NERD

noun (People and Society) (Youth Culture) In US slang: a contemptible or boring person, especially one who is studious, conventional, or 'square'; a dweeb. Etymology: Of uncertain origin: possibly a euphemistic alteration of turd, but perhaps simply an allusion to a nonsense word used in Dr Seuss's children's book If I Ran the Zoo (1950): And then, just to show them, I'll sail to Ka-Troo And Bring Back an It-Kutch, a Preep and a Proo, a Nerkle, a Nerd, and a Seersucker, too! History and Usage: Nerd itself has been in use in US slang since the sixties, but enjoyed a fashion in the late seventies and early eighties which led to the development of a number of derivatives and compounds. Notable among these are the adjectives nerdish, nerdlike, and nerdy and the nouns nerdishness and nerdism. The nerd affects a fussy, conventional (and, some would say, pretentious) style of dress and appearance which became known as the nerd look; the quintessential characteristic of the nerd, a plastic pocket protector worn in the top pocket to prevent pens from soiling the fabric, was nicknamed the nerd pack. The word nerd had supposedly gone out of fashion by the late eighties in favour of dweeb and other synonyms, but it and its derivatives had by then already spread to the UK and continued to appear frequently in print, even in US sources, into the early nineties. A British variation on the same theme is nerk, a stupid or objectionable person (probably formed by telescoping nerd and jerk to make a blend); the corresponding adjective is nerkish. To make the simplest and most effective statement of your nerdishness, all you need to do is go out and buy a bra. Not the kind associated with women, but the black, oozy, plastic kind that dimwits put on the front of their cars. The auto bra is at its nerdish best when used on cars costing less than ø10,000. Car & Driver Oct. 1989, p. 3 Cedrico and Angelita...would call them aunt and uncle if they didn't consider such titles nerdy. Alice Walker Temple of My Familiar (1989), p. 395 Most people think of BBSs as crude hacker forums where computer nerds trade tips on how to pirate software or break into the Pentagon's computers. Computer Buyer's Guide 1990, part 3, p. 34 Nerdpacks are for engineers and computer programmers who have earned their status as nerds, or compulsive-obsessive gadget freaks. Michael Johnson Business Buzzwords (1990), p. 97