Dob & Snitch

Snitch (pronounced snich)

(1) To snatch or steal; pilfer.

(2) To turn informer; tattle.

(3) Among the criminal classes, a slang term for the nose.

(4) A tiny morsel of food (rare).

(5) A ball used in the fictional sport of Quidditch.

1785: The sense of “an informer" was probably from underworld slang meaning "the nose", a use dating from circa 1700, apparently a development of the earlier (1670s) meaning "fillip on the nose"; snitcher in same sense is from 1827.  The alternative etymology suggests a dialectal variant of sneak, perhaps even an imperfect echoic.  Sneak was from the Middle English sniken, from the Old English snīcan (to creep; to crawl).  The meaning "to steal, to pilfer" is attested from 1904 and is possibly a variant of snatch.

The nouns snitcher and snitch are synonymous with informer, other synonyms being blabbermouth, double-crosser, turncoat, sneak, squealer, source, fink, stoolie, betrayer, tattler, snitcher, tattletale, informant, rat, weasel, narc, whistle-blower, tipster, canary & nark although some are more weighted than others in the ways they’re used by the criminal classes.

Dob (pronounced dob)

(1) As the acronym DOB (DoB; D.O.B. etc), date of birth.

(2) In Australian slang, usually as “dob in”, to snitch or inform on someone.

(3) An acronym for many things: Date of Business; Department of Banking; Difficulty of Breathing; Data Object et al.

(4) In Northern Irish slang, to play truant from school.

(5) As dob (do one’s best), the accessory term to dib (from dyb (do your best)) in some of the rituals of the Boy Scout movement.

1950s: The etymology of dob as Australian slang for “to inform upon”; “to report someone’s transgression to the authorities”, is mysterious.  Unlike many forms, it seems to have emerged late, the fist known instance in print being from 1955.  It’s curious because the British dialect dob (to put down an article heavily or clumsily; to throw down; to throw stones at a mark) would doubtless have been known in Australia from the earliest days of white settlement (1788-on) but there’s no obvious connection.  Dictionaries of Australian slang do report other meanings including “to contribute money to a common cause”, and “impose upon someone a responsibility to perform and unwanted or unpopular task”, the former with some relation to the British forms, the latter something of a variation on “dobbing in” in its usual sense.  Also noted is the use in Australian Rules (VFL, ALF etc) football to mean “to kick (the ball) long and accurately; to kick (a goal)”, again with some relation to the British dialectical form relating to the throwing stones or certain actions in the game of marbles.

Lindsay Lohan, DoB: 2 July 1986.

The etymology of dob in Australia is regarded as unknown.  That dob (meaning a snitch) appears not to have been in use until the 1950s suggests many of the influences on the language which can account for some evolutions or innovations (US English, exposure to foreign languages during wartime) weren’t involved.  Nor was that other profound effect: television, which wasn’t introduced until 1956.  The 1950s was a time of high immigration to Australia, and for the first time by a large number of those for who English wasn’t their first language but no evidence of a connection has ever been offered.  That leaves the British dialectal dob as the likely origin and during the second half of the nineteenth century, the influence of these words on the local dialect was at its greatest so all that is needed to explain it is the etymological missing link.  The was also a historic use for dob as a companion word to dib (the phonetic form of the acronym DYB (do your best)), dob in this context standing for “do one’s best”, the abbreviated dib and dob used in certain chants in the rituals of the Boy Scout movement.  Once seen as an admirable institution to inculcate the values essentials in the development of youth, decades of scandal and critical analysis mean it’s now thought something between quaint and seriously weird.

Dobbed in, Tony Abbott (b 1957; Prime-Minister of Australia 2013-2015), Manly Beach, Sydney, September 2021.

Mr Abbott was fined Aus$500 after a member of the public informed the police, providing photographic evidence as proof of him out and about in public without a mask, in violation of the rules.  Denying guilt, Mr Abbott claimed he was "well within the law, reasonably interpreted”, although he wasn't going to challenge the fine, not wishing to "waste police time".  He further added he thought the current regime "rather oppressive”.  While not greatly inconvenienced by the Aus$500 fine, Mr Abbott was concerned at the corrosive effect of the laws, saying that he "...never thought dobbing and snitching was part of the Australian character", and that he thought "...as soon as we can leave this health-police state mindset behind us, the better for everyone.”  Even before falling victim to snitchers and dobbers, Mr Abbott had delivered a speech in which he said there were "...aspects of contemporary Australia, which I personally find a little bit unsettling", noting especially "...the readiness of people to dob and snitch on their neighbours worries me a lot, frankly.”  He thought this something like the behavior of those in the former GDR (German Democratic Republic, the old East Germany) who dobbed in fellow citizens to the Stasi, the secret police.

As a victim of the fascist-pig state, Mr Abbott resorted to the dissident's trick of tautology to emphasise his point, "snitch" and "dob" in this context meaning the same thing.  There may be some nuances in that "snitch" probably more overtly reeks of criminality but technically, certainly regarding those reported for flouting public-health regulations, the words are synonymous.  It's not known how many informers the NSW Minister of Heath recruited to his mask-Stasi to dob and snitch on the unmasked but if Mr Abbott is right and it’s something like the Stasi, on the basis of estimates of those used in the GDR, in a state with the population of New South Wales, the number could have been anything between 250,000 and a million.

Dissidents conspire.

Fellow dissident, former deputy prime- minister Barnaby Joyce (b 1967, thrice deputy PM (between various unpleasantnesses) 2016-2022)) was in June fined Aus$200 after he was dobbed-in when masklessly buying fossil-fuel at an Armidale petrol station.  Unlike Mr Abbott, Mr Joyce admitted he was guilty as sin and copped it sweet.

Sneaker

Sneaker (pronounced snee-ker)

(1) A high or low shoe, notionally intended to be worn when playing sport or other recreational activities, usually with a rubber or synthetic sole and uppers of canvas, leather or a synthetic material (sold as “a pair of sneakers”).

(2) One who sneaks; a “sneak”.

(3) A vessel of drink (a now archaic UK dialect form).

(4) A large cup (or small basin) with a saucer and cover (Indian English, now largely archaic).

(5) In biology, as “sneaker male”, a male animal which pretends to be a female to get close to a female, thereby increasing their chance of mating.

(6) In marine hydrology, disproportionately large coastal waves which can without warning appear in a wave train.

1550s: The construct was sneak + -er.  The origin of sneak is uncertain.  It may be from the thirteenth century Middle English sniken (to creep, to crawl), from the Old English snīcan (to creep, to crawl), from the Proto-West Germanic snīkan, from the Proto-Germanic sneikanan or snīkaną (“to creep, to crawl”) which is related to the root of both snail & snake.  Similar forms include the Danish snige (to sneak), the Swedish snika (to sneak, hanker after) and the Icelandic sníkja (to sneak, hanker after).   Alternatively, there may be a link with snitch, also of uncertain origin.  Snitch may be an alteration of the Middle English snacche (a trap, snare) or snacchen (to seize (prey)), the source of the modern English snatch.  A parallel evolution in Middle English was snik & snak (a sudden blow, snap).

The alternative etymology is as a dialectal variant of sneak.  The noun emerged in the 1590s as a development of the verb (as implied in “sneakish” in the sense of “creep or steal about privately; move or go in a stealthy, slinking way” and most etymologists have concluded it was probably a dialectal survivor from the Middle English sniken from the Old English snican, from the Proto-Germanic sneikanan.  The –er suffix was from the Middle English –er & -ere, from the Old English -ere, from the Proto-Germanic -ārijaz, thought most likely to have been borrowed from the Latin –ārius where, as a suffix, it was used to form adjectives from nouns or numerals.  In English, the –er suffix, when added to a verb, created an agent noun: the person or thing that doing the action indicated by the root verb.   The use in English was reinforced by the synonymous but unrelated Old French –or & -eor (the Anglo-Norman variant -our), from the Latin -ātor & -tor, from the primitive Indo-European -tōr.  When appended to a noun, it created the noun denoting an occupation or describing the person whose occupation is the noun.  Sneaker is a noun; the noun plural is sneakers.

Reader's Digest published a number of maps illustrating regional variations in the way things are described in the US.  While they didn't seem to indicate there was a costal v flyover linguistic divide, the Mason-Dixon line did seem to have some influence and there was something of an east-west divide.  One outlier however was "sneakers" which was found predominately to be prevalent only around the north & south Atlantic coasts, the rest of the country preferring "tennis shoes" while there were pockets in the Mid-West where "gym shoes" had traction.  The publication noted their map represented only the dominant form and that all forms (and other) could be found throughout the land.

According to Google Trends, in on-line shopping, while the numbers bounce around, they do so within a range and "sneakers" remains statistically dominant.

The noun sense of sneak as “a sneaking person; person of selfish and cowardly temper and conduct” dates from the 1640s a development from the verb; by 1700 it was used to describe “the act or practice of sneaking”.  The transitive sense of “stealthily to insert” was known by the mid-seventeenth century while that of “partake of or get surreptitiously” dates from 1883.  The phrase “to sneak up (on someone or something)” was in use by 1869.  As an adjective (in reference to feelings, suspicions etc) it was used in the sense of “not openly vowed, undemonstrative” from 1748 while the “sneak-thief” (one who enters through unsecured doors and windows to steal) was first so describe in 1859.  “Sneak previews” were originals viewings of movies held before their public release for friendly critics and others likely to provide helpful publicity, the phrase first used in 1938.

Nike Dunk SB Low Freddy Kruger (US$30,000), a tribute to the villain (or hero; opinions differ) in the Nightmare on Elm Street films, the Nike swoosh a nice allusion to the blades in the famous gloves.

The noun use of sneaker to describe certain rubber-soled shoes was in use by at least 1895 and thus (even if tangentially) linked to the use in the 1590s sense of “a sneak; one who sneaks around”).  The use for shoes was of course based on rubber-soled shoes being essentially noiseless in contrast to those which leather soles which were usually fitted with protective metal heel & toe plates to reduce wear.  A slang term for any soft-soled (usually rubber) shoe was “brothel creeper”, based on the idea that men who frequented such places preferred to do so silently so as not to be conspicuous.  The original term was actually “sneak”, first documented in accounts of prison life in 1862 as prisoners’ slang for both the wardens who at night wore “India-rubber shoes” and the shoes themselves.  The same issue was noted by the Nazi war criminals held in Spandau Prison between 1947-1987.  The prisoners had complained the heavy boots worn by the guards disturbed them but when the authorities issued rubber-soled footwear they found it harder to undertake un-noticed their many surreptitious activities.

There are a number of alternative names for the shoes.  Some are obvious such as “basketball shoes” or “tennis shoes” and “sports shoe” is a classic generic but plimsole has also endured in some places.  That was based on the “Plimlsoll Line” (originally Plimsoll’s Mark) which was a line painted on the hull of British ships to mark the point the waterline was allowed to reach before the vessel was declared overloaded.  It was named after English Liberal MP Samuel Plimsoll (1824-1898), a strident advocate of shipping reforms (many of which were codified in the Merchant Shipping Act (1876) including the “Plimsoll mark”).  Plimsoll came into use in 1907 to refer to rubber-soled, canvas shoe because the band around the shoes holding together the two parts evoked an image of the line on ships.  The spelling quickly shifted to “plimsole” because of the sound association between “soll” and “sole”.  An earlier form was “tacky” (also as “tackie”) which was probably of Dutch or Afrikaans origin, or else from tacky (slightly sticky), a quality associated with rubber, especially before the introduction of vulcanization.  In South Africa, tacky is used not only of rubber-soled shoes but also of car type and often other things made from rubber.

Lindsay Logan, nueva embajadora de Allbirds (the new Allbirds ambassador), possibly on a Wednesday.

In 2022, Allbirds appointed Lindsay Lohan as an ambassador for its "Unexpected Athlete" campaign, focusing on her for the new limited edition of its most successful sneakers (they seem to prefer "running shoe") to date, the Tree Flyer.  The promotional video issued for the announcement was nicely scripted, beginning with Ms Lohan’s perhaps superfluous admission that as an ambassador for running “I am a little unexpected" before working in a few references to her career in film (showing again a rare sense of comedic timing), fondness for peanut butter cookies and the odd social media faux-pas, many of which she's over the years embraced.  The feature shoe is the "Lux Pink" which includes no plastics.  As a well-known car driver and frequent flyer who has for years lived in an air-conditioned cocoon in Dubai, it’s not clear how far up the chart of conspicuous consumption Ms Lohan has stamped her environmental footprint but US-based footwear and apparel company Allbirds claims its design, production & distribution processes are designed to make its products as eco-friendly as possible.  It is a certified “B Corporation”, a system of private certification of for-profit companies of their "social and environmental performance" conferred by B Lab, a non-profit organization which aims to provide consumers with a reliable way to distinguish the genuinely environmentally active from those which cynically “greenwash”.

Lindsay Lohan, Allbirds “Unexpected Athlete Ambassador”.

They’re known also as “gym shoes”, “leisure shoes”, “sandshoes”, “kicks”, “trainers”, “training shoes” and running shoes and in Australia, until the 1990s, one big-selling (and still manufactured) model (the Dunlop Volley) almost universally known as “the Dunlop” and shoe shops do document the difference between “basketball shoes” and “basketball boots”, the latter with an upper built higher to afford greater protection for the ankles.  Interestingly, sneakers (however described) have become something of a cult and many expensive variations are available although analysts see to believe much of the price-tag is can be attributed to profit rather than development or production costs and, like the luxury handbag market, there are claims of “limited availability” and “restricted customer list” but most conclude that usually the only “limit” is demand although some genuine short production runs have been verified, usually for promotional purposes.  They’ve become also an item frequently stolen and among certain demographics, being assaulted so one’s sneakers can be stolen is a not uncommon experience.  Somewhat related to that cultural phenomenon has been the emergence of an after-market for “collectable” or “vintage” sneakers never to be worn and preferably still in their original packaging.  The record price paid at auction is apparently US$2.2 million but some new sneakers associated with celebrities list at as much as US$25,000, intended presumably endlessly to be traded as collectables rather than worn, much in the manner of some of the rarest exotic cars which even the manufacturers admit are produced for just that market.