Sandwich

Sandwich (pronounced sand-wich or san-wich)

(1) Two or more slices of bread or the like with a layer of meat, fish, cheese etc between each pair.

(2) A type of cake with noticeably distinct horizontal layers. 

(3) To insert something between two other things (used figuratively also of ideas, concepts, historic events etc).

(4) In engineering or construction, a technique of assembly in which materials (which need not be flat) are joined in two or more layers.

(5) To eat one or more sandwiches (archaic except in literary or poetic use).

1762: Named after John Montagu (1718-1792), fourth of Earl Sandwich, a bit of a cad and gambler who, during marathon sessions at the tables, would eat slices of cold meat between bread rather than rise for a meal and thus "miss a bet".  However, the earl’s biographer suggested his subject was a serious chap, committed to the navy, politics and the arts and the sandwiches were actually eaten at his desk at the Admiralty but the legend is much preferred.  It was in his honor Captain James Cook (1728-1779) named the Hawaiian Sandwich islands in 1778 when Montagu was First Lord of the Admiralty (then the UK's minister for the Royal Navy).  The family name is from the place in Kent which in the Old English was Sandwicæ (sandy harbor; trading center).  In structural linguistics, a "sandwich" word is one in which two or more syllables have been split (al la slices of bread) and filled with another word.  Use of the technique is common and exemplified by an opinion such as: "Fox News is just Murdoch propafuckinganda".  The term was coined by US lexicographer Dr Harold Wentworth (1904-1965).  A "sandwichery" is a place where sandwiches are sold and the noun sandwichness (the state or quality of being a sandwich) seems only ever used as jocular term food reviews.  Sandwich, sandwichness & sandwichery are nouns, verb & adjective, sandwiched is a verb and sandwichlike, sandwichy & sandwichless are adjectives; the noun plural is sandwiches (the always rare sandwichs probably now extinct).

There are a least dozens and likely more than a hundred recorded descriptions of sandwiches with names drawn variously from the fillings, type of bread, method of preparation, (alleged) regional origin or occasion when served but the word has also appeared in idiomatic use including: “nothing sandwich” (a sandwich with a bland taste (used also figuratively as a synonym of “nothingburger” to suggest something is of less significance than its appearance or treatment accorded deserves)); “soup sandwich” (something or someone thought disorganized, incompetent, fundamentally flawed or unfinished; “air sandwich” (a sandwich consisting only of bread and a sauce or spread, but no filling (in figurative use a strategy that has high-level direction and low-level administrative support but in operation is close to inert); “Elvis sandwich” (a sandwich made peanut butter, sliced or mashed banana, and sometimes bacon on toasted bread, based on the fondness the singer Elvis Presley (1935-1977) had for the concoction (a banana smeared with peanut butter was reputedly a favourite snack of Bill Clinton (b 1946; POTUS 1993-2001)); “shit sandwich” (something highly undesirable that is rendered more acceptable or palatable by the addition of more tolerable or agreeable components); “tavern sandwich” a sandwich consisting of unseasoned ground beef and sautéed onions in a bun); “barley sandwich” (a glass of beer (synonymous with “liquid lunch”); “lead sandwich” (a method of suicide in which a shotgun is placed in the mouth and discharged  (100% success rate as might be expected)) and “prawn (shrimp) sandwich brigade” (those who attend sporting event to socialize and enjoy the hospitality in corporate hospitality boxes rather than having any interest in the event).  In physics a “nanosandwich” is a nanoscale structure consisting of a dielectric layer between two discs and in chemistry a “sandwich compound” is any compound in which a metal atom is located between the faces of two planes of atoms, especially between two rings.   

Sandwich is a town in Barnstable County, Massachusetts, its population 20,675 at the last census; the oldest town on Cape Cod, in 2014, Sandwich turned 375 years old.  Sandwich has a police department: They are the Sandwich Police.

The Sandwich Police cruiser is a second generation (1998-2011) Ford Crown Victoria (1992-2011), built on the corporation's "Panther" platform (1978-2011).  When Ford ceased production of the Crown Victoria, it was the last of the old-style (BoF (body-on-frame), V8, RWD (rear wheel drive)), full-sized cars that were the backbone of the US industry for much of the first four post-war decades.  Although by the 1990s judged archaic by the US motoring press (and some international journalists who drove them in 2009 expressed amazement such a thing was still made), the demise of the Crown Victoria was a matter of regret for US police departments and many other fleet operators (notably rental car companies) because the CV's combination of virtues (robust, reliable, spacious, low TCO (total cost of ownership)) made them ideally suited for "heavy duty use" and in fleets, even today, some remain faithfully in service.  In truth, if driven within it's limitations, a CV (or the companion Mercury Grand Marquis) could be a satisfying experience for what it lacked in refinement it compensated for in other ways and for those who yearn still for the way things used to be done, the more desirable of the CVs can be a good choice.

More sandwich police: A police officer at the Ingham Subway in Queensland, Australia preparing a sub, an event held by Subway Australia on 2 November, 2018 to mark World Sandwich Day.  On the day, 329,814 sandwiches were assembled for needy families.

There is doubt whether the sandwich became so-named as early as 1762 because the first documented account of the earl’s culinary innovation was written in 1770 but it certainly caught on.  The sandwich board, the two-sided mobile advertising carried on the shoulders was first so-described in 1864 and someone employed to "wear" the device was sandwichman (a word now probably extinct although sandwich boards still occasionally are seen, carried presumably by sandwichpersons).  The Wall Street Journal once described the sandwich as "Britain's biggest contribution to gastronomy" but, given the parlous reputation of the rest of their pre-modern cuisine, the WSJ may have been damning with faint praise.  Regardless, while Lord Sandwich may have lent his name, the historical record suggests sandwiches have been eaten since bread was first baked, pre-dating the earl by thousands of years.

In 2022, with Lindsay Lohan on location in Ireland for the shooting of the Netflix film Irish Wish (2024), Westport Café The Creel created a sandwich to honor the famous visitor.  The Lindsay LoHam included 'nduja sausage, Monterey Jack cheese, mixed grated cheddar, caramelized onions and, naturally enough given the name, ham.  Irish Wish remains available to stream but the Lindsay LoHam enjoyed only a limited release.

By convention, when more than two slices of bread are used it becomes a "club sandwich" and it's now not uncommon for filled bread rolls, pita, flatbreads, etc also to be sold as sandwiches.  When the filling is spread atop a single slice of bread, it can be called an "open sandwich" which (historically) is oxymoronic but in commerce the term is well-established; dating from the 1920s, these first appeared on menus as "open face sandwich" but the term was soon clipped.  Over millennia, there must have been countless inventions and re-inventions of variants of the sandwich and the innovations have been linguistic as well as culinary, one noted concoction the muffuletta, a thick, round sandwich, typically containing ham, salami, and cheeses and topped with an olive salad, a specialty of New Orleans; it seems first to have been served in the late 1960s, the name from the Sicilian dialect, from the Italian muffoletta (a round hollow-centered loaf of bread), from muffola (mitten), from the French moufle.  In New Orleans, among the muffuletta cognoscenti, there is a heated faction and a room-temperature faction.  Another delicacy is the fried brain sandwich which, although now associated with things south of the Mason-Dixon line, was apparently first offered in St Louis, Missouri.  Self-explanatory, it's made with thinly sliced fried slabs of calf’s brain on white toast; to some a genuine delicacy, to others it'd be an acquired taste.  Etymologists note that confusingly, in the US, some restaurants (said to be most often those “specializing in barbecue”) use “sandwich” in its adjectival sense when serving a meal that is smaller than either lunch or dinner yet not so modest to be thought “a snack”.  These offerings do not imply that of necessity what’s served will be in the form of “a sandwich” although some may be, the point being what’s on the menu is “something smaller than what appears on the lunch and dinner menus”.

Quintessential Grilled Cheese: The ultimate cheese toastie.

In 2017, Guinness World Records officially recognized the “Quintessential Grilled Cheese” on the menu at New York City’s Serendipity 3 as the planet’s most expensive commercially available sandwich.  Then listed at US$214, it was made with Dom Perignon champagne-infused French Pullman bread, 23-karat edible gold, a rare Italian cheese and grass-fed white truffle butter.  Served on a Baccarat crystal plate with a bowl of South African lobster tail tomato bisque, the restaurant required customers to order 48-hour in advance.  Obviously not a typical cheese toastie, the core ingredient was Caciocavallo Podolico, an extremely rare Italian cheese made from the milk of a mere 25,000-odd cows grazing on fennel, licorice, and wild strawberries; accounting for some of the sandwich’s high price, the beasts lactate only for a few weeks over May-June.  The luxury toastie still appears on Serendipity 3's menu (along with the “World's most expensive fries” but interestingly, the restaurant have not advised any increase in the price, despite recent inflation and the spike in the gold price.  Given it need to be ordered in advance, presumably it's now on a PoA (price on application) basis.  Still, renowned also for its Frrrozen Hot Chocolate (there’s a $25,000 “Haute” version of that which must be remarkable), Serendipity 3 does sound the ideal place for a first date although it would raise expectations and one should choose the place only if one has the disposable income for regular return visits.  The Quintessential Grilled Cheese deserves at least a footnote in economics textbooks because a cheese toastie at that price is one of the industry's most literal instances of “conspicuous consumption” and its qualities may also be Veblen in that should Serendipity 3 note a slowing in sales, demand might be stimulated by raising the price, the point about Veblen goods being their behavior moving in the opposite direction on the classic PED (Price Elasticity of Demand) curve.    

Lindsay Lohan next to pink ice cream truck, Salt Lake City, Utah, 2021.

In 2021, RadarOnline (a pop culture aggregation handler published by RMG (Radar Media Group)) reported that while on-location in Salt Lake City, Utah for the shooting of the Netflix movie Falling for Christmas (2022), Lindsay Lohan bought ice cream sandwiches for the film crew.  Ice cream is in Utah a popular commodity because of what's laid down in the Word of Wisdom, (a kind of etiquette guide cum rulebook) for members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (the Mormons).  The Word of Wisdom is properly styled the Doctrine and Covenants (the D&C (1835)) and is the Mormon scriptural canon, section 89 containing the dietary rules proscribing, inter-alia, the consumption of alcohol, tobacco and hot drinks (ie tea & coffee).  Noted Mormon Mitt Romney (b 1947; Republican nominee in the 2012 US presidential election, US senator (Republican-Utah) 2019-2025) usually looks so miserable not only because of what has become of the Republican Party but because the D&C's index of the forbidden denies him the simple indulgence of a cup of coffee.  The rules also explain why manufacturers of chocolate, candy & soda have long found the Mormons of Utah a receptive and lucrative market; other than the joyful singing of hymns, the sugary treats are among their few orally enjoyed pleasures.  In Utah, as well as ice cream sandwiches, there's a ready market too for “dirty sodas”; Mormons aren’t allowed to do anything “dirty” (though it's rumored some do) and a dirty soda (a soda flavored with “spikes” of cream, milk, fruit purees or syrups) is about as close to sinfulness as a reading of the D&C would seem to permit.  Mormans sometimes team an ice cream sandwich with their dirty soda and for those who want more, ice cream cakes are also a big seller.  

Replacing humans with mechanical devices has a long history: Automated dystrybutor piwa i kanapek (beer and sandwich dispenser), Kraków, Poland.  It was installed in May 1931.

In the mid 1950s when English in the US was more regionalized than it would become, in New York City a sandwich typically was sold as a “hero” while in other parts it might be a grinder (based on the ground meat often used as the base of the filling) or a submarine (based on the use of a long, tubular bread roll, the use carried-over when other types of bread were used).  The “poor boy” was a description from New Orleans of uncertain origin but presumed related to the idea of a sandwich being a “cheap meal” to take-away while richer folks sat in the diner and ate off a plate.  Most intriguing was the “hoagie” which definitely emerged in the Pennsylvanian city of Philadelphia though the history is disputed.  One explanation is the original was a “big sandwich” in the form a filled split-roll (al la those served by the modern Subway chain) and thus resembling in shape a large cigar, the linguistic link claimed to be with “stogie”, a common slang term for a cigar, the construct thought to be stoga + -ie, the first element derived from the Conestoga Cigar Company which in the 1880s was one of the first Pennsylvanian cigar factories.  The connection sounds plausible but is undocumented.  The professionals seem unconvinced by the alternative suggestions: (1) a folk-etymology alteration of the Greek gyro (a back-formation from the plural gyros, from the Ancient Greek γύρος (gýros) (from the turning of the meat on a spit) or (2) some connection with the US popular musician Hoagland “Hoagy” Carmichael (1899-1981).  The Greek link is undocumented and thought “vague” and although as a songwriter Hoagy Carmichael enjoyed success as early as the late 1920s, his fame as a performer wasn’t established until a decade later and in Philadelphia the sandwiches were being sold as “hoggies” as early as 1935, thus the conclusion his later celebrity status might have influenced a change in the spelling, “Hoagies” on sale by 1945.  It is of course possible the original “hoggie” was derived from “hog” on the basis of at least some of the sandwiches being “pork rolls” but of this there’s no evidence.  As a footnote, although rarely seen without a cigarette, Mr Carmichael seems not to have been a cigar smoker.

1959 Lotus Elite S1.

The Lotus Elite (Type 14) was produced in two series (S1, 1957-1960; S2, 1960-1963) and was a rolling catalogue of innovation and clever re-purposing of off-the-shelf parts.  One of its most distinctive features was borrowed from aviation: the stressed-skin fibreglass monocoque construction which obviated entirely the need for a chassis or space-frame, the body an integrated, load-bearing structure created using the “sandwich technique”.  The only substantial steel components were a sub-frame supporting the engine and front suspension and a hoop to which was attached the windscreen, door hinges and jacking points.  The company’s philosophy was “simplify, then add lightness” while lent the Elite some delightful characteristics but even had all components been produced in accordance with the specification, many parts of the structure were so close to the point of failure that some revisions to the design would anyway have been necessary but the early cars were far from perfect.  The contact for the fabrication of the bodies had been won by a boat-builder, then one of the few companies with much experience in molding fibreglass.

Club sandwich: The Elite's triple-layer monocoque.

However, the Elite was a more complex design than a boat hull and fibreglass was still a novel material, even Chevrolet in the United States, with access to the financial and engineering resources of General Motors, found early in the production of the Corvette there were lessons still to be learned.  Unlike many boats which used a single or double-layer method, the Elite’s body consisted of three stressed-fiberglass layers (thus in industry jargon a “club sandwich”) which, when joined in a monocoque, created the bulkheads and eight torsion boxes gave the structure its strength and stiffness although the success was something of a surprise.  The designer, working in the pre-CAD (computed-aided design) era and with no experience of the behavior of fibreglass, had doubted the material would be strong enough so had the first prototype built with some steel and aluminum plates sandwiched between the layers with mounting brackets bonded in points at the rear to support the suspension and differential mountings.  In subsequent tests, these proved unnecessary but so poorly molded were many of the layers that structural failures became common, the resin porings of inconsistent thickness creating weaknesses at critical points, suspension struts and differentials known to punch themselves loose from mountings or even tear away chunks of the supposedly supporting fibreglass.

Le Mans 24 Hour, June 1959:  Lotus Elite #41 leads Ferrari 250TR #14. The Ferrari (DNF) retired after overheating, the Elite finishing eighth overall, winning the 1.5 litre GT class.

Needing an operation more acquainted with the tight tolerances demanded in precision engineering, after finishing some Elites, Lotus switched suppliers, the molding contract granted to the Bristol Aeroplane Company. This transformed quality control and the remaining 750-odd Elites carried an S2 designation, the early cars retrospectively (but unofficially) dubbed S1.  Even so, despite the improved, lighter and stiffer shell, it would be another generation before the structural implications of fibreglass would fully be understood and the flaws inherent in the design remained, suspension attachment points sometimes still prone to detachment, Lotus content to the extent it now happened only under extreme loading rather than habitually.  The combination of light-weight, a surprisingly powerful engine and a degree of aerodynamic efficiency which few for decades would match delivered a package with a then unrivalled combination of performance and economy.  On the road, point-to-point, it was able to maintain high average speeds under most conditions and only in then unusual places like the German Autobahns with their unlimited speeds could heavier, more powerful machines assert their advantage.  On the circuits, it enjoyed an illustrious career, notable especially for success in long-distance events at the Nürburgring and Le Mans.  The frugal fuel consumption was an important factor too, as well as claiming five class trophies in the Le Mans 24 hour race, the Elite twice won the mysterious Indice de performance (an index of thermal efficiency), a curious piece of mathematics actually designed to ensure, regardless of other results, a French car always would win a trophy for something.

Charlotte Brontë (1816–1855).

Elizabeth Gaskell's (1810–1865) 1857 biography (a very Victorian work) long loomed over the memory of Charlotte Brontë because it portrayed the author of the deliciously depraved eponymous protagonist in Jane Eyre (1847) as the doomed, saint-like victim of the circumstances which crushed her and the consumption which stalked her.  The old curmudgeon G.K. Chesterton (1874–1936) reckoned that while a good biography told one much about the subject, a bad one revealed all one needed to know about the author.  Gaskell’s crafted miserabilia of course created a legend of its own, a kind of death cult for those for whom victimhood isn’t quite enough so Charlotte Brontë has long been on the emo reading list (a very specific sub-set of the canon).  However, whatever might have been the tone of reviews penned by those critics who found little to admire in works by women, even jaded types like literary editors were captivated by her words, George Smith (1865-1932) who worked for the publishing house Smith, Elder & Co at Cornhill noting in his diary: “After breakfast on Sunday morning I took the manuscript of Jane Eyre to my little study, and began to read it.  The story took me captive.  When the servant came to tell me that luncheon was ready I asked him to brim me a sandwich and a glass of wine, and still went on with Jane Eyre.  Dinner came; for me the meal was a very hasty one; and before I went to bed that night I had finished reading the manuscript.”  She deserved better than the gloomy impression left by Elizabeth Gaskell and history has been kind although even George Smith who admired her thought he discerned what she really wanted from life, writing in The Critic in 1901: "I believe she would have given all her genius and all her fame to be beautiful.  Perhaps few women ever existed more anxious to be pretty than she, and more angrily conscious of the circumstance that she was not pretty."  That was perhaps toxic masculinity as expressed by the literary middle class but Anthony Trollope (1815-1882) focused just on the work, writing in his Autobiography (1883): "I venture to predict that Jane Eyre will be read among English novels when many whose names are now better known shall be forgotten."  

Of the fourth Earl of Sandwich who got a bit of fun out of life

Portrait of John Montagu, fourth Earl of Sandwich (1783) by Thomas Gainsborough (circa 1727-1788), National Maritime Museum, Greenwich.

John Montagu was one of the more interesting chaps to sit in the House of Lords.  Rich and well-connected, he was a libertine in the milieu of the aristocratic swagger of the eighteenth century, his country house described by a contemporary as “the scene of our youthful debaucheries, the retreat of your hoary licentiousness.”  There’s never been any suggestion Sandwich was in his self-indulgence any more depraved than many of his companions but certainly, he fitted-in.

In his lifetime, the earl’s fame came not from the eponymous snack but his long affair with Miss Martha Ray (1746-1779), a most becoming and talented young singer.  It’s never been known when first they made friends but she lived with him as his mistress from the age of seventeen (he was then forty-five), the relationship producing nine children.  The concubinage of Miss Ray he  enjoyed while his wife was suffering from mental illness and while it’s not recorded if her condition was triggered by her husband’s ways, given he conducted an affair also with his sister-in-law, there must be some suspicion.

Montagu's behavior attracted the interest of many, including John Wilkes, a prominent satirist who wrote a number of pieces critical of the earl’s politics and ridiculing his (not so) private life.  Montagu’s revenge was swift.  Wilkes didn’t write only publicly-published satire, he also had a small circle of socially elite subscribers to his other literary output.  That was pornography, and the earl was a subscriber.  To discredit Wilkes, Lord Sandwich rose in the House of Lords and read extracts from Wilkes’ The Essay on Women which he prefaced by telling their lordships “…it was so full of filthy langue (sic) as well as the most horrid blasphemies”.  The earl did not exaggerate and even today the words would shock and appall their lordships although, it must be admitted, it's always been a place where members easily are appalled (or at least affect to be).  The vengeance backfired, the Lords ruling his speech a breach of procedure which sounds a mild rebuke but in that place was a damning censure.  It also provoked Wilkes who responded with tales of Sandwich’s “debauchery, miserliness and lack of good faith” and a biography published in the 1760s labelled him “an arsonist and thief”.  His reputation never recovered although, when masticating a sandwich, we all still should remember him and be glad.

Portrait of Martha Ray (in pussy bow) by Nathaniel Dance-Holland  (1735–1811).

Miss Ray’s end was sadder still.  Lord Sandwich granted her a generous allowance and obtained a flat in Westminster so she had somewhere to live during those times when, for whatever reason, she couldn’t stay in his house.  He also introduced her to a young soldier, James Hackman (circa 1752-1779) who became obsessed with her and soon turned into what would now be called a stalker.  In 1779, Hackman resigned his commission to join the church and it seems he and Ms Ray may have had a brief liaison but she declined his offers of marriage, apparently because she thought his social status and financial means inadequate to keep he in the style to which she'd become accustomed.  Not handling rejection well, Hackman remained infatuated, became obsessively jealous and renewed the pursuit.  One evening in April 1779, after following her to the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, he shot her dead, apparently under the impression she had taken another lover, which may or may not have been true.  Immediately after the murder, Hackman attempted suicide but succeeded only in wounding himself and was arrested.  Two days after she was buried, the Reverend Hackman was sentenced to be hanged and within the week he died on the Tyburn gallows in a public execution before “a large crowd”.

Bang

Bang (pronounced bhang)

(1) A loud, sudden, explosive noise (such as the discharge of a firearm).

(2) A resounding stroke or blow.

(3) In informal, use, a sudden movement, show of energy or instance of something suggesting great value, energy, vitality or spirit (source of many idiomatic forms such as “started with a bang”, “went off with a bang”, “great bang for the buck” etc).

(4) Suddenly and loudly; abruptly or violently.

(5) In figurative use, precisely; directly; right (such as “bang on” or “bang in the middle” (ie exactly correct” or “bang to rights” (caught red-handed; guilty as sin).

(6) In informal use, a sudden or intense pleasure; thrill or excitement (now less common).

(7) In slang, various senses of precision such as “bang off” (instantly; right away) or “bang on” (marvelous; perfect; just right).

(8) In vulgar slang, the act or instance of sexual intercourse (with many variants, the most infamous the gangbang).

(9) In the jargon of mining, civil engineering etc, the physical explosive product.

(10) In the slang of drug users, an injection or other form of dose of a narcotic; a shot of heroin which proved lethal.

(11) In US criminal class clang, to participate in street gang criminal activity.

(12) In the slang of typology & the printing trade, an exclamation point, a variant being the interrobang (a punctuation mark (‽) which merges the question mark (?) and the exclamation mark (!) to indicate a query made as an interjection).

(13) In Irish slang, a strong smell (often used of halitosis (chronic bad breath)).

(14) In regional slang (limited apparently to the New England region in the US), an abrupt left-turn by a road-user (Boston, Massachusetts) or a left, right or U-turn (more generalized); the typical use is “bang a left/right/uey”. The equivalent use in Australia & New Zealand is “hang a left/right/uey” although there a U-turn is known also as a “U-bolt”.

(15) In regional slang (limited apparently to urban areas in Nigeria), to fail an exam.

(16) In mathematics, a factorial (on the basis the factorial of n is often written as n!)

(17) In the jargon of financial markets, rapidly or in high volumes suddenly to sell (an equity, commodity, currency etc), causing prices to fall.

(18) In the jargon of hairdressing, as bangs, a number of variants of the fringe.

(19) In reggae music, an offbeat figure played usually on guitar and piano.

(20) In vulgar slang, to have sexual intercourse with (sometimes with the implication of “without consent”.

(21) To strike or beat resoundingly; to pound; to strike violently or noisily.

(22) To hit or painfully to pump.

(23) To throw or set down roughly; to slam.

1540-1550: From the Middle English bangen, from the Old English bangian or borrowed from the Old Norse banga (to pound, hammer), both from the Proto-Germanic bangōną (to beat, pound), from the primitive Indo-European ben- (to beat, hit, injure).  It was cognate with Scots bang & bung (to strike, bang, hurl, thrash, offend), the Icelandic banga (to pound, hammer), the Old Swedish bånga (to hammer (from which modern Swedish gained banka (to knock, pound, bang), the Danish banke (to beat) & bengel (club), the Low German bangen, & bangeln (to strike, beat) (the German dialect banken may originally have been imitative), the West Frisian bingel & bongel, the Dutch bengel (bell; rascal) and the German Bengel (club) & bungen (to throb, pulsate).  Bang is a noun, verb & adverb, banged is a verb & adjective, banger is a noun, banging is a noun, verb & adjective; the noun plural is bangs.

Of the universe

The origin of the term “Big Bang Theory” (which describes a model accounting for the origin and most of the dynamics of the (present) universe during the last 14 billion years-odd) is traced to a chance remark by English astrophysicist Sir Fred Hoyle (1915–2001) on BBC Radio in 1949 but it wasn’t until the late 1960s it came widely to be used in scientific circles and a few more years before it was part of the common public language.  Hoyle always denied he’d intended to be disparaging of what was then a theory some 30 years old and this most historians came to accept although certainly he was unconvinced of the idea’s soundness and for some decades clung to his preferred “steady state” model of the universe.  The steady state position is sometimes misunderstood as something like “twas ever thus” but is better understood as “constant process”, the crucial difference that while the steady staters held matter constantly was being created as the universe expands, the big bangers believed the distance between the matter which came into existence a fraction of a second after the big bang increased as the universe expanded from its one-time singularity.  Hoyle never quite became a big banger but as the evidence mounted, he modified his model to become what was dubbed “a quasi steady stater” although his increasingly convoluted explanations forcing observations to somehow fit his belief convinced few.  The criticism of Hoyle was he made cosmology into a kind of theology.

Noted golfer Paige Spiranac (b 1993) is active on Instagram and recently posted a “Life update” to her four million followers, advising “I have bangs now”.  Hopefully, she will keep us informed and there will be more to come.  For golfers, she has posted a set of invaluable short clips called Paige Quickies which are guides for both the experienced wishing to hone their techniques and those taking up the sport.  Being highly qualified, she filled one gap in the instructional market with a collection of tips for “busty golfers” (specific weight distribution a significant element as the body pivots when swinging a club).  On Instagram, in less than 24 hours, the clip garnered over 2.6 million views.

Hoyle's use of the term “big bang” while it did graphically emphasise the difference of opinion between the two schools of thought, was unfortunate as a contribution to public understanding because of the connotations of the words  “big” & “bang”, most imagining the origins of the universe as starting with a huge, noisy explosion whereas what was envisaged by the theorists was a sudden “cosmic inflation” (of space), a process which continues and was in the 1990s found to be accelerating although not everywhere equally.  The big bang theory is now the orthodoxy in the mainstream scientific community though some questions remain unanswered including the mystery of why, based on a number of calculations which explain many other things, over 90% of the universe’s matter is “missing” (or at least can’t be observed).  The fudge to “explain” that has been the twin concepts of “dark matter” and “dark energy” which are more “speculative concepts” than a theoretical model and best understood as an elegant way of saying “don’t know”.  There have been a number of suggestions to account for the “missing matter”, the most intriguing being the notion the calculated “matter number” might be too high because of “drag effect” created by the operation of time itself.  Time obviously is important otherwise everything would happen at the same time and who knows what else it does; recently, particle physicists reported having witnessed pinpricks of darkness moving faster than the speed of light without breaking the laws of relativity so there's much still to be understood.

Of cars

Big banger and old banger: John Greenwood (1945-2015) in “Spirit of ’76” Chevrolet Corvette, Le Mans 24 Hour, June 1976 (left) and a despondent Lindsay Lohan with Herbie while in “old banger” state, Herbie: Fully Loaded (2005), the Corvette an “8-banger” and the Beetle a “4-banger”.  The Corvette was powered by a 427 cubic inch (7.0 litre) big-block V8 and although forced to retire after a failure in the fuel delivery system, while it was running, nothing in the field could match the mark of 222 mph (354 km/h) it set thundering down the then 6 km (3.7 mile) Mulsanne straight.  In 1976, Mulsanne had yet to be distorted by the silly chicanes added in 1990 at the behest of the FIA (Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (the International Automobile Federation, world sport's dopiest regulatory body)).

With cars, “banger” proved productive.  Because an ICE (internal combustion engine) always includes a “power stroke” (or its equivalence), in which the fuel-air mix explodes (the combustion causing “a bang” which sequentially is the sound from the exhaust system; to aficionados sometimes a pleasing tone, sometimes not), in slang, vehicles came to be described by the cylinder count thus (most frequently “4-banger”, “6-banger” or “8-banger”).  However, a car could also be a “big banger” (one with a large displacement ICE, usually a V8 with the appellation coming from the “big-block” era of the post-war years when Detroit mass-produced engines with pistons the size of paint cans) or an “old banger” (one old, worn out or battered”.  Old banger was synonymous with “clunker”, “beater”, “hooptie”, “jalopy”, “wreck”, “crock”, “shitbox”, “rustbucket” etc and the dubbing came either from the appearance (“banged up” in the sense of being dented or damaged) or the “banging” noise (backfiring, a damaged exhaust system etc) the dilapidated machines emanated.

Of sausages and such

Bangers & Mash by the Daring Gourmet.  Not everyone garnishes their B&M with chopped parsley.

Unrelated to ICEs, a banger could be (1) one who bangs (in any sense (sex, violence etc), (2) the penis (3) a sausage (the use reputedly based originally not on any resemblance to a penis but, dating from the time when they were produced by encasing the contents in the intestine casings of slaughtered animals (often sheep), the combination of excess water in the mix and the impervious skin making them susceptible to exploding if not punctured prior to being cooked), (4) the breasts of a female (and thus usually in the plural) and (5) in popular music a highly rated song (some of which would be enjoyed by (6) headbangers (that subset of music fans who “dance” by violently shaking their heads in time to the music)).

Rolling Stone magazine No.169, September 12, 1974.  Rolling Stone and Playboy magazine in the 1960s & 1970s attracted a large audience of the market segments attractive to advertisers and alongside the content with which both most were associated, they attracted respectable authors to write about politics and interview subjects such as celebrity philosophers and Nazi war criminals.

As well as being a noun plural “Bangs” is also a proper noun as a surname, the most noted being Lester Bangs (1948–1982) who in the late 1960s began to write reviews of popular music, prompted by an advertisement in Rolling Stone magazine inviting reader submissions.  He wouldn’t have thought what he criticized was “pop” and Rolling Stone magazine (first published in 1967) was one of a number of titles that created an ecosystem in which classifications proliferated with clear “hierarchies of respectability” evolving among those who regarded “pop” as a serious musical form and Bangs definitely was one of them; before the mid-1960s, popular music usually wasn’t written about with the tone of reverence afforded to jazz, opera, the avant-garde and such.  Bangs died a drug-related death although not the traditionally “messy” one associated with the field he critiqued.  Having contracted influenza, he was self-medicating with an opioid analgesic and a benzodiazepine; his overdose was ruled “accidental”.

Of hair

In hairdressing, the noun “bangs” is used to describe a number of variants of the fringe (or sections of hair) cut straight across the forehead, the derived verb used as “to bang the hair”.  Sometimes there are “left and right” bangs but even when a style wholly is a conventional fringe the convention is to speak of “bangs”, although hairdressers, especially when constructing something asymmetric, will refer to the “left” or “right” bang.  Although there are on the internet claims the use is based on the notion of a clipped hair “bursting out” (ie “explosively” in a figurative sense and thus based on “bang” in the sense of something sudden), verified evidence confirms “bangs” joined the rich jargon of hairdressing late in the nineteenth century as a clipping (get it?) of “bang-tail”, a term then used for decades in used in equestrian circles to described a horse’s tail being allowed to grow long and then cut (docked) straight across (the painless cut called a “bang-off”).  Apparently with origins in Scotland before spreading south and across the Atlantic, it joined “gee-up” as a phrase with equine roots enjoying a re-purposing for wider use.  The OED cites the first use of “bang” for the cutting of human hair to 1878 and within half-a-decade US newspapers and periodicals had adopted the plural form “bangs” when referring to a straight-across cut of hair on the forehead.  It was in the late 1880s the imaginative use “lunatic fringe” was coined (a century later to become a popular name for hairdressing salons) and “fringe” remained the dominate use in the UK and much of the Commonwealth while the US opted for the punchier “bangs”.  As a tool of US linguistic imperialism, the internet in the twenty-first century did its job and throughout the English-speaking world, bangs now peacefully co-exists with fringe with youth tending to the former.

Takes on Cleopatra with bangs long & short.

Elizabeth Taylor (1932–2011) in Cleopatra (1963, left) and Lindsay Lohan (b 1986) in Liz & Dick (2012).  Based on period sculptures, it seems likely the queen had curly hair but because of the prevalence of their appearance on women in surviving art from Ancient Egypt, bangs became entrenched in the public’s imagination of Cleopatra and film directors accordingly complied.  While it's true that the look (on men and women) does appear on much surviving imagery from Ancient Egypt it must be remembered that then, as now, public art was not necessarily representative of the appearance of the wider population although it probably did align with that of the elites.  Also, the as the archaeological records make clear, the consistency of style (straight-cut bangs (ie a horizontal fringe) across the forehead with hair apparently perfect (often shoulder-length and symmetrical) which appears dense, geometric, and highly regular was achieved with the use of wigs of human hair, wool, or plant fibres.  Carefully constructed and styled into clearly repeatable forms, the blunt bangs, at least among certain parts of society, must have been an enduring fashion statement.

The “bang” technique with origins in equine grooming is used with ponytails and is called the “straight blunt cut”; for this purpose the only substantive difference between a “pony's tail” and a “ponytail” is scale.

While, whether of human fringes or horses' tails, “bangs” might be a nineteenth century coining, the hair style is as ancient as humanity, the prehistoric origins doubtlessly a simple expedient to keep the hair from dangling in the eyes, the trim presumably a tiresome task in the era before scissors.  From that humble beginning evolved eventually the array of styles now available, at least some of which allegedly have been a political statements of group solidarity.  A fine “brief history of bangs” is maintained by Odele Beauty (their “Rinse Blog” an indispensable source of technical information) and there it’s claimed Cleopatra’s (Cleopatra VII Thea Philopator (Κλεοπάτρα Θεά Φιλοπάτωρ (“Cleopatra father-loving goddess” in the Koine Greek); circa 69 BC–circa 10 BC, Queen of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt from 51-30 BC and the last active Hellenistic pharaoh) “famous fringe is apparently a myth” although on the basis of surviving art, it seems likely Ancient Egyptians “wore blunt-cut bang wigs as early as 3000 BC” and whether or not they were the “influencers”, the look spread north to the Greece and Rome of Antiquity, Odele Beauty noting Augustus (Gaius Julius Caesar Augustus (known also as Octavianus (Octavian)); 63 BC-14 AD, founder of the Roman Empire (27 BC-476 AD) and first Roman emperor 27 BC-14 AD) “wore his hair combed into a short, forehead-framing fringe, setting a new trend (later dubbed the “Caesar cut”) that future emperors would follow.”  

Jeanne d'Arc (Joan of Arc, 1901), oil on canvas by Albert Lynch (1860–1950).  The short bangs were always present in older paintings of Joan of Arc but it wasn't unusual for modern artists to be influenced by contemporary trends.  Monsieur Lynch left no notes so it's not known if he had in mind the circa 1901 style what of what later would come to be known as a “bloshie young woman”.  Joan of Arc (circa 1412–1431) sometimes was depicted bangs blunt and not but artists had her variously blonde or brunette and with hair wild or coiffed and their images may reflect what male artists thought such a woman should look like.

Surviving European art from the Medieval to Modernity confirms bangs seem never to have gone away and the emergence of the word late in the 1800s suggests they must then have been a quite a thing.  By then, bangs had survived seventeenth century disapprobation of the church, priests finding fashion trends symbols of ungodly vanity and inappropriate for modest, pious women.  However what cemented bangs in their cultural place seems to have been the social ripples from World War I (1914-1918), the so called flappers of the “roaring twenties” taking to them as an adjunct to the other forms of fashion minimalism they adopted as earlier, restrictive conventions were shrugged-off.  Although it had earlier also enjoyed some less pleasing connotations, “flapper” in the sense of the “bright young things” of the era is thought a re-adaptation of the nineteenth century Northern English slang meaning “teen-age girl” and it referenced the hair not routinely being “put-up” in the adult manner and instead kept in plaits or braids, left to “flap about” as she moved.  The 1920s re-cycling of “flapper” retained the connection with “lively young girl” and had nothing to do with hair; bangs had been around for millennia before the flappers but they made them one of their signature looks.  Since the 1920s, trends have ebbed and flowed in the cyclical way fashion works and bangs variously have been softened, blunted, gained wispy curls (not to be confused with the dreaded “fly-away bits”), bulked up as “bumper bangs”, trimmed back to be the “baby bangs” of pixie cuts and evolved in the twin streams of the “curtain bangs” which seductively would drape over the eyes and the dramatic, “set piece installations” made famous by Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) which for years provided hairdressers with a solid income stream as young ladies everywhere demanded the same thing.

Although it’s not uncommon to see headlines like “Bangs are back”, that’s misleading because they never went away; like hairdressers, headline writers have their own methods of operation.  It would be more accurate were the sites to headline which bangs are trending and that’s now a global thing because it matters not whether a trend is noted as happening in Seoul, Sydney, Seattle and Santiago because on the internet everything is happening at the same time and looks now wax, wane or die in global unison and while the imaginative can doubtless describe some variants, beyond than the basic, self-explanatory forms (short, straight, blunt), there are really five distinct bangs:

Air bangs (seen here in conjunction with long side bangs also favored by goths).

(1) Air bangs are characterized by being light and sparse.  First defined as an element of K-beauty (the aesthetic of South Korea which encompasses hair, clothes, cosmetics music) etc these are known also as “Korean bangs” but their alternative name (see-through bangs) better describes the look.  Despite the name, they are not ideally suited to those with thin or wispy hair and like just about every style, work best with thick locks which provide a better contrast and more scope for styling.  Professional stylists caution those at home crafting air bangs from a conventional fringe to do the process slowly because it's easy to over-estimate to much need to be cut (specialized tools are available).  One advantage of air bangs compare with a straight cut is that in using unequal-length strands, that aspect of precision is avoided but the look does work best if there's a perception of consistency in the spacing. 

Baby bangs: On Pinterest, this was described as a “statement cut” and on that the content provider didn't expand but one suggested statement might be: “admission of guilt”.  Still, the bangs do mean attention is drawn to her lovely sanpaku eyes so there's that.

(2) Baby bangs are short, straight or blunt-edged bangs which are used usually in coordination with the shorter flavours of bob, the reason for that being that if paired with more voluminous cuts, the bangs tend to “get lost” or worse, look like mistakes.  Micro bangs are also “bangs writ small” but differ in that the look is used with styles other than bobs and is identified by being ; not usually considered conventionally attractive, it appears more on catwalks and in photo-shoots than on the street although some do (unwisely) pick up the look.  Baby bangs really suit only a tiny sub-set of the population (most of whom are aged under 15) and should be thought the Pontiac Aztec (2001-2005) of hair-styles in that they're functional, offer good visibility and undeniably are distinctive but are ugly.  All that can be said for both is that on the inside, looking out, one doesn't have to see them. 

Lindsay Lohan with curtain bangs, done in the “twin-hemispheric” or “double polyspheric mode”.

(3) Curtain bangs are long bangs, parted in the centre (although there have been asymmetric interpretations) and designed to resemble a two-drape curtain tied at the side, partially to reveal the face.  The leading edges of the most artfully styled sit just at the point where the eye color is visible and devoted fashionistas wear them with a “curtain reveal top” in which the curve of the garment matches that of the bangs, something which can be as hard to achieve as it sounds.  With a change of as little as a half inch (12.5 mm), stylists can use curtain bangs to change the perception of the shape of a face, the most popular visual trick being elongation, making a “round” face appear something more sought (heart, diamond or inverted triangle).  Combined with skilfully applied makeup, the transformation can be dramatic. 

An emo selfie with classic emo bangs.  The expression is emoesque but the vibrancy of the colors on clothes and bandana is untypical, emos tending more to goth-flavored looks with black and gray although purple seems now less of an emo thing.

(4) Emo bangs are less concerned with shape and symmetry, the important thing being the sweep of hair from the forehead fully covering at least one eye and maybe partially obscuring the other.  Amateur psychiatrists and other students of the emo (a distinct sub-set of humanity) probably have their own thoughts on whether the emo’s goal is to limit what they see of the world or to limit how much others see of them.  Emos are however pragmatic and although their have the honor of an eponymous style, they're also sometimes seen with various bangs. 

There seems little to suggest bangs are a reliable marker of TERFdom and those wishing to assert where they stand on TERFness should probably don an appropriate T-shirt.

(5) Not all agree TERF bangs should be thought a distinct class but they are short, straight, blunt-edged bangs seen usually with shorter cuts (not necessarily bobs).  The term is said to have originated on the microblogging platform Tumblr (which vies with MySpace for as the social media site to have suffered the greatest loss between its high-valuation and most recent sale) when in 2014 a user posted the suggestion such bangs seemingly were exclusive to TERFs (Trans Exclusionary Radical Feminists).  That obviously was impressionistic and it was never clarified whether the suggestion was intended humorously but if not, it’s an example of a gaboso (pronounced gah-boh-so).  A gaboso (Generalized Association Based On Single Observation) (also as the verb gabosoed) is the act of taking one identifiable feature of someone or something and using it as the definitional reference for a group; it ties in with logical fallacies.  While it’s doubtful many professional hairdressers have TERF bangs in the lexicon, it seems novel enough to warrant a mention.