Sneaker (pronounced snee-ker)
(1) A high or low shoe, notionally intended to be worn when playing sport or other recreational activities, usually with a rubber or synthetic sole and uppers of canvas, leather or a synthetic material (sold as “a pair of sneakers”).
(2) One who sneaks; a “sneak”.
(3) A vessel of drink (a now archaic UK dialect form).
(4) A large cup (or small basin) with a saucer and cover
(Indian English, now largely archaic).
(5) In biology, as “sneaker male”, a male animal which pretends
to be a female to get close to a female, thereby increasing their chance of mating.
(6) In marine hydrology, disproportionately large coastal waves which can without warning appear in a wave train.
1550s: The construct was sneak + -er. The origin of sneak is uncertain. It may be from the thirteenth century Middle English sniken (to creep, to crawl), from the Old English snīcan (to creep, to crawl), from the Proto-West Germanic snīkan, from the Proto-Germanic sneikanan or snīkaną (“to creep, to crawl”) which is related to the root of both snail & snake. Similar forms include the Danish snige (to sneak), the Swedish snika (to sneak, hanker after) and the Icelandic sníkja (to sneak, hanker after). Alternatively, there may be a link with snitch, also of uncertain origin. Snitch may be an alteration of the Middle English snacche (a trap, snare) or snacchen (to seize (prey)), the source of the modern English snatch. A parallel evolution in Middle English was snik & snak (a sudden blow, snap).
The alternative etymology is as a dialectal
variant of sneak. The noun emerged in
the 1590s as a development of the verb (as implied in “sneakish” in the sense
of “creep or steal about privately; move or go in a stealthy, slinking way” and
most etymologists have concluded it was probably a dialectal survivor from the Middle
English sniken from the Old English snican, from the Proto-Germanic sneikanan. The –er suffix was from the Middle English –er & -ere, from the
Old English -ere, from the
Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, thought most
likely to have been borrowed from the Latin –ārius where, as a suffix, it was used to form adjectives from nouns
or numerals. In English, the –er suffix,
when added to a verb, created an agent noun: the person or thing that doing the
action indicated by the root verb. The
use in English was reinforced by the synonymous but unrelated Old French –or & -eor (the Anglo-Norman variant -our),
from the Latin -ātor & -tor, from the primitive Indo-European -tōr.
When appended to a noun, it created the noun denoting an occupation or
describing the person whose occupation is the noun.
Reader's Digest published a number of maps illustrating regional variations in the way things are described in the US. While they didn't seem to indicate there was a costal v flyover linguistic divide, the Mason-Dixon line did seem to have some influence and there was something of an east-west divide. One outlier however was "sneakers" which was found predominately to be prevalent only around the north & south Atlantic coasts, the rest of the country preferring "tennis shoes" while there were pockets in the Mid-West where "gym shoes" had traction. The publication noted their map represented only the dominant form and that all forms (and other) could be found throughout the land.
According to Google Trends, in on-line shopping, while the numbers bounce around, they do so within a range and "sneakers" remains statistically dominant.
The noun sense of sneak as “a sneaking person; person of selfish and cowardly temper and conduct” dates from the 1640s a development from the verb; by 1700 it was used to describe “the act or practice of sneaking”. The transitive sense of “stealthily to insert” was known by the mid-seventeenth century while that of “partake of or get surreptitiously” dates from 1883. The phrase “to sneak up (on someone or something)” was in use by 1869. As an adjective (in reference to feelings, suspicions etc) it was used in the sense of “not openly vowed, undemonstrative” from 1748 while the “sneak-thief” (one who enters through unsecured doors and windows to steal) was first so describe in 1859. “Sneak previews” were originals viewings of movies held before their public release for friendly critics and others likely to provide helpful publicity, the phrase first used in 1938.
The noun use of sneaker to describe certain rubber-soled
shoes was in use by at least 1895 and thus (even if tangentially) linked to the
use in the 1590s sense of “a sneak; one who sneaks around”). The use for shoes was of course based on rubber-soled
shoes being essentially noiseless in contrast to those which leather soles
which were usually fitted with protective metal heel & toe plates to reduce
wear. A slang term for any soft-soled (usually
rubber) shoe was “brothel creeper”, based on the idea that men who frequented such
places preferred to do so silently so as not to be conspicuous. The original term was actually “sneak”, first
documented in accounts of prison life in 1862 as prisoners’ slang for both the
wardens who at night wore “India-rubber shoes” and the shoes themselves. The same issue was noted by the Nazi war
criminals held in Spandau Prison between 1947-1987. The prisoners had complained the heavy boots
worn by the guards disturbed them but when the authorities issued rubber-soled
footwear they found it harder to undertake un-noticed their many surreptitious activities.
There are a number of alternative names for the
shoes. Some are obvious such as “basketball
shoes” or “tennis shoes” and “sports shoe” is a classic generic but plimsole has
also endured in some places. That was
based on the “Plimlsoll Line” (originally Plimsoll’s Mark) which was a line painted
on the hull of British ships to mark the point the waterline was allowed to
reach before the vessel was declared overloaded. It was named after English Liberal MP Samuel
Plimsoll (1824-1898), a strident advocate of shipping reforms (many of which
were codified in the Merchant Shipping Act (1876) including the “Plimsoll mark”). Plimsoll came into use in 1907 to refer to rubber-soled,
canvas shoe because the band around the shoes holding together the two parts evoked
an image of the line on ships. The
spelling quickly shifted to “plimsole” because of the sound association between
“soll” and “sole”. An earlier form was “tacky”
(also as “tackie”) which was probably of Dutch or Afrikaans origin, or else
from tacky (slightly sticky), a quality associated with rubber, especially
before the introduction of vulcanization.
In South Africa, tacky is used
not only of rubber-soled shoes but also of car type and often other things made
from rubber.
Lindsay Logan, nueva embajadora de Allbirds (the new Allbirds ambassador), possibly on a Wednesday.
In 2022, Allbirds appointed Lindsay Lohan as an ambassador for its "Unexpected Athlete" campaign, focusing on her for the new limited edition of its most successful sneakers (they seem to prefer "running shoe") to date, the Tree Flyer. The promotional video issued for the announcement was nicely scripted, beginning with Ms Lohan’s perhaps superfluous admission that as an ambassador for running “I am a little unexpected" before working in a few references to her career in film (showing again a rare sense of comedic timing), fondness for peanut butter cookies and the odd social media faux-pas, many of which she's over the years embraced. The feature shoe is the "Lux Pink" which includes no plastics. As a well-known car driver and frequent flyer who has for years lived in an air-conditioned cocoon in Dubai, it’s not clear how far up the chart of conspicuous consumption Ms Lohan has stamped her environmental footprint but US-based footwear and apparel company Allbirds claims its design, production & distribution processes are designed to make its products as eco-friendly as possible. It is a certified “B Corporation”, a system of private certification of for-profit companies of their "social and environmental performance" conferred by B Lab, a non-profit organization which aims to provide consumers with a reliable way to distinguish the genuinely environmentally active from those which cynically “greenwash”.
Lindsay Lohan, Allbirds “Unexpected Athlete Ambassador”.
They’re known also as “gym shoes”, “leisure shoes”, “sandshoes”,
“kicks”, “trainers”, “training shoes” and running shoes and in Australia, until
the 1990s, one big-selling (and still manufactured) model (the Dunlop Volley)
almost universally known as “the Dunlop” and shoe shops do document the
difference between “basketball shoes” and “basketball boots”, the latter with an
upper built higher to afford greater protection for the ankles. Interestingly, sneakers (however described)
have become something of a cult and many expensive variations are available
although analysts see to believe much of the price-tag is can be attributed to
profit rather than development or production costs and, like the luxury handbag
market, there are claims of “limited availability” and “restricted customer
list” but most conclude that usually the only “limit” is demand although some
genuine short production runs have been verified, usually for promotional
purposes. They’ve become also an item
frequently stolen and among certain demographics, being assaulted so one’s
sneakers can be stolen is a not uncommon experience. Somewhat related to that cultural phenomenon
has been the emergence of an after-market for “collectable” or “vintage” sneakers
never to be worn and preferably still in their original packaging. The record price paid at auction is
apparently US$2.2 million but some new sneakers associated with celebrities
list at as much as US$25,000, intended presumably endlessly to be traded as
collectables rather than worn, much in the manner of some of the rarest exotic
cars which even the manufacturers admit are produced for just that market.
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