Microaggression

Microaggression (pronounced mahy-kroh-uh-gresh-uhn)

(1) A casual comment or action directed at a marginalized, minority or other non-dominant group that (often) unintentionally but unconsciously reinforces a stereotype and can be construed as offensive.

(2) The act of discriminating against a non-dominant group by means of such comments or actions.

1970: The construct was micro- + aggression.  The word was coined by African-American Chester Middlebrook Pierce (1927-2016), a former Professor of Education and Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School.  Micro (small, microscopic; magnifying; one millionth) was a word-forming element from the New Latin micro- (small), from the Ancient Greek μικρός (mikrós) (small).  The origin is disputed between etymologists, the traditional view being it was from the primitive Indo-European (s)meyg- & (s)mēyg- (small, thin, delicate) and was cognate with the Old English smicor (beauteous, beautiful, elegant, fair, fine, tasteful), source also of the Modern English smicker and related to the German mickrig.   However, there’s a highly technical discussion within the profession, hinged around the unexplained “k” in the Greek and there’s the suggestion of pre-Greek origin on the basis of variation between initial /m/ and /sm/, as well as the variant forms μικός (mikós) and μικκός (mikkós).  Aggression, dating from 1605–1615, was from the French aggression, from the Latin aggressionem (nominative aggressio (a going to, an attack)), a noun of action from past participle stem of aggredi (to approach; attack) the construct being ad (to) + gradi (past participle gressus (to step)) from gradus (a step).  The Classical Latin aggressiōn (stem of aggressiō), was equivalent to aggress(us) + iōn derived from aggrēdi (to attack).  The psychological sense of "hostile or destructive behavior" had its origin in early psychiatry, first noted in English in 1912 in a translation of work by the Austrian neurologist and the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud (1856-1939).  While not exactly synonymous, microassault and microinequity are similar concepts, the most closely related verb being microinvalidate (to engage in microinvalidation, to make a relatively small statement or action (microaggression) that negates another person's experience, thoughts or feelings).  Microaggression, microaggressiveness, microaggressor & microaggressee are nouns, microaggress, microaggressed & microaggressing are verbs, microaggressive is an adjective and microaggressively is an adverb; the noun plural is microaggressions. 

Dr Chester Middlebrook Pierce (1927-2016).

Microaggression is an adaptable and possibly infinitely variable concept that probably most belongs in sociology; typically, it's defined as any of the small-scale verbal or physical interactions between those of different races, cultures, beliefs, or genders that are (perhaps sometimes generously) assumed to carry no malicious intent but which can be interpreted as revealing an underlying (and often unconscious) bias.  The criteria can be both objective and subjective and it’s noted compliments or comments intended to be positive can be defined as microaggressions if interpreted as patronizing or perpetuating stereotypes (racial, gender, sexual orientation, class, occupational, geographical etc).  Probably, the only "safe" identity-based categorizations are now those purely statistical: average heights by nationality and such although such is the sensitivity, the recommendation of many is now wholly to avoid anything that possibly could be construed as a microaggression, the only exceptions being those directed at groups defined as "privileged" (white people, Christians, cisgender, heterosexual males etc).  Very much a "spectrum" word, microaggression began life as a defensive shield but has in recent years attracted criticism (from both left and right) because it was able to be weaponized in "cancellation culture".  The standard psychology texts suggest the behavior manifests in three forms:

Microassault: An explicit racial derogation which can be verbal or nonverbal which can include labelling, avoidant behavior and purposeful discriminatory actions.

Microinsult: Communications that convey rudeness or insensitivity and demean a person's racial heritage or identity; subtle snubs which may be unknown to the perpetrator; hidden insulting messages to the recipient of color.

Microinvalidation: Communications that exclude, negate, or nullify the psychological thoughts, feelings, or experiential reality of a person belonging to a particular group.

The concept emerged to address the underlying racism that endured even after overt, deliberate expressions of racism (at least against defined minorities) had become unacceptable in polite society.  It held that microaggressions generally happened below the level of awareness of well-intentioned members of the dominant culture and were different from acts of intentional bigotry (such as the use of racist epithets) because the those committing microaggressions often intend no offense and are unaware they are causing harm.  That wasn't exactly a Golgothaesque "forgive them for they know not what they do" but in the abstract did position the dominant (and not of necessity majority) culture as normal with minorities treated as aberrant or pathological.

Although the word’s origin lay in the politics of race and ethnicity, it proved readily adaptable to other areas such as gender, sexual orientation, mental illness, disability and age.  Within academic sociology, there’s a (typically) highly technical debate about the nature of microaggression and intersectionality at the cross-cutting cleavages of non-dominant groups.  As regards the media, the discipline had a well-refined model to describe how microaggressions were either reinforced or encouraged by a news and entertainment industry that both reflected and was controlled by the hegemony of the dominant culture.  The sudden shock of the emergence of social media has changed things (diversity of source and content) but the main effect has been to balkanize: While there are places where microaggressions will not be tolerated, there are others where such things are routine and some where microaggressions are about the mildest forms of racism and such.  To date, much work in exploring this area has been impressionistic and it’s not clear if the analytical metrics, where they exist, are sufficiently robust for theories to be coherent beyond the sense of constant "mission creep".  In a sense, social media and the development of DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) are synergistic with the maintenance and critique of microaggressions one of many elements in the culture wars.

As an indication of the how things have changed, in 1939 the terms “paleface” and “redskin” were in 1939 appropriated for use in literary criticism by Russian-born (in modern-day Ukraine) Jewish-American literary critic and essayist Philip Rahv (1908–1973).  What in retrospect makes that most interesting was Rahv was not a kind of “proto-MAGA” (Make America Great Again) figure from the Republican Party’s far-right (a faction that definitely existed in 1939 although different labels were applied) but was of the “left”, emphasizing the virtues of cosmopolitanism and Marxist analysis, one irony in his casual use of “paleface” and “redskin” being his advocacy of “breaking down” ethnic and racial barriers.  He was in the early 1930s a member of the ACP (American Communist Party) but, trans-nationally, long-suppressed fissiparous forces had been unleashed by comrade Stalin (1878-1953; Soviet leader 1924-1953) and Rahv in 1937 was expelled from the ACP by the dominant Stalinist Popular Front faction, condemned as a “Trotskyite” (a follower the exiled Russian comrade Leon Trotsky (1879-1940; founder in 1938 of the Fourth International).  His political activities in the US for a while continued but by the 1950s he’d become one of “The God that Failed” ex-communists and, after a brief flirtation with the “New Left” (or rather what he thought the New Left should have been), he retreated to literature to wage a low-intensity campaign against structuralism.

One of General LeMay’s “civilizing influences”, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay that delivered the first of the two nuclear weapons (thus far) used in conflicts.  It’s now on display in the Smithsonian Institution's National Air and Space Museum, Dulles International Airport, Chantilly, Virginia.

The splicing of the planet's “races” into “civilized”, “barbarian” and “savages” was very much a thing of nineteenth century European thought (although the notion existed also in Imperial China, the definitely very civilized mandarins there appalled by “barbarians” such as the British).  While the terms in this context probably originated in casual use, as the “scientific methods” of the Enlightenment became more generally applied, the notion was taken up, systematized and in some cases codified (with anatomical illustrations) by ethnographers, anthropologists, academic physicians, palaeontologists and others, the most notorious application probably the use in the pseudo-science of eugenics, a “discipline” to some so persuasive its echo continues on both sides of the Atlantic to be heard in the twenty-first century.  The concept of civilization (very much equated with “Western”) has long been a great concern of white supremacists and although the composition of “threats to its survival” does shift, it’s perceived always to be under assault.  Some have offered solutions.  US General Curtis LeMay (1906–1990; Chief of Staff of the USAF (US Air Force) 1961-1965) once remarked to a colleague: “Empirical evidence suggests the most successful way to civilize a nation is to A-bomb it…twice.”  It was said in making the observation he seemed “at least half-serious” and it had been Boeing B-29 Superfortresses under his command that in August 1946 had dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima & Nagasaki so the general likely felt entitled to be proud of his contribution to that civilizing influence.  A confessed Freemason, (a cult that can hardly be said much to have improved civilization), General LeMay was vice-presidential running mate on the 1968 ticket of notorious racist and segregationist George Wallace (1919-1998; governor (Democratic Party) of Alabama 1963–1967, 1971–1979 & 1983–1987) and, by historic standards, the duo enjoyed success, the AIP (American Independent Party) ticket gaining 13.5% of the popular vote, carrying five states for 46 votes in the Electoral College.

Allen's "Red Skins" and "Chicos": On supermarket shelves in Australia until 2020.

It is of course now unthinkable a figure of the left (liberals, progressives etc), Trotskyites or otherwise, would be so casually microaggressive as to take terms so vested with racism as “paleface” and “redskin” so they could, with no acknowledgment of the history, be re-purposed as devices in literary criticism.  However, “The past is a foreign country: they do things differently there” and in the US in 1939, to do such a thing was unremarkable, an indication of the cultural currents underpinning society with the use of language both a product and part of the construct.  Paleface (the construct being pale +‎ face) came from US English and appeared in the anthropological record as early as 1797 (the origin uncertain) but seems not to have entered general use until the early 1920s.  The origin is uncertain but it was supposedly a calque from a Native American language; the form presumably coined when those of the first nations encountered Europeans.  The earliest verified use of the word redskin (the construct being red + skin) dates from 1769 although despite documents from the 1580s referring to the skin-tone of indigenous Americans as “red”, that use by European explorers and settlers was not consistent and in some instances may have been a reference to the use of red “paint” used to adorn the face and upper-body.  “Paleface” has been used as an intended slur against white people (with little apparent effect) but “redskin” definitely is an ethnic slur offensive to Native Americans although the record suggest than until around the mid-nineteenth century it was neutral and merely descriptive before ascending the “linguistic treadmill”.  Use puts it now well beyond being a microaggression.

The re-brand, 2020.

Allen's "Red Skins" and "Chicos" were in 2020 re-named "Red Rippers" and "Cheekies" respectively.  In the US, it was in 2020 the NFL (National Football League) team the Washington Redskins retired the name used since 1933, adopting Washington Football Team before in 2022 settling on a re-branding as Commanders.  The team's administration, when announcing the name-change, made no mention of the preceding controversy, nor the pressure from corporations, something most analysts suggested prompted the change more than any of the representations by Native American communities.  According to the Allen's, the recipes for the lollies remained “unchanged” and thus far Streets’ Golden Gaytime (sold in New Zealand as the Cookie Crumble) ice cream snack has survived the linguistic treadmill.

  

Gaytime meme.

The meme features Eric Abetz (b 1958; Liberal Party senator for Tasmania, Australia 1994-2022, Treasurer of Tasmania since 2024).  A student of Leviticus, Mr Abetz does not approve of any form of gaynessness.  First sold in 1970, and in general use clipped usually “Gaytime”, the confectionery is a toffee and vanilla ice cream, dipped in compound chocolate with a heavy sprinkling of large “crumbs” of vanilla biscuit, all on a wooden paddlepop-stick.  Although by 1970 “gay” was in use in the context of “male homosexuals”, it had not in Australian society gained critical mass and there’s nothing to suggest the name was then chosen for reasons other than the historic association of “gay” with “happy” and certainly the connotations later attached to “golden” by the gay community would have been unknown to most.  The company in the 1980s anyway embraced the possibilities with advertising tag lines such as “It's hard to have a Gaytime on your own” and complaints about the name in the new century received scant support from even gay-rights activists.

In 1939, Rahv used “paleface” and “redskin” to distinguish between what he called “two poles”; his sense was of the diametrically opposed “north & south” but his model was stylistic and thematic rather than geographic (and really not quite an antinomy as some have suggested).  The polarization as defined by Rahv had him group writers according to their attitude, style, subject matter and such, Nathaniel Hawthorne (1804–1864), Herman Melville (1819–1891) and Henry James (1843-1916) classified as “palefaces” while Walt Whitman (1819–1892), and Mark Twain (1835-1910) were “redskins”.  In Rahv’s literary world view, palefaces had cultured and patrician attitudes, wrote in a mannered style using symbolism and explored “lofty” themes with great complexity.  The redskins wrote works of the rugged men of frontier life or the working class, criminals and “low lifes” in the unpleasant parts of towns and cities.  He didn’t seem to suggest writing in a colloquial and naturalistic way couldn’t be interpolated into thematically complex literary texts, just that it was inevitable a “down market” cast of characters and places they frequented would shape the work.  So Rahv saw palefaces as “civilized” and redskins as “barbarians”; presumably he’d have thought “savages” to be “non-literary” and thus “beyond the pale” as it were.  Of those Americans who came later, categorization must be speculative but can be fun.

Use of "Eskimo" definitely can be deemed microaggressive. While ice-cream lovers can still buy "Gaytimes", they had to adjust to the "Eskimo Pie" being renamed (variously "Edy's Pie" or "Polar Pie").  It remains to be seen if the use of polar bears in some of the new packaging triggers controversy.  The creatures do appear in aspects of Inuit culture and religion and it's not clear if permission for use has been sought.

William Faulkner (1897–1962) and Kurt Vonnegut (1922–2007) both seem redskins and Norman Mailer (1923–2007) clearly was no paleface though he might have thought being filed with the barbarians an effete slight on his savagery.  Gore Vidal (1925–2012) was a redskin who really wanted to be a paleface (and never stopped trying) while Philip Roth (1933–2018) was such a paleface he never quite mastered the “redskin mode” despite the occasional heroic attempt.  John Updike (1932–2009) was a paleface but the problem inherent in assigning writers with a hefty oeuvre to polarized categories is that at the margins their writing can “straddle” and sometimes those margins are wide.  That’s why plausible cases can be made arguing both Bernard Malamud (1914–1986) and Saul Bellow (1915–2005) at times at least “tended” to either pole.  What Rahv would have made of Faulkner in 1949 and Bellow in 1976 being awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature while Updike and Roth were ignored (despite the latter engaging in self-promotion not far short of Donald Trump’s (b 1946; POTUS 2017-2021 and since 2025) auto-advocacy to be the Peace Prize laureate) would be interesting to know but safely can it be imagined he’d have thought the entire Nobel Committee redskins after in 2016 they conferred the honor in literature on musician Bob Dylan (b 1941).  Maybe it was women of the Swedish Academy (the body that chooses the Literature laureates) who vetoed Roth; in all he wrote of women (and it was a lot), Roth revealed much about himself but little about them, despite the usually elegant internal logic.  Rahv was anyway appalled literature appeared to exist in such a dichotomy and, being an old Trotskyite who never quite stopped taking seriously Karl Marx’s (1818-1883) politics, longed for a world where folk wrote like Marcel Proust (1871-1922) or Thomas Mann (1875–1955), the latter at least acknowledged in 1929 by the Nobel Committee.

1958 Studebaker Scotsman advertisement.

There was in 1957 nothing unusual or offensive in Studebaker naming a car “Scotsman” and it would have been well-understood as a reference to the car’s low purchase price and (alleged) TCO (total cost of ownership).  Scotsman buyers could even save a little more were they prepared to forgo the extravagance of chrome bumpers and choose the "delete option" of painted units; Mercedes-Benz also once offered that on taxi versions of a number of utilitarian sedans, the most produced the W115s (1968-1976). Other manufacturers used the same concept as Studebaker: Citroën ID vs DS, Cadillac Calais vs de Ville etc, some including fewer features and simpler trim, some also changing the mechanical specification but the principle was always: same size, less stuff, lower price.  The name "Scotsman" was picking up on the reputation of the Scots for frugality and it would have been thought something neutral at worst and more likely positive, thriftiness in the early post-war US still generally thought a virtue despite the best attempts of capitalism to encourage consumer gluttony; as fat overtook the land, things would change.  Technically, such use would now fulfil the criteria of a “microaggression” even if deployed in a way making clear it’s being intended as a compliment.  Scots can of course use the trope of themselves and even if used by others, as race-based microaggressions go, it’s probably at the "lower range" of offensiveness, those applied to “white people”, rarely noticed and certainly not grounds for cancellation.  Still, by the 2020s, it’s highly unlikely a car company would now name a car a “Scotsman” and certainly not if it was a “stripper” (ie a low-cost model with minimal standard equipment).

The “Scotsman’s supercar”: 1968 Plymouth Road Runner, Car Life magazine, May 1968.

Quite when the term "stripper" (in that context) vanished from commercial use can’t be certain but it would have occurred later in the twentieth century and certainly after 1968 when Car Life magazine, reviewing the new Plymouth Road Runner, called the stripped-down, low-priced muscle car: “a sort of Scotsman’s supercar”.  As well as a relic of linguistic use, Car Life’s test was interesting because unlike many of its contemporaries that often conducted tests using vehicles tweaked by manufacturers or dealers for optimal performance, they used the genuine, stock-standard articles, bought from the showroom floor, that being a more realistic path to discovering if thing did "what it said on the tin".  What Car Life revealed was the Road Runner (when equipped with the standard 383 cubic inch (6.3 litre) V8)) was quicker than a typical 383 powered car using the same body (as would be expected given the lower weight and modifications to the 383 used in the model) but was unable to match the sub-15 second ¼-mile (402 metre) runs reported by many.  The basic Road Runner was actually representative of the performance of most of the era’s “muscle car ecosystem” while the storied cars that “out of the box” were able consistently to log ¼-mile ETs (elapsed time) in the 13 or 14 second bracket were relatively rare and a tiny sliver of what came to be classified as "muscle cars", some of which just "looked the part" although that did prove a lucrative market.  Of course, to solve any perception of inadequacy, a buyer could tick the box for the optional 426 (7.0) Street Hemi V8 and while that was expensive, as well a fixing any performance deficit, putting one in a Road Runner was the cheapest path to Hemi ownership, a compelling case at a time when a thousand dollars was a lot of money.

Channeling her inner Scotsperson: Lindsay Lohan in Royal Stewart tartan, Freaky Friday (2003), costume test photo (Walt Disney Pictures).

Despite the perception of many (encouraged bydepictions in popular culture), tartan in the sense of specific color & pattern combinations attached to specific clans is something of recent origin.  Tartan (breacan (pɾʲɛxkən) in Scots Gaelic) is a patterned cloth consisting of criss-crossed, horizontal and vertical bands in multiple colours.  The word plaid is now often used interchangeably with tartan (particularly in North America and when not associated with anything Scottish (especially kilts)), but technically (and always in Scotland), a plaid is a large piece of tartan cloth, worn as a type of kilt or large shawl although it’s used also to describe a blanket.  During the disputes between England and Scotland, the wearing of tartan became a political expression and the Dress Act (1746) was part of the campaign to suppress the warrior clans north of the border; it banned tartan and other aspects of Gaelic culture. The law was repealed in 1782 and tartan was soon adopted as both the symbolic national dress of Scotland and in imagery more generally.

The Royal Stewart was the personal tartan of Elizabeth II (1926-2022; Queen of the UK and other places, 1952-2022) and although historically associated with the royal house of Stewart (or Stuart), it has become one of the most widely used in commercial fashion and in that sense appears in parallel with the clan affiliation.  Commonly worn to formal events such as weddings, ceilidhs (social gatherings, the nature of which casts a wide net) or Burns Night (celebrating the life of Robert "Rabbie" Burns (1759–1796 and still in popular imagination Scotland's "national poet")), the modern trend is to pair a kilt with a Prince Charlie or Argyll jacket, traditionalists adding a Sporran (pouch), Hose (kilt socks) & flashes, Ghillie brogues (traditional shoes) and even a Sgian dubh (a small dagger tucked in the sock) although carrying the last item may be unlawful in some jurisdictions.  Lindsay Lohan in her screen test wore the dress in something of the way in the 1970s it became part of the punk sub-culture but for more conventional types there are also scarves, ties, sashes and such.  Remarkably, in the age of identity politics and sensitivity to cultural appropriation, the etiquette guides note there is no objection to non-Scots folk wearing their tartan of choice except when an event is clan-specific in which case only those in the lineage should don the fabric.  That said, even then, the consequence of a tartan faux pas will likely be less severe than wearing a Rangers shirt in a Glasgow pub filled with Celtic’s hoops.  Still, deployed with sufficient cultural insensitivity, improper use of tartan could be a microaggression.

Microaggression in Progress: A Mean Girls (2004) "mall scene".

Mean Girls was replete with instances of microaggressiveness.  We’re still (mostly) allowed (quietly) to be amused by some of these, but, a quarter-century on, there’s now a more hostile critique of subtle verbal or behavioural slights that communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative messages to marginalized groups, even if genuinely often unintentional; what seems subtle to some may to others be blatant insensitivity.  In satire, there's still some tolerance for such depictions although audiences are now expected to be as appalled as they are amused and, of course, as a satire of the gut-wrenching ecosystem that is high school social dynamics, subtle forms of relational aggression and passive-aggressive exclusion were not hard to find and can be categorized:

(1) Racial and Geographic Microaggressions: The line: “If you're from Africa, why are you white?” was an invalidation of an individual’s cultural identity on the basis of not according with another’s geographic & racial assumptions & expectations.  The school map of “the cafeteria cliques” includes “Cool Asians”, the labelling reducing individuals to their ethnicity and when paired with what is nominally a most positive teen modifier (cool), that operates as a racial micro-insult implying (1) most individuals of that ethnicity are “not cool” and (2) non-white students are in a sense monolithic and acknowledged as “acceptable sub-groups” only if they in some way adhere to “white people constructs” of “white normative standards”.  “Black hotties” operates at the same level, although “hot” (a type of “coolness”!) usually is positive, the implication here is that “hotness” inherently is a quality of certain white girls and a black girl can be deemed “hot” only compared to other black girls; she cannot, in the absolute sense, merely be a “hottie”, that descriptor operating only on white girls.  The surprised response “Oh you speak English?” when someone is introduced to a black student thought to be from Africa reveals the cultural assumption such an individual would likely lack proficiency in the language; it’s a classic micro-invalidation.

Microaggression weaponized ironically.

(2) Gender and Academic Microaggressions: When Cady expresses interest in joining the school math team, she’s told it’s “social suicide”, a pushback reinforcing gendered and social stereotypes that young women cannot be simultaneously be popular, attractive and intellectually gifted, thus the trope of intentionally failing math to gain a boy's attention.  The “I’m too pretty to do math” T-shirt plays with this and works well if worn by a pretty math nerd although, it'd be really subversive on a "not-pretty" girl.

(3) Backhanded compliments disguised as “niceness”: Such things can be the least objectionable of all microaggressions especially if there’s some equivalency in the power-relationship and the quip is witty, subtle and (ideally retrospectively) understood.  It can also be done “by proxy” such as when saying to one student “I love your skirt, where did you get it?”, only to wait until she’s out of earshot before turning to another and saying “That is the ugliest effing skirt I've ever seen.”  What this does is make an individual realize they may not be able to find sincere or truthful anything they’re told.

Aggression rather than microaggression: “Fetch” anyway likely never would have “happened”.  Although a convenient clipping of “fetching” (often in the form “quite fetching” or “most fetching” and meaning “charming; captivating; compelling” etc), by the early twenty-first century “fetching” in those senses had long since descended into the category of “dated”; it was an “old people” word, use thus “social suicide”.

(4) Image and fat-shaming: Because the social identity of the “Plastics” was so tied to rigid “beauty standards” (some group-imposed, some the prevailing norms), by use of the “Kalteen Bars manipulation” it was possible to induce weight-gain in Regina, an act of sabotage opening the possibility of subjecting her to micro-insults and non-verbal cues (staring at her body or pointing out strict dress-code rules that really can’t be adhered to by someone gaining weight) to signal there’s been a violation of group standards, requiring exclusion.  In that, the techniques are different from something like: “Gretchen, stop trying to make 'fetch' happen.”; that is pure aggression: A group’s hegemon maintaining control by suppressing another member’s attempt to assert their personal identity through something as seemingly innocuous as the introduction of a new slang term.  It was a type of linguistic imperialism, similar to the attitude of Spanish nationalist troops who occupied Catalonia and the Basque country after their victory in the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939).  Harshly they would tell those they heard talking in regional dialects: “Speak the language of the Empire, don’t bark like dogs!”  

Knickers

Knickers (pronounced nik-erz)

(1) Loose-fitting short trousers gathered in at the knees.

(2) A bloomers-like undergarment worn by women.

(3) A general term for the panties worn by women.

(4) In product ranges, a descriptor of certain styles of panties, usually the short-legged underpants worn by women or girls.

(5) In slang, a mild expression of annoyance (archaic).

1866: A clipping of knickerbockers (the plural and a special use of knickerbocker).  The use is derived from the short breeches worn by Diedrich Knickerbocker in George Cruikshank's illustrations of Washington Irving's (1783-1859) A History of New York (1809), published under the pen-name Dietrich Knickbocker.  The surname Knickerbocker (also spelled Knikkerbakker, Knikkerbacker, and Knickerbacker) is a American creation, based on the names of early Dutch early settlers of New Netherland, thought probably derived from the Dutch immigrant Harmen Jansen van Bommel(l), who went variously by the names van Wy(y)e, van Wyekycback(e), Kinnekerbacker, Knickelbacker, Knickerbacker, Kinckerbacker, Nyckbacker, and Kynckbacker.  The precise etymology is a mystery, speculations including a corruption of the Dutch Wyekycback, the Dutch knacker (cracker) + the German Bäcker (or the Dutch bakker (baker)), or the Dutch knicker (marble (toy)) + the German Bäcker (or the Dutch bakker).  Aside from the obvious application (of or relating to knickerbockers), it was in the US used attributively as a modifier, referencing the social class with which the garment was traditionally associated; this use is now listed as archaic.  Knickers is a noun and is one of those words which serves also as a plural.

Men in knickerbockers.

Washington Irving was a US writer, historian and diplomat, most remembered today as the author of Rip Van Winkle (1819).  Although the bulk of his work was that of a conventional historian, his early writing was satirical, many of his barbs aimed at New York’s high society and it was Irving who in 1807 first gave NYC the nickname "Gotham" (from the Anglo-Saxon, literally “homestead where goats are kept”, the construct being the Old English gāt (goat) +‎ hām (home)).  The name Diedrich Knickerbocker he introduced in 1809 in A History of New York (the original title A History of New-York from the Beginning of the World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty).  A satire of local politics and personalities, it was also an elaborate literary hoax, Irving through rumor and missing person advertisements creating the impression Mr Knickerbocker had vanished from his hotel, leaving behind nothing but a completed manuscript.  The story captured the public imagination and, under the Knickerbocker pseudonym, Irving published A History of New York to critical and commercial success.  The name Diedrich Knickerbocker became a nickname for the Manhattan upper-class (later extended to New Yorkers in general) and was adopted by the New York Knickerbockers basketball team (1845-1873), the name revived in 1946 for the team now part of the US National Basketball League although their name usually appears as the New York Knicks.  The figurative use to describe New Yorkers of whatever status faded from use early in the twentieth century.  Knickerbocker was of course a real name, one of note the US foreign correspondent HR Knickerbocker (1898–1949) who in 1936 was a journalist for the Hearst Press, accredited to cover the Spanish Civil War (1936-1940).  Like many foreign reporters, his work made difficult by the military censors who, after many disputes, early in 1937 deported him after he’d tried to report the retreat of one of the brigades supplied by Benito Mussolini (1883-1945; Duce (leader) & prime-minister of Italy 1922-1943) with the words “The Italians fled, lock, stock and barrel-organ”.

Kiki de Montparnasse lace knickers, US$190 at FarFetch.

It was in the Knickerbocker tale of 1809 that Washington made the first known reference in print to the doughnut (after the 1940s often as "donut" in North American use although that spelling was noted as early as the mid-nineteenth century) although the “small, spongy cake made of dough and fried in lard”) was probably best described as “a lump” because there seems to be no suggestion the size and exact shape of the things were in any way standardized beyond being vaguely roundish.  It’s not clear when the holes became common, the first mention of them apparently in 1861 at which time one writer recorded that in New York City (the old New Amsterdam) they were known also as olycokes (from the Dutch oliekoek (oily cake) and some food guides of the era listed doughnuts and crullers as “types of olycoke”.

For designers, conventional knickers can be an impediment so are sometimes discarded: Polish model Anja Rubik (b 1983), Met Gala, New York City, May, 2012.  Note JBF hair-style and commendable hip-bone definition.

Knickers dates from 1866, in reference to loose-fitting pants for men worn buckled or buttoned at the waist and knees, a clipping of knickerbockers, used since 1859 and so called for their because of their resemblance to the trousers of old-time Dutchmen in George Cruikshank's (1792-1878) illustrations in the History of New York.  A now extinct derivation was the Scottish nicky-tam (garter worn over trousers), dating from 1911, a shortened, colloquial form, the construct being knickers + the Scottish & northern English dialect taum, from Old Norse taumr (cord, rein, line), cognate with the Old English team, the root sense of which appears to be "that which draws".  It was originally a string tied by Scottish farmers around rolled-up trousers to keep the legs of them out of the dirt (in the style of the plus-fours once associated with golf, so-named because they were breeches with four inches of excess material which could hang in a fold below the fastening beneath the knee, the plus-four a very similar style to the classic knickerbocker).  The word “draws” survives in Scots-English to refer to trousers in general.  It also had a technical use in haberdashery, describing a linsey-woolsey fabric with a rough knotted surface on the right side which was once a popular fabric for women's dresses.  Writers also like "knickers" because it's a "quasi-naughty" word which adds spice without crossing any lines a censor might notice.  The Australian critic (of just about everything) Clive James (1939-2019) reacted to Margaret Thatcher's (1925–2013; UK prime-minister 1979-1990) victory speech after results of the 1979 general election were announced by observing: "She sounded like the Book of Revelation being read out over a railway station public address system by a headmistress of a certain age in calico knickers."  

Cami-knickers, 1926, Marshalls & Snelgrove, Oxford Street, London.

The New York garment industry in 1882 adopted knickers to describe a "short, loose-fitting undergarment for women" apparently because of the appeal of the name.  By 1884, the word had crossed the Atlantic and in both France and the UK was used to advertise the flimsier of women’s “unmentionables” and there have long many variations (although there’s not always a consistency of style between manufacturers) including Camiknickers, French Knickers and (the somewhat misleading) No Knickers (which are knickers claimed to be "so comfortable you won't believe you're wearing them", said also to be the yardstick used to find the "perfect bra").  From the very start, women’s knickers were, as individual items, sold as “a pair” and there’s no “knicker” whereas the singular form knickerbocker, unlike the plural, may only refer to a single garment.  In the matter of English constructed plurals, the history matters rather than any rule.  Shoes and socks are obviously both a pair because that’s how they come but a pair of trousers seems strange because it’s a single item.  That’s because modern "trousers" evolved from the Old Scots Trews, Truis & Triubhas and the Middle English trouzes & trouse which were separate items (per leg) and thus supplied in pairs, the two coverings joined by a breechcloth or a codpiece.  A pair of spectacles (glasses) is similar in that lens were originally separate (al la the monocle), things which could be purchased individually or as a pair.  The idea of a pair of knickers was natural because it was an adaptation of earlier use for the men’s garments, sold as “pairs of knickerbockers” or “pairs of knickers”.

Advertisement for French lingerie, 1958.  Now owned by Munich-based Triumph International GmbH, Valisère was in the early twentieth century founded as a glove manufacturer by Perrin family in Grenoble, Isère (thus the name).  Until 1922, exclusively it made fabric gloves but in 1922 expanded to produce fine lingerie and instantly was successful, in the coming years opening factories in Brazil and then Morocco.

In English, euphemisms for underwear (especially those of women) have come and gone.  In that, the churn-rate is an example of the linguistic treadmill: Terms created as “polite forms” become as associated with the items they describe as the word they replaced and thus also come to be thought “common”, “rude” or “vulgar” etc, thus necessitating replacement.  Even the now common “lingerie” (in use in English by at least 1831), had its moments of controversy in the US where, in the mid-nineteenth century, on the basis of being so obviously “foreign” and thus perhaps suggestive of things not desirable, decent folk avoided it.  It was different in England where it was used by manufacturers and retailers to hint at “continental elegance” and imported lacy, frilly or silk underwear for women would often be advertised as “Italian lingerie” or “French lingerie”.  That was commercial opportunism because lingerie was from the French lingerie (linen closet) and thus deconstructs in English use as “linen underwear” but any sense of the exclusive use of “linen” was soon lost and the association with “luxury” stuck, lingerie coming to be understood as those undergarments which were delicate or expensive; what most wore as “everyday” wear wouldn’t be so described.

Christmas lights in the centre of Eislingen, Germany, 3 December 2015.

A town of over 20,000 souls in the district of Göppingen in Baden-Württemberg which lies in Germany’s south, the (presumably unintentional), “knickers theme” Christmas lights the good burghers choose in 2015 seem to have induced much envy because on social media there were many posts claiming them for other places including Tomsk, Sevastopol and Kutaisi.

Although apparently seen used in 1866 and by the early 1880s in general commercial use to describe “underpants” (dating from 1871) for women or girls”, “knickers” was not the last word on the topic, “undies” (1906), “panties” (1908) and “briefs” (1934) following.  However, for those with delicate sensibilities, mention of “knickers” (one’s own or another’s) could be avoided because there evolved a long list of euphemisms, including “inexpressible” “unmentionables” (1806); “indispensables” (1820); “ineffable” (1823); “unutterables” (1826); “innominables” (1827); “inexplicable” (1829); “unimaginable” (1833), and “unprintables” (1860).  In modern use, “unmentionables” is still heard although use is now exclusively ironic but the treadmill is still running because as the indispensable Online Etymology Dictionary noted when compiling that list, “intimates” seems (in the context of knickers and such to have come into use as recently as 1988; it’s short for “intimate apparel”, first used 99 years earlier.

Beknickered or knickered: Lindsay Lohan in cage bra and knickers, Complex Magazine photo-shoot, 2011.  In the technical sense, were the distinctive elements of a cage bra truly to be structural, the essential components would be the underwire and gore. 

The bra, like a pair of knckers, is designed obviously to accommodate a pair yet is described in the singular for reasons different again.  Its predecessor, the bodice, was often supplied in two pieces (and was thus historically referred to as “a pair of bodies” (and later “a pair of bodicies”)) and laced together but that’s unrelated to the way a bra is described: It’s a clipping of the French brassière and that is singular.  Brasserie entered English in the late nineteenth century although the French original often more closely resembled a chemise or camisole, the adoption in English perhaps influenced by the French term for something like the modern bra being soutien-gorge (literally, "throat-supporter") which perhaps had less appeal although it may be no worse than the more robust rehausseur de poitrine (chest uplifter) which seems more accurate still.  Being English, "brassiere" was soon clipped to "bra" and a vast supporting industry evolved, with global annual sales estimated to exceed US$60 billon in 2025 although since Donald Trump's (b 1946; US president 2017-2021 and since 2025) imposition of increased tariffs, just about all projections in the world economy must be thought "rubbery".

Danish model Nina Agdal (b 1992), Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Summer of Swim Fan Festival & Concert Bash, Coney Island Beach and Boardwalk, Brooklyn, New York, 28 August, 2016.

Ms Agdal can be described as being “unknickered” or “knickerless”, the choice depending presumably on what best suits the rhythm of the sentence.  Those adjectives reference the absence of knickers whereas “deknickered” describes their removal.  For serious students of fashion, “unknickered” or “knickerless” are used literally but a trap for young players is that there are dresses designed to produce the effect when worn with specially-designed knickers.  In the same way, there is no difference in meaning between “knickered” and “beknickered”, both a reference to having a pair on; they’re now rare but in the US when the wearing of knickerbockers was quite a thing, both would often appear in print.  The phrase “all fur and no knickers” (also as “all fur coat and no knickers”) conveys the critique: Having a superficially positive appearance that is belied by the reality.  That’s a slur suggesting the apparent beauty is but a surface veneer concealing something common and differs from “beauty is only skin deep” in that latter refers to someone or something genuinely beautiful but in some way ugly whereas the former implies the “beauty” is fake.  In that “all fur and no knickers” is related to “mutton dressed-up as lamb” (the even more cutting put-down being “mutton dressed as hogget”) and “all hat and no cattle”, reputed to have originated in Texas.  To “get one's knickers in a knot” or “to get one's knickers in a twist” is to become overwrought or needlessly upset over some trivial matter or event.  Used usually as the admonition: “Don’t get your knickers in a knot (or twist)”, the companion phrase being “keep your knickers on” which means much the same thing: “stay calm and don’t become flustered”.  The term “witches' knickers” is UK slang describing discarded, wind-blown plastic bags snagged in trees and bushes.  Gym knickers traditionally were the large, loose shorts worn by girls during school sports, the style very similar to what are now sold as “French knickers” (known in the US also as “tap pants”).  Camiknickers are a women's undergarment covering the torso; often worn (sometimes in decorated form) under short dresses or with slacks, the industry mostly has switched to marketing them under the names Teddy, Tedi or bodysuit.

Booby

Booby (pronounced boo-bee)

(1) A bird, a gannet of the genus Sula, having a bright bill, bright feet, or both; some are listed as threatened or endangered.

(2) A slang term for someone thought stupid or a dunce, ignorant or foolish (although still used in the mid-twentieth century, it's probably now obsolete, the meaning crowded out by intrusion of newer slang, some of which has also fallen victim to the linguistic treadmill).

(3) The losing player in a game (the historic UK usage "booby prize", now largely obsolete except in informal use).

(4) One of the many slang terms for the human female's breasts and related to the more common boob, boobs and boobie.

(5) In croquet, a ball that has not passed through the first wicket. 

1590s: From Spanish Latin from the earlier pooby, apparently a blend of (the now obsolete in this context) poop (to befool) and baby, perhaps by association with Spanish bobo (stupid person, slow bird), thought to be from an imitative root of the Latin balbus (stuttering).  Balbus was from the primitive Indo-European balb- & balbal- (tongue-tied) and was cognate with the Ancient Greek βαμβαίνω (bambaínō) & βαμβαλύζω (bambalúzō) (I chatter with the teeth), the Russian болтать (boltatʹ) (to chatter, to babble), the Lithuanian balbė́ti (to talk, to babble), the Sanskrit बल्बला (balbalā) (stammering) and the Albanian belbët (stammering).  The booby prize dates from 1883, a prize given to the loser in a game as concept which persists in some sporting competitions as "the wooden spoon", the idea being something as removed as possible from the usual silverware given as trophies.  The booby trap was first noted in 1850, originally a schoolboy prank (ie something only a "boob" would fall for); the more lethal sense developed during World War I and remain common military and para-military use.  Booby and boobyism are nouns, boobyish and (the non-standard but potentially useful)  boobyesque are adjectives; the noun plural is boobies.

Boobies: found usually in pairs

A nice pair of boobies.  Charmingly, blue-footed boobies are known to be monogamous, pairs often staying together for life.

A booby is a seabird in the genus Sula, part of the Sulidae family. Boobies are closely related to the gannets (Morus), which were formerly included in Sula, the genus created in 1760 by the French naturalist Mathurin Jacques Brisson (1723-1806).  The name is derived from súla, the Old Norse and Icelandic word for the other member of the family Sulidae, the gannet.  The English name booby was based on the Spanish bobo (stupid) as the tame birds often landed on board sailing ships, where they were easily captured and eaten.  As well as a popular addition to the diet of sailors for whom meat other than fish was a rarity, it was fortuitous for many, the Admiralty's archives revealing boobies are often mentioned as having been caught and eaten by shipwrecked sailors.  In taxonomic classification, variations include Abbott's booby (Papasula abbotti), blue-footed booby (Sula nebouxii), brown booby (Sula leucogaster), masked booby (Sula dactylatra), Nazca booby (Sula granti), Peruvian booby (Sula variegata), red-footed booby (Sula sula) & Tasman booby (Sula dactylatra tasmani).

One step at a time.

The distinctive blue feet (the result of pigments ingested from their diet of fish) also play a part in the bobby’s mating ritual although not exactly in the podophilic sense familiar in a sub-set of humans.  In the spring mating season, the bird’s feet become a bright turquoise blue and, to demonstrate their health and vitality conspicuously they will display them to potential partners.  The job done, as their eggs hatch, the blue hue fades to something less vivid.  One aspect of their behaviour which amused the ornithologists who first observed it was that if among fishers unloading their catch, it tossed a small fish from the by-catch, a booby will take it and waddled off somewhere to enjoy it in solitude rather than gulping it down as in common in many species.  Like penguins, although ungainly on land, they are skilled plunge divers which used their streamlined bodies and air sacs “fly” through the water, catching their prey at high speed and they hunt in "packs", coordinating their movement to maximize the catch.  Boobies have been recorded diving from as high as 90 m (300 feet), their speed upon entry estimated at around 100 km/h (60 mph).

Boobies in time, in step.

Based on the use by mainstream internet sites (including nominally reputable news organizations), boob (more commonly in the plural as boobs) seems to have emerged as the preferred slang for breasts, probably because it seems the term women find most acceptable and the one they most often use, not infrequently as their default descriptor.  The origin appears to lie in bubby (plural bubbies), a slang term for the female breast dating from the 1680s which is thought to be imitative of a baby's cry or the sucking sound heard during lactation.  It was most associated with south-east England although that may reflect more extensive documentation rather than proof of regionalism.  Inherently anyway a form in oral use, the alternative pronunciations included buhb-ee, boo-bee & boob-ee so the evolution to boob was perhaps not unexpected although most dictionaries list the earliest known instance as a late 1930s Americanism with the back-formed clippings boob & boobs not appearing until the early post-war years, initially as a vulgarism, women not embracing use for decades although that their approval seems to have coincided with late second-wave feminism is presumably coincidental.

Fully loaded: Lindsay Lohan in boobie-top with crash helmet in Herbie: Fully Loaded (2005).

In fashion, the boobie top (less commonly as booby-top) is a style of clothing (including dresses) which in some way draws attention to or emphasizes the breasts.  The design is most associated with generous displays of cleavage or skin but is used also to refer to garments which wholly cover the breasts in such as way as to highlight the size, shape or movement.  In the industry, a “boobie top” differs from a “boob tube” in that while the former seeks to highlight the breasts as a feature (either by using the fabric tightly to shift the focus to the size and shape or with a cut which displays the cleavage component of the décolletage) while a “boob tube” is a different interpretation of the minimalist: it completely envelopes the breasts (ie little or no visible cleavage) but otherwise exposes the torso.

A “tube top” in the original style (left) and a “boob tube” (right), both now likely to be advertised as a “boob tube”.

The style was in 1972 first described as a “tube-top” (strapless and extend from the armpits to the naval; such garments had earlier been available but the name was new) and the companion “tube skirt” appeared the next season (again, a re-labeling).  The first “boob tubes” were advertised in 1977 and the early were all a truncated version of the “tube top” in that they wrapped only around the breasts); inherently it was a midriff-baring creation and could be thought of as a kind of strapless, bandeau bra designed for outdoor wear (on warmer days).  Constructed with elasticized fabrics, they were designed to be worn without a bra but, like all forms of structural engineering, physics does limit what's possible and they came later to be available also with a “built in bra”.  Others just choose boob tubes made with a thicker material so a strapless bra unobtrusively could be worn beneath but, VBS (visible bra-straps) no longer being a sin against fashion, some now choose a to make the bra part of the look.  In truth, the terms “tube top” & “boob tube” were all a bit misleading because it was only the material covering the breasts which tended toward a truly tubular bra with the rest being more or less flat and a better description might have been “flange” but this wouldn’t have had the same appeal in a boutique so “tubes” they became.  In product descriptions, the distinction between “tube top” and “boob tube” quickly became blurred and the latter tends now often to be used of both types. 

US Army booby trap messaging, 1942.  Such infections have for centuries been a significant part of military medicine because STIs often would reduce unit strength (ie "battle-ready" troops).

During World War II (1939-1945), the US military kept up with evolution of slang, something reflected in advertising which lent a new definition to "booby trap", a familiar concept in which soldiers were well-drilled.  Despite the efforts of padres, it was rare for commanders to attempt to impose morality and when on deployment it was common for there to be "authorized" brothels (often separate facilities for officers and other ranks) with the prostitutes subject to regular inspection by medical staff and allowed to practice their ancient profession only if the supervising doctor issued a "clean" certificate.  Until well into the twentieth century (and the beginning of the antibiotic era), it wasn't unusual for the losses of combat-ready troops to illness & disease to exceed those caused by battlefield causalities and although the numbers were dwarfed by conditions such as malaria, preventing and treating sexually transmitted diseases (STDs, then called venereal disease (VD)) was an important component of military medicine.  It wasn’t until the 1970s the initialism VD began to be replaced by STD (VD thought to have to have gained too many specific associations) but fortunately for AT&T, in 1951 they renamed their STD (Subscriber Toll Dialing) service (for long-distance phone calls) to DDD (Direct Distance Dialing), apparently for no better reason than the alliterative appeal although it's possible they just wanted to avoid mentioning “toll” with all that implies.  Many countries in the English-speaking world continued to use STD for the phone calls, even after the public health specialists had re-purposed the initialization.  In clinical use, STI (Sexually Transmitted Infection) seems now the preferred term.

The other booby trap: Helpful advertising circa 1950.

In Western legal systems, two aspects of consumer protection which greatly advanced in the twentieth century were product liability and “truth in advertising”.  What the changes in product liability did was break the nexus of “privity of contract”, meaning it was no longer required that to seek redress or compensation, an injured party had to be the purchaser of the defective goods.  That reform took shape during the inter-war years but “truth in advertising”, although an old concept enforced in contract law, really became a movement in the post-war years; it was designed to remove from commerce “deceptive or misleading” claims although advertising agencies still had a wide scope to be “economical with the truth” if they could make their assertions fit into the “mere puffery” rubric.  One field never policed was women’s shapewear (corsets and such) which, with a judicious placement of struts, elasticized panels, ribs and padding could variously make body parts appear curvier, straighter, smaller, larger or higher.  The Wonderbra (and its many imitators) was probably the best known example because among the many garments and devices it was the one which most dramatically deceived and misled.  Of all this trickery the law remained silent and the sage advice remained: caveat emptor.