Canon

Canon (pronounced kan-uhn)

(1) An ecclesiastical rule or law enacted by a council or other competent authority and, in the Roman Catholic Church, approved by the pope; the body of ecclesiastical law.

(2) In certain denominations in Christianity, one of a body of dignitaries or prebendaries attached to a cathedral or a collegiate church; a member of the chapter of a cathedral or a collegiate church.

(3) In the Roman Catholic Church, one of the members (canons regular) of certain religious orders.  Historically, a member of either the Augustinian or Premonstratensian, living communally as monks but performing clerical duties.

(4) The body of rules, principles, or standards accepted as axiomatic and universally binding in a field of study or art.

(5) A fundamental principle or general rule.

(6) A standard; criterion.

(7) The books of the Bible recognized by any Christian church as genuine and inspired.

(8) Any officially recognized set of sacred books.

(9) A piece of music in which an extended melody in one part is imitated successively in one or more other parts (fugal).

(10) A size of printer's type (historically used for the printing of church canons), equal to 48 point (archaic).

(11) In hymnography, a kind of hymn in Eastern Orthodox Christianity

(12) In bell-founding, one or more hanging loops cast integrally with the crown.

(13) In Roman law, a rent or stipend payable at some regular time, usually annually).

(14) In cooking, the alternative spelling of cannon (rolled and filleted loin of meat).

1150-1200: In ecclesiastical use, from the Middle English canonicus (shared with French), a back formation from the Old English canōnic (one under rule), from the Medieval Latin canōnicus (of or under rule).  The word in Ancient Greek was kanōnikós from kanon (any straight rod or bar; rule; standard of excellence), possibly from kanna (reed).  As applied to the clergy, the title dates from circa 1200, from the Anglo-French canun, from the Old North French canonie (which is Modern French is chanoine), from the Church Latin canonicus (clergyman living under a rule), the noun use of the Latin adjective canonicus (according to rule).  The meaning “standard, accepted list” is from the Old English, again from the Latin, from the Greek kanōn (rule, rod for measuring, standard), related to kanna (a reed or cane) and in English, dates from circa 1400 but only in the context of the lists assembled for ecclesiastical purposes.  Canon is a noun & adjective, canonization is a noun, canonize is a verb, canonized is a verb & adjective and canonical is an adjective; the noun plural is canons.

The Latin word was taken in ecclesiastical use for "decree of the Church" and eventually this expanded into the codified "Canon Law" of the Church.  The general sense of "a rule or principle" dates from the late fourteenth century while the idea of a "standard of judging" is from circa 1600.  From circa 1400 as "The Scriptures", the word was applied to those books of the Bible accepted by the Christian church" and this later extended to secular books of admitted excellence or supremacy (an most importantly meeting the approval of the Church) and in some archives there are a number of such lists but according to Harold Bloom (1930-2019) who noted the history in The Western Canon (1994), the "...secular canon, with the word meaning a catalog of approved authors, does not actually come into use until the mid-eighteenth century."

Thou shalt not.

The canon as a "catalogue of acknowledged saints" is from 1727, reflecting the implications of the late fourteenth century verb canonize and the companion noun canonization.  To canonize was to "place officially in the canon or calendar of saints" and was from the Old French canonisier and directly from the Medieval Latin canonizare, from the Late Latin canon (church rule, catalogue of saints).  The noun canonization (act of enrolling a beatified person among the saints) was from the Medieval Latin canonizationem (nominative canonizatio), the noun of action from the past-participle stem of canonizare.  Use has varied greatly between pontificates, something explained by the power to canonize lying exclusively in the gift the pope since 1179.  The related forms are canonized, canonizing and the marvelous canonicity.  The use in music to describe "a kind of fugal composition" is from the 1590s.  In the traditional sense of the Western canon of literature, although never a fixed-set, it’s become increasingly contested, even to the point of being criticized, inter alia, by post-modernists, critical theorists, Marxists and feminists as a form of cultural imperialism.  

Lindsay Lohan's canon of film

1998 The Parent Trap

2003 Freaky Friday

2004 Confessions of a Teenage Drama Queen

2004 Mean Girls

2005 Herbie: Fully Loaded

2005 My Scene Goes Hollywood: The Movie

2006 A Prairie Home Companion

2006 Just My Luck

2006 Bobby

2006 Friendly Fire

2006 The Holiday

2007 Chapter 27

2007 Georgia Rule

2007 I Know Who Killed Me

2009 Labor Pains

2010 Machete

2011 Lindsay Lohan

2012 First Point

2013 Inappropriate Comedy

2013 Scary Movie 5

2013 The Canyons

2015 Till Human Voices Wake Us

2019 Among the Shadows (The Shadow Within in some markets)

2022 Falling for Christmas

2023 Irish Wish

2024 Our Little Secret

2025 Freakier Friday

Pope Leo’s canon of film

Coinciding with having summonsed to the Vatican a goodly number of film stars, directors, producers and such, the Holy See’s press office released the names of Leo XIV’s (b 1955; pope since 2025) four favourite movies, the pontiff himself confirming the list during an interview with Variety.

It's a Wonderful Life (1946)
The Sound of Music (1965)
Ordinary People (1980)
La Vita è Bella (Life is Beautiful (1997))

The Hollywood actors and filmmakers who enjoyed a papal audience would have learned His Holiness values movies not only for their intrinsic qualities but also for their social role, lamenting the diminishing number of neighbourhood cinemas meant many no longer enjoyed the shared experience of communal viewing.  The pope’s message was the film industry was a “workshop of hope” and a vital institution during a time of global instability and “digital overload”; while the celebrities doubtlessly enjoyed the photo-opportunity and listened politely, whether the suggestion they should “…confront violence, war, poverty and loneliness” and will “…cooperate in affirming the social and cultural value of this activity” remains to be seen.  Conclusion to be drawn from the pope’s canon of film: He wouldn’t have been much fun at parties but will go the heaven.

A romantic nihilist's canon of film

1939 Wuthering Heights

1958 Touch of Evil

1958 Vertigo

1964 Dr Strangelove

1970 Zabriskie Point

1971 A Clockwork Orange

1971 Dirty Harry

1973 The Exorcist

1979 Nosferatu the Vampyre

1986 The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

1987 Nightmare on Elm Street III

1987 Withnail and I

1990 Truly, Madly, Deeply

1991 Europa (Zentropa in the US)

1991 Delicatessen

Conclusion to be drawn from a romantic nihilist’s canon of film: Will go straight to Hell.

Stew & Casserole

Stew (pronounced stoo or styoo)

(1) A preparation usually of meat, fish, or other food cooked by stewing, especially a mixture of meat and vegetables (recipes exist for vegetarian & vegan stews).

(2) In informal use, a state of agitation, uneasiness, or worry.

(3) A term for a brothel; a whorehouse (archaic), in the collective “the stews” was a neighborhood in which there were many brothels (the red light district).

(4) A cooking vessel for boiling or stewing (obsolete since the early eighteenth century); a cauldron; still seen as a modifier (stew pot).

(5) To cook food by simmering or slow boiling; to undergo cooking by simmering or slow boiling.

(6) In informal use, to fret, worry, or fuss, often in the phrases “in a stew” or “to stew over” (synonyms include agitation, confusion, dither, flap).

(7) In informal use, to feel uncomfortable due to a hot, humid, stuffy atmosphere, as in a closed room; to swelter.

(8) A fishpond or fish-tank (often as stew-pond); (mostly archaic UK use with origins in Sussex).

(9) An artificial oyster bed (in US regional use).

In the preparation of tea, to cause the tea to become bitter by infusing or drawing for too long

(10) As a general descriptor, a mix (usually of heterogeneous objects, substances, people etc).

(11) In slang (commercial flight crew, cruise ship crews, military mess staff), a clipping of steward or stewardess.

(12) A public room for hot steam baths (obsolete).

Circa 1300:  From the Middle English stew, stue, stewen & stuwen (to take a sweat bath) and stuen (to take a very hot bath), from the Anglo-Norman estouve, from the Old & Middle French estuver (étuve in modern French), a verbal derivative of estuve (sweat room of a bath) (thought related to the Medieval Latin stupha, of uncertain origin), from the unattested Vulgar Latin extūfāre (evaporate), the construct being ex- (out of; from) + the unattested tūfus (vapour), from the Ancient Greek τῦφος (tûphos) (smoke, steam), from τύφω (túphō) (to smoke).  It was cognate with the Italian stufare, the Spanish estufar and the Portuguese estufar.  In the Old English there was stuf-bæþ (a hot-air bath, vapor bath).  Stew in the sense of fish tanks was from the Old French estui, from estoier (to shut up, confine), ultimately from the Latin studium (study).  Stew is a noun & verb, stewable is an adjective, stewed is a verb & adjective and stewing is a noun.  The noun plural is stews.

The intransitive use dates from the 1590s while the meaning "to boil slowly, to cook meat by simmering it in liquid" came into use in the early fifteenth century.  The meaning "to be left to the consequences of one's actions" is from 1650s, especially in figurative expression “to stew in one's own juices”.   The use of stewed to suggest a state of drunkenness dates from 1737.  As a noun dating from circa 1300, a stew was first a "vessel for cooking" from the verb while the meal (stewed meat with vegetables) wasn’t so described until 1756 and the coordinate terms (which emerged or were over the centuries borrowed) included brew, simmer, hash, jumble, medley, mishmash, potpourri, pottage, pot pie, stroganoff, salmagundi, casserole, hotpot (also hot-pot), hot-dish, cassoulet, goulash & ragout.  Modifiers are common (beef stew, chicken stew, Irish stew, cowboy stew, son-of-a-bitch stew, son-of-a-gun stew, hillbilly stew etc, army stew, prison stew etc).  Stews are probably among the oldest prepared & combined dishes cooked by man, the original cooking vessels including animal skulls and turtle shells.

The apparently curious use to refer to brothels dates from the mid-fourteenth century (often in the plural as stews and whole districts could be describes as “the stews” if thought to contain many brothels or be the haunt of prostitutes.  It was a carry-over of the earlier use of stew (from the Old French estuve "bath, bath house; bawdy house) to refer to a bath house (a heated room designed for public bathing) and the parallel reflected the apparently not undeserved reputation of medieval bath houses.  In late fourteenth century Middle English, Ionete-of-the-steues (Janet of the Stews) was common slang for a prostitute.  Adolf Hitler (1889-1945; Nazi head of government 1933-1945 & head of state 1934-1945) was Austrian and must have liked stew-favored idioms.  When he heard the British government had provided a security guarantee to Poland, he became enraged and shouted "I'll cook them a stew (einen Eintopf kochen) they'll choke on!"

Casserole (pronounced kas-uh-rohl)

(1) A baking dish of glass, earthenware etc, often with a cover and sometimes used also as a serving dish.

(2) Any food, usually a mixture, cooked in such a dish.

(3) To bake or cook (food) in a casserole.

(4) A small (metal, glass, carbon fibre or ceramic) dish with a handle, used in chemical laboratories.

1706: From the sixteenth century French casserole (ladle-like pan), the construct being casse (small saucepan; pan for dripping) (from the Old Provençal cassa (large spoon), akin to the Medieval Latin cattia (pan, dipper; crucible) (influenced by the Provençal caça but the ultimate source may be the ancient Greek kyathion or kuathion, a diminutive of kuathos (cup for the wine bowl) + -role (the diminutive suffix)).  Similar (and related formations include cassole (without the -er-) and casseron (using the diminutive suffix -eron, from -on).    The Middle French was casserolle.  Casserole is a noun and verb, casseroled is an adjective and casseroling a verb; the noun plural is casseroles.

The word exists in many European languages including Danish (kasserolle), German (Kasserolle), Norwegian Bokmål (kasserolle), Norwegian Nynorsk (kasserolle) & Russian (кастрю́ля (kastrjúlja)).  The word for centuries described only the cooking vessel but by the late nineteenth century (some sources say explicitly 1889 but it’s likely the oral use pre-dates this) it was applied also of the dishes cooked in one, under the influence of chefs’ jargon such as en casserole & à la casserole.  As need be, modifiers are added (tuna casserole, chicken casserole, vegetarian casserole etc).  In situations where confusion might arise, it’s recommended the meals be called “casseroles” and the cooking vessels “casserole pans”.

Lindsay Lohan cooking marshmallowed yams in casserole dish, Thanksgiving, 2013.

Stews and casseroles are frequently indistinguishable (although by tradition stews have a thicker gravy), especially when served although there are techniques in cooling which allow as chef to produce a casserole with a crusty surface whereas a stew tends to be wholly amorphous.  Both are slow-cooked, one-pot dishes, the difference being that stews are cooked on a stovetop while casseroles are oven-baked.  Chefs insist a casserole should be baked uncovered in the oven but many leave the lid on and the differences can make a difference in that in an oven, heat circulates all around whereas on a stovetop it’s applied only from the bottom.  For this reason stews are usually cooked in pots made from earthenware, cast-iron or some other material with high heat-retention properties; this will tend to equalize the temperature and when cooking a stew, it should be covered from the point when the liquid is added onto the solid ingredients and left to simmer for a few hours until the gravy thickens.  For a stew, chefs recommend frying the meat to the point of crustiness before adding other ingredients and, although the view is not universal, many suggest that if adding onions (an essential ingredient for many), they too should be pre-cooked.  With casseroles, meat may need to be pre-cooked depending on the cut.

Chickpea & Aubergine Stew

Preparation time: 15 minutes (plus overnight soaking).

Cooking time: 8-10 hours.

Serves: 4-6.

Dig out the slow cooker to make this healthy stew. Topped with toasted pine nuts and served with flatbreads, it makes a wonderfully nutritious vegan meal

Ingredients

200g dried chickpeas, soaked overnight

2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (plus extra to serve (to taste)

2 onions, finely sliced

6 garlic cloves, crushed

1 tablespoon baharat

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 small bunch of flat-leaf parsley, stalks finely chopped, leaves roughly chopped (to serve)

3 medium aubergines (eggplant), sliced into 20 mm (¾ inch) rounds

2 x 400g cans chopped tomatoes

1 lemon, juiced

50g pine nuts, toasted (to serve)

Selection of pitta breads or flatbreads, to serve (optional)

Method

(1) Drain the chickpeas and bring to the boil in a pan of salted water. Cook for 10 minutes, then drain.

(2) Heat oil in a frying pan over a medium heat and fry the onions for 10 mins, or until beginning to soften.  Stir in the garlic, baharat and cinnamon and cook for 1 minute. Tip the onion mixture into a slow cooker and add the chickpeas, parsley stalks, aubergines (eggplant), tomatoes and 2 cups of water. Season to taste.

(3) Cover and cook on high for 2 hours, then turn the heat to low and cook for 6-8 hrs more until the mixture has reduced slightly and the chickpeas and aubergines are really ten

(4) Stir in lemon juice, then scatter the pine nuts and parsley leaves.  Drizzle with olive oil and serve with pitta breads or flatbreads.

Arrow

Arrow (pronounced ar-oh)

(1) A slender, straight and usually pointed missile or weapon made to be shot from a bow and equipped with stabilizing fins (historically feathers) at the end of the shaft near the nock.

(2) Anything resembling an arrow in form, function, or character.

(3) A linear, wedge-shaped symbol used on maps, architectural drawings, engineering blueprints or any document to indicate direction or placement.

(4) In astronomy, the constellation Sagitta.

(5) In text handling and for other purposes, to indicate the proper position of an insertion by means of an arrow-like symbol (often in the form “to arrow in”).

(6) In graph theory, a directed edge (arc).

(7) In computing, the -> symbol, which has specific meanings in a number of programming languages (in Unicode, the hexadecimal range for the 112 supported arrows is 0x2190–0x21ff).

(8) In botany, the inflorescence or tassel of a mature sugar cane plant.

Pre 900: From the Middle English arewe & arwe, from the Old English arwan, from the earlier earh (oblique form ēarw-), from the Proto-Germanic arhwō, from the primitive Indo-European arku & hérkwo- (bow, arrow).  It was cognate with the Persian پيکان (paykan) (arrow), the Faroese ørv (arrow), the Old Norse & Icelandic ör (arrow) (plural örvar), the Gothic arhvazna & arhwazna; the (unattested) Germanic arhwō (feminine) and related to the Latin arcus (genitive arcūs) (bow, arc),  thus the unattested Latin arku- (bow; arch) and the unattested pre-Germanic arku-ā (belonging to the bow).  The word was rare in the Old English. The more common forms to describe an arrow were stræl (which is cognate with the word still common in Slavic and once prevalent in Germanic, related to words meaning "flash, streak") and fla & flan (the -n perhaps mistaken for a plural inflection), from the Old Norse, a North Germanic word which may originally conveyed the sense of "splinter" or “sharp pioint”.  Stræl was extinct by circa 1200; fla became flo in early Middle English and survived only in Scots dialects until the fourteenth century.  Arrow is a noun & verb, arrowing is a verb and arrowed is a verb and adjective although arrowless and arrowlike are the more common adjectival forms; the noun plural is arrows.

Lindsay Lohan in ugg boots with bow & arrow; photoshoot by Ellen Von Unwerth (b 1954) for GQ magazine's German edition, Malibu Beach, California, June 2010.

Convair B36 Peacemaker.  An incident on Valentine's Day 1950 which involved a USAF SAC Convair B-36B (44-92075) was the first (retrospectively) to be classified a "broken arrow".

The meaning in cartography and related fields (a mark like an arrow) dates from 1834.  The noun arrow-head (also arrowhead) is from the late fifteenth century but the ancient ones found buried in the soil were in the seventeenth century called elf-arrows.  The noun arrow-root (also arrowroot) dates from the 1690s, and was so named because the plant's fresh roots or tubers were used to absorb toxins from the wounds caused by poison-darts.  In US military terminology (command and control; nuclear weapons safeguards), broken arrow refers to an accidental event involving nuclear weapons, warheads or components not thought to create a risk of nuclear war.  The term had been used by the military to mean other things, some localized to specific combat theatres, but to avoid any confusion, the Pentagon in the mid-1960s standardized the nomenclature for reporting incidents involving nuclear weapons or related components.  At the time, many of the codes were based on Native American-themed phrases (Broken Arrow, Empty Quiver, Bent Spear etc), something which would not now be done.

Railton Mobil Special, powered by a pair of supercharged Napier Lion VIID (WD) broad arrow (W-12) aero-engines.  On 16 September 1947 it set the world Land Speed Record (LSR) on the Bonneville Salt Flats at 394.2 mph (634.4 km/h) in a two-way run over the measured mile (385.6 & 403.1 mph (620.6 & 648.7 km/h)).

Broad arrow internal combustion engines (ICE) are also referred to as “W engines” and have three groups of cylinders, one vertical and the two others symmetrically angled at less than 90° on either side.  The configuration has always been rare but is not new, the English Napier company building a W12 aero-engine between 1917-1935 which was such a sound design that development allowed it to enjoy an unusually long life as the most powerful engine of its era.  As well as aircraft, it was used in boats and racing cars, a pair of W12s powering the car which in 1947 set the world land speed record (LSR), a mark which stood until 1964.

1992 Mercedes-Benz 600 SEL (W140) and the conceptual sketch for the proposed broad arrow W18 intended for the hypothetical 800SEL.

In the late 1980s, Mercedes-Benz, already concerned that Jaguar & BMW had made the V12 seem a bit common, became alarmed when learning a prototype BMW V16 (code name Goldfisch) had been installed in a 7 series (E32) and was being tested.  The Mercedes engineers didn’t need a tape measure to know a V16 would be too long to fit under the hood (bonnet) of their upcoming W140 and weren’t at all attracted to the idea of lengthening the nose, knowing such a change would (1) further delay a programme already behind schedule, (2) cost a lot of money in a project already over-budget and (3) make no economic sense given the V16 would be a low-volume model.  If a V16 was too long and an H16 too complex and hard to package, the obvious solution was a broad-arrow engine which can be thought of as a flattened V12 with an additional bank of cylinders in the centre and thus a W18.  Although wider than a V12 and even a V8, the W140’s engine bay was wide and, being barely longer than a straight-6, the idea seemed compelling.

BMW 750iL (E32) fitted with prototype 6.7 litre (406 cubic inch) V16 (codename Goldfisch).  Such was the length of the V16 that the front-mounted radiator was deleted and replaced by twin units in the rear, large scoops installed above the rear wheels to direct airflow; a rear grill was fabricated for heat extraction.    

It was a time of excess and the buoyant economies on both sides of the Atlantic (and notably also in Japan) gave little hint of the troubles to follow.  The engineers decided their flagship of the 1990s would be an 800 SEL, the only discussion note being whether the internal components would be taken from the 2.6 litre (159 cubic inch) six or the 2.8 litre (171 cubic inch) unit and thus create either a 7.8 litre (476 cubic inch) W18 or one of 8.4 litres (513 cubic inch).  In a then rare example of restraint, they settled for the smaller one.  There have been suggestions the engineers thought BMW would never proceed with a V16 because of the problems in packaging and doubted their own multi-bank proposal would ever see the light of day but as a design it was hard for an engineer to resist so dutifully (and one suspects lovingly) they drew the blueprints to be presented to the board for approval.

Auto Motor magazine's sketch (2000) of a somewhat unfortunately proportioned V24 Maybach coupé (left); the circulated image of a Mercedes-Benz V24 (2 x M120 V12s) which probably always was fake news (centre) and the Maybach Exelero test-bed (2005) which made do with a V12 and followed Auto Motor's lead though with a finer sense of scale.

By the time the blueprints landed on the boardroom table it had become clear that things were changing and perhaps the 1990s might be a bit different to what had been envisaged in early 1987 when the parameters for the big W140 were laid down.  As well as the disturbing indications that the US Federal Reserve was prepared to raise interest rates to the point where the economy would go into recession in a bid finally to tame the inflation which had been building since the late 1960s, also looming were ever-stricter emission regulations.  Accordingly, the board vetoed the 800 SEL project and expressed themselves content the 6.0 litre (366 cubic inch) V12 (M120) already in development would be more than adequate for all purposes.  The board’s decision turned out to be prescient, the M120 one of the company’s best power-plants and one which was enlarged several times for specialist applications, the largest displacing 7.3 litres (445 cubic inch).

Mercedes-Benz Vision Maybach 6 Cabriolet (2017).

Since then, the trend has been towards smaller capacity engines and, as the ICE approaches, if not extinction then certainly a diminished role in land transport, there’s no longer much talk of W18s or V16s (although Bugatti in June 2024 released one while they still could).  However, in the late 1990s, the Mercedes-Benz engineers did have one final fling at multi-cylinder glory, filing conceptual drawings of a V24 (2 x M120s) which could be used under the (very long) hood of an imagined Maybach coupé.  This one circulated but they appear never to have troubled the board by seeking approval to build even a prototype although, had the circumstances been different, it might have been a nice fit for either the one-off Maybach Exelero test-bed (2005) or the Vision Maybach 6 Cabriolet (2017) which nicely captured the spirit of the pre-war 500K & 540K special roadsters.

1932 Bucciali TAV 8-32 Saoutchik Fleche d’Or (Golden Arrow).

About as incongruous in the early 1930s as the 800 SEL would have been sixty years later was the Bucciali TAV8-32.  Produced by a French concern with a history in military aviation, Bucciali manufactured automobiles between 1922-1932 and was a noted pioneer in the (still uncommon though by then not ground-breaking) concept of front-wheel drive, then known as Traction Avant (TAV), a phrase Citroën would later make famous.  Their machinery was intriguing but the crowning achievement was the eighth iteration, the TAV 8-32 and Bucciali enjoyed a successful run in 1930, France for various reasons not then greatly suffering from the depression which had already affected many countries.  The next year however the economy went rapidly into decline and like many manufacturers, Bucciali’s business became first marginal and bankruptcy soon beckoned, the company doing well to limp to an inevitable demise in 1932.

Few TAV 8-32s survive but one memorable four-door version has been on the show circuit for some time.  The 1932 TAV 8-32 Saoutchik Fleche d’Or (Golden Arrow), the name an allusion to the imagery used on the coachwork, was fitted with a stunningly sculpted, low-slung body by the French coach-builder Carrozzeria Saoutchik.  Apart from the TAV configuration which made possible the distinctive low chassis, the Fleche d’Or included other interesting features including a Voisin twelve cylinder sleeve-valve engine with four carburetors, a transverse transmission and 24 inch wheels, fabricated from steel with integral brake drums.  The distinctive stork on each side of the hood side was fabricated from German silver, phosphor bronze and gold-plated brass, the design borrowed from the insignia of the World War I (1914-1918) fighter squadron of the builder.

Bogan

Bogan (pronounced bow-ghin)

(1) A backwater, usually narrow and tranquil or sluggish.

(2) Any narrow stretch of water.

(3) In Australia and New Zealand, derogatory slang used to describe a person whose speech, clothing, attitude and behavior are considered unrefined or unsophisticated.

Circa 1991: The origin of bogan is uncertain, about the only thing on which most dictionaries agree (although none have produce anything more than anecdotal evidence) is the term may have emerged in Melbourne in the late 1970s, the earliest documented use dating from 1991.  Competing words from the same era (such as bevans, westies, chiggas (or chiggs) & booners), which tended to be regionally specific faded from use as bogan became universal, the speculation being the use on commercial television and youth-oriented FM radio accelerated the process.  There is both a Bogan River and a Bogan Shire in central New South Wales (NSW) and it’s speculated some earlier Australian slang may be the basis for the modern use.  The first recorded instance of bogan in a jocular adjectival form was in Banjo Paterson’s (1864–1941) The City of Dreadful Thirst:

We don't respect the clouds up there, they fill us with disgust,
They mostly bring a Bogan shower ⁠— three raindrops and some dust;
But each man, simultaneous-like, to each man said, 'I think
That cloud suggests it's up to us to have another drink!

The “bogan shower” was thus a poor imitation of the real thing and, presumably by extension, the later “bogan gate” described a rather rough & ready, makeshift farm gate.  From here, some etymologists suggest the idea of the bogan as something cheap, inferior and unsophisticated developed although how and why it began to gain critical mass in the 1980s remains unexplained.  It has however proved adaptable.  In one of Australia's recent spate of defenestrations, the knifed prime-minister was replaced with one a bit boganish and the prime-minister's official residence came to be referred to by some as "boganville" (a play on words referencing Bougainville Island which is (at least for now) part of Papua New Guinea (PNG)).  Mischievously, the opposition's spokesman on foreign affairs stood in parliament and asked the deposed leader (by then the foreign minister) "Will the Foreign Minister advise the House when he intends to return to Bougainville?"

The word is the Australia version of those that exist elsewhere such as Chav in England (probably derived from chavi, a Romani (Roma; Traveller; Gypsy) word for child) or Ossi (easterner) in the Fourth Reich (used in post-unification Germany as a disparaging term for those coming to the west from the former GDR (East Germany)).  Use is criticized as a form of snobbery which of course it is but a form of inverse-snobbery has emerged with bogans now self-identifying in a modern form of class-pride.  The unique aspect of boganism is that, unlike chav or other ethnic-based slurs, bogans are associated, however inaccurately in a world of cross-cutting cultures, exclusively as white and of Anglo-Saxon extraction.  This makes bogans the only societal sub-set set able to be derided, denigrated and vilified; bogans having no recourse to the formal and informal mechanisms of protection available to other (ethnic, race, gender, sexual orientation, sex etc) minorities.  Society seems to need to have one minority available for disparagement and a combination of legislation and social pressures mean all others now enjoy some sort of protection.  Others permissible targets such as fat, stupid people are not actually a separate group; such people presumed to be bogans until proven otherwise.

Winfield Blue was once really blue and advertised: 1976 (left), 1979 (centre) & 1986 (right). 

Bogan stereotypes abound and historically they had names like Todd and Chantelle, the archetypical Chantelle a sixteen year old mother of two and in some sort of relationship with a man who may be the father of at least one and while barely literate and probably unable to point to Canada on a map, is most adept with Instagram and TikTok.  Of late however, the list of possible bogan names has expanded (including a few original concoctions) and one news site identified (an apparently non-exhaustive list) the most bogan names thus far registered in 2022 which included Brexleigh, Iveigh, Juul, Kardi, Kior, Maevery, Miraccle, Resilia, Salmon & Samanda for girls while boys were blessed with Brave, Draven, Draxler, Kashdon, Knoxlee, Ledgen, Maxon, Roar, Zaiken & Zinc.  The novel names or variations in spelling of older forms is new but some cultural markers are intergenerational such as footwear (thongs if possible, Ug Boots if it’s too cold) and cigarettes, Winfield Blue (although the packaging is now plain except for the disturbing photographs of the consequences of smoking) apparently still the most popular and carried usually tucked into a t-shirt’s sleeve.  However, despite the most enduring stereotype, the mullet is no longer the default hair-style and the goatee not the inevitable beard, rat-tails and a number of closely cropped variations now common.

Bogan culture

Bogans at home.  This house will contain many big TVs.

Bogans may seem remote from the progress of civilization but there’s certainly an identifiable culture and, within their cultural specializations, there's doubtless a pecking order.  Although derided by the genteel as unsophisticated, that’s a misunderstanding because although sophistication is a hierarchal construct, there are many different sophistications, all of which enjoy their own hierarchies and while bogans may be thought to have appalling taste in most things, in aspects of life in which they’re interested (big televisions, jet-skis etc), bogans are genuine experts.

Cashed-up bogans (CUBs) at home.  This house will contain many big TVs which will be positioned by the interior decorator is a "tasteful way".

A recent phenomenon is the CUB (cashed-up bogan) which reflects the higher incomes incomes enjoyed in the last quarter-century odd by those (skilled and trained but not usually university-educated) who have benefited from the resources and construction booms.  It’s a term of both social and economic significance and refers to those who have recently and suddenly become richer yet lack the cultural and social skills to match what is typically expected of those with wealth.  In this it differs from a parvenu in that conventions of use suggest a parvenu tends to come from the middle-class and is often an employee while a CUB is quintessentially from the trades and will likely be self-employed.  Parvenu and the CUB are terms laden with the snobbery of classism.  The idea is of those newly arisen (ie the nouveau riche), especially if by some accident or luck or circumstances, being thought by those already there not worthy of their new assertion of status and despised for their attempts to persuade, the sort of people David Lloyd George (1863–1945; UK prime-minister 1916-1922), speaking of his Liberal Party colleagues, called “jumped-up grocers”.  The CUB by comparison is unaware of or indifferent to the conventions of polite society and, content with materialism, usually makes no attempt socially to climb.  That means snobs despise them for other reasons; multiple huge televisions in vulgar houses thought not tasteful, hence the view it’s just appalling for such people to have money because they have not the taste to know how it should be spent.

The highest form of bogan culture remains the burn-out, and the hotted-up Holden Commodore seems still the preferred machine.  A burn-out is achieved by applying maximum power to the rear wheels while applying the brakes on the front and object is to destroy the back tyres, preferably by reducing both to chunks of smoking rubber.  All this is achieved while travelling a very short distance, usually in somewhat irregular circles.  The burn-out’s origin is in drag-racing where it’s done (in a brief, straight-line run), to heat the tyres to the point at which they achieve maximum traction.  In such competition, the object is to attain the lowest elapsed-time to complete a quarter-mile (402.336 m) sprint from a standing start.  So in drag-racing, there’s thus a purpose whereas otherwise the burn-out is thought a display of bogan barbarism.  Polite society frowns on hobbies such as burn-outs but in fairness to bogans, some of the engineering required to produce machines with the robustness required to endure the stresses imposed is of very high quality.

While the hotted-up Commodore is the vehicle of choice, bogans not yet able to afford such a status-symbol (your actual basic bogan), will improvise.

Before the word became associated with opprobrium, Bogan was just another name to be applied to this and that and dotted around the place are many avenues so named.  Some living at these addresses are not best pleased and for some years residents of a pleasantly leafy part of Sydney’s North Shore have been lobbying their council to change their roadway’s name from Bogan Place to Rainforrest Close.  One resident noted there was also the practical benefit to de-boganizing the place given the street sign has been stolen six times in two years.  However, he added the main reason was "We're middle class people and it's got really nothing to do with who's in the street".  Presumably it’s all Audis and Lexuses there and not a hotted-up Commodore in sight.  However, others saw commercial possibilities and Forbes Shire Council changed the name of Bogan Gate Road to The Bogan Way, an initiative of the Tottenham Development Group which expects the new name to attract hordes of bogans in hotted up Commodores anxious to take selfies under the street signs, the attraction being they’ll spend time in community, spending up big on pre-mix cans of bourbon & cola and packets of Winfield Blue, thereby injecting much money into the local economy.

Bogan and Sons is a highly regarded hardware supplier (Unit 10 / 8 Chrome Street, Salisbury, Queensland 4107, Australia).