 1961, when it was included in Webster's Third New International Dictionary with the comment "usu. considered obscene". Its first appearance in the Oxford English Dictionary was in 1972, which cites the word as having been in use from 1230 in what was supposedly a London street name of "Gropecunte Lane". It was, however, also used before 1230, having been brought over by

SECTION 60

#1732800812719

4588-582: The word as a term of abuse is relatively recent, dating from the late nineteenth century. The word was not considered vulgar in the Middle Ages , but became so during the seventeenth century, and it was omitted from dictionaries from the late eighteenth century until the 1960s. The etymology of cunt is a matter of debate, but most sources consider the word to have derived from a Germanic word ( Proto-Germanic *kuntō , stem *kuntōn- ), which appeared as kunta in Old Norse . Scholars are uncertain of

4662-635: The word in his acts, which got him arrested in Queensland and Western Australia for breaching obscenity laws of those states in the mid-1980s. Australian comedic singer Kevin Bloody Wilson makes extensive use of the word, most notably in the songs Caring Understanding Nineties Type and You Can't Say "Cunt" in Canada . The word appears in American comic George Carlin 's 1972 standup routine on

4736-608: The word in mainstream cinema occurs in Carnal Knowledge (1971), in which Jonathan ( Jack Nicholson ) asks, "Is this an ultimatum? Answer me, you ball-busting, castrating, son of a cunt bitch! Is this an ultimatum or not?" In the same year, the word was used in the film Women in Revolt , in which Holly Woodlawn shouts "I love cunt" whilst avoiding a violent boyfriend. Nicholson later used it again, in One Flew Over

4810-446: The word is used in the draft of a love letter mistakenly sent instead of a revised version and, although not spoken, is an important plot pivot. Irvine Welsh uses the word widely in his novels, such as Trainspotting , generally as a generic placeholder for a man, and not always negatively, e.g. "Ah wis the cunt wi the fuckin pool cue in ma hand, n the plukey cunt could huv the fat end ay it in his pus if he wanted, like." The word

4884-514: The word on a live airing of the Today Show , a network broadcast-TV news program, in 2008 when being interviewed by co-host Meredith Vieira about The Vagina Monologues . Coincidentally, nearly two years later in 2010, also on the Today Show , Vieira interviewed a thirteen-year-old girl said the word twice to describe the contents of text messages she was privy to that were central to

4958-540: The word only once in Ulysses , with four other wordplays ('cunty') on it, D. H. Lawrence later used the word ten times in Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928), in a more direct sense. Mellors, the gamekeeper and eponymous lover, tries delicately to explain the definition of the word to Lady Constance Chatterley: "If your sister there comes ter me for a bit o' cunt an' tenderness, she knows what she's after." The novel

5032-498: The word seems to have become obscene. Although Shakespeare does not use the word explicitly (or with derogatory meaning) in his plays, he still uses wordplay to sneak it in obliquely. In Act III, Scene 2, of Hamlet , as the castle's residents are settling in to watch the play-within-the-play , Hamlet asks his girlfriend Ophelia , "Lady, shall I lie in your lap?" Ophelia replies, "No, my lord." Hamlet, feigning shock, says, "Do you think I meant country matters ?" Then, to drive home

5106-462: The world; English is the most commonly used language in the sciences, with Science Citation Index reporting as early as 1997 that 95% of its articles were written in English, even though only half of them came from authors in English-speaking countries. In publishing, English literature predominates considerably, with 28% of all books published in the world [Leclerc 2011] and 30% of web content in 2011 (down from 50% in 2000). The increasing use of

5180-400: Was discovered having an affair with Deborah Willet: he wrote that his wife "coming up suddenly, did find me embracing the girl con [with] my hand sub [under] su [her] coats; and endeed I was with my main [hand] in her cunny. I was at a wonderful loss upon it and the girl also ...." Cunny was probably derived from a pun on coney , meaning "rabbit", rather as pussy is connected to

5254-619: Was given a "15" rating despite containing seven uses of the word. The BBFC have also allowed it at the "12" level, in the case of well known works such as Hamlet. In their Derek and Clive dialogues, Peter Cook and Dudley Moore , particularly Cook, used the word in the 1976 sketch "This Bloke Came Up To Me", with "cunt" used 35 times. The word is also used extensively by British comedian Roy 'Chubby' Brown , which ensures that his stand-up act has never been fully shown on UK television. Australian stand-up comedian Rodney Rude frequently refers to his audiences as "cunts" and makes frequent use of

5328-563: Was recorded in some areas as meaning "the vulva of a cow". This was pronounced as [kʌnt] in Devon , and [kʊnt] in the Isle of Man , Gloucestershire and Northumberland . Possibly related was the word cunny [kʌni], with the same meaning, in Wiltshire . The word "cunty" is also known, although used rarely: a line from Hanif Kureishi 's My Beautiful Laundrette is the definition of England by

5402-523: Was the subject of an unsuccessful UK prosecution in 1961 against its publishers, Penguin Books , on grounds of obscenity. Samuel Beckett was an associate of Joyce, and in his Malone Dies (1956), he writes: "His young wife had abandoned all hope of bringing him to heel, by means of her cunt, that trump card of young wives." In 1998, Inga Muscio published Cunt: A Declaration of Independence . In Ian McEwan 's novel Atonement (2001), set in 1935,

5476-475: Was worth a royal ransom"). Merriam-Webster states it is a "usually disparaging and obscene" term for a woman, and that it is an "offensive way to refer to a woman" in the United States. In American slang , the term can also be used to refer to "a fellow male homosexual one dislikes". Australian scholar Emma Alice Jane describes how the term as used on modern social media is an example of what she calls "gendered vitriol", and an example of misogynistic e-bile. As

#718281