Cunt: A Cultural History of the C-Word The c-word, 'cunt', is perhaps the most offensive word in the English language, and consequently it has never been researched in depth. Hugh Rawson's Dictionary Of Invective contains the most detailed study of what he calls 'The most heavily tabooed of all English words' (1989), though his article is only five pages long. Cunt: A Cultural History Of The C-Word is therefore intended as the first comprehensive analysis of this ancient and powerful word. 'Cunt' has been succinctly defined as 'the bottom half of a woman or a very despicable person' (Pentti Olli, 1999). According to Francis Grose's scurrilous definition, it is 'a nasty name for a nasty thing' (1796).
'Cunt' is a synonym for 'vagina', though this is only its most familiar meaning. As a noun, 'cunt' has numerous other senses: a woman (viewed as a sexual object), sexual intercourse, a (foolish) person, an infuriating device, an ironically affectionate term of address, the mouth as a sexual organ, the anus as a sexual organ, the buttocks, prostitution, a vein used for drug-injection, a synonym for 'damn', an attractive woman, an object or place, the essence of someone, and a difficult task. Lightroom 5 Crack Mac Francais.
It can also be used as an adjective (to describe a foolish person), a verb (meaning both to physically abuse someone and to call a woman a cunt), and an exclamation (to signify frustration). Despite its semantic flexibility, however, 'cunt' remains our highest linguistic taboo: 'It has yet, if ever, to return to grace' (Jonathon Green, 2010). 'Cunt' is a short, monosyllabic word, though its brevity is deceptive. The word's etymology is surprisingly complex and contentious. Like many swear words, it has been incorrectly dismissed as merely Anglo-Saxon slang: 'friend, heed this warning, beware the affront Of aping a Saxon: don't call it a cunt!' In fact, the origins of 'cunt' can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European 'cu', one of the oldest word-sounds in recorded language.
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'Cu' is an expression quintessentially associated with femininity, and forms the basis of 'cow', 'queen', and 'cunt'. Manual For Optoelectronics Xplorer on this page. The c-word's second most significant influence is the Latin term 'cuneus', meaning 'wedge'.
The Old Dutch 'kunte' provides the plosive final consonant. The Oxford English Dictionary clarifies the word's commonest contexts as the two-fold 'female external genital organs' and 'term of vulgar abuse' (RW Burchfield, 1972). At the heart of this incongruity is our culture's negative attitude towards femininity.
'Cunt' is a primary example of the multitude of tabooed words and phrases relating to female sexuality, and of the misogyny inherent in sexual discourse. Kate Millett sums up the word's uniquely despised status: 'Somehow every indignity the female suffers ultimately comes to be symbolized in a sexuality that is held to be her responsibility, her shame [.] It can be summarized in one four-letter word. And the word is not fuck, it's cunt. Our self-contempt originates in this: in knowing we are cunt' (1973). When used in a reductive, abusive context, female genital terms such as 'cunt' are notably more offensive than male equivalents such as 'dick'. This linguistic inequality is mirrored by a cultural imbalance that sees images of the vagina obliterated from contemporary visual culture: 'The vagina, according to many feminist writers, is so taboo as to be virtually invisible in Western culture' (Lynn Holden, 2000).