Whether you’re staunchly anti-swearing, like George Washington, or unapologetically foul-mouthed, like Mel Brooks, you can’t deny that curse words are a significant part of human communication. So let’s put our knee-jerk reactions aside, don our lab coats and look at the phenomenon of swear words with calm, scientific detachment.
“The foolish and wicked practice of profane cursing and swearing is a vice so mean and low that every person of sense and character detests and despises it.”
— George Washington
“I’ve been accused of vulgarity. I say that’s bullshit.”
— Mel Brooks
Be warned: This article features enough curse words to merit an R rating. You can’t make an omelette without cracking some goddamn eggs!
What Makes Curse Words Bad?
“Dirty” Words
For a word to qualify as a swear word, it must have the potential to offend, crossing a cultural line into taboo territory. As a general rule, swear words originate from taboo subjects. This is pretty logical. The topic is off-limits, so the related words aren’t meant to be spoken either. Certain topics are almost universally taboo — death, disease, excrement. You know, icky stuff. Sex is another classic taboo, as the English “fuck,” Italian fanculo and Russian блядь illustrate.
Preferred themes for profanity can also reflect differences among cultures. Germans are pretty relaxed about sex and nudity, so they rarely use sexually-themed curse words. These words are uttered so rarely that they still have the power to make people cringe. As a result, ficken sounds way dirtier and meaner to most German speakers than the word “fuck” sounds to most English speakers. German swearing parlance keeps things down-to-earth and poop-oriented with Kacke!, Mist! and the world-famous Scheiße! — which is used so often that it’s become as harmless as “darn it.”
Context
But subject matter isn’t the only criteria for curse words: context also plays a big role. Sex might be a taboo subject, but not in a gynecologist’s office. Try insulting someone using medical terms, and your victim will probably just be confused: “Did you just call me a reproductive organ head?” Among friends, you might curse quite casually and jokingly, but the same words would come across as terribly insulting during a job interview.
Blasphemy
High and holy things taken out of context create another category of curse words: blasphemy. For example, “God,” “hell” and “Jesus Christ” are inoffensive in the context of a sermon, but can be cutting when shouted in anger. So-called “liturgical swearing” is taken to rarified heights by French Canadians. A properly angry Quebecer can unleash a real scorcher like, Criss de calice de tabarnak d’osti de sacrament!, which translates literally to “Christ of the chalice of the tabernacle of the host of the sacrament!” This might sound tame in English, but it’s the French-Canadian equivalent of a hail of F-bombs.
The Power Of #&@%!
Like antibiotics, curse words can lose their power with overuse. Cable TV liberally douses American living rooms with as many “goddamns,” “shits,” “cocksuckers” and “motherfuckers” as Tony Soprano and Al Swearengen can string together. So, did those words make you cringe, or have you been watching too much TV?
It’s hard to say whether the increase of cursing on TV reflected an increase in cursing among average Americans, or whether TV “corrupted” how Americans speak. Regardless, the result is the same: more Americans are becoming inoculated against these words — perhaps even to the point of immunity. Taboos change, and so swearing must too.
Some taboos disappear — “damn” doesn’t carry the fire and brimstone heft of damnation that it once did — while social changes can bring about new taboos. Before the civil rights movement in the United States, derogatory epithets describing one’s race, creed or sexual orientation were used by all sorts of regular folks who didn’t consider for a second that they were being prejudiced. Today, these words are most certainly taboo. But negative epithets aren’t always pulled out of circulation. They can take 180 degree turns when they are reappropriated within marginalized groups: the “N-word” is an obvious example, but less charged examples include “queer” or even “nerd.”
@babbelSwearing might be frowned upon, but sometimes a well-placed curse word can perfectly express how you’re feeling, in any language 🙊 #linguistics #language #vocabulary #edutok
Why Do We Swear?
“Under certain circumstances, profanity provides a relief denied even to prayer.”
—Mark Twain
1. Catharsis
Most of the time, swearing is an emotive reaction. When we’re frustrated, surprised or angry, cursing offers an emotional release. Experiments have even shown that swearing increases the body’s ability to endure pain. To test this, researchers at Keele University in the United Kingdom had volunteers hold their hand in icy water for as long as they could stand it. They found that participants were able to hold their hand there for 40 seconds longer, on average, when they repeated a swear word, and they also attested to a lower level of perceived pain when doing so.
2. Insult, Abuse And Exclusion
Curse words are not needed to insult someone — a simple “you’re ugly” usually gets the point across — but they do crank up the mean factor. They also act as rage concentrate: why explain to your neighbor that you hate him when “fuck you” puts that gosh darn son-of-a-gun in his place with only two words?
Note: If you curse at people who can’t hear you (commuters in their cars, athletes on TV), you’re just letting off steam, which belongs to the previous category.
3. Group Solidarity
Among friends, swearing has a crucial social function: sharing a lexicon of words and breaking societal taboos is a form of bonding. Ritual insults among friends are not abusive, but actually a sign of belonging to the group. In this context, “fuckface,” “dickhead,” “bitch” and “asshole” can all be terms of endearment. People tend to curse more in same-sex groups of peers and when the atmosphere is relaxed. People swear the least when things are really tense.
4. Style & Emphasis
As any stand-up comedian can tell you, swear words are powerful tools. More often than not, a well-placed “fuck!” is the alchemical ingredient that turns lead into comedy gold. You can’t make a statement any more emphatic than by dropping an F-bomb where a more timid and prudent soul would use a boring old adverb. Swear words add emotion and urgency to otherwise neutral sentences.
Why Do Curse Words Capture Our Attention?
As far as your brain is concerned, swear words aren’t even words — they are concentrated lumps of emotion. They are even stored in a completely different part of the brain from every other word we know! Formal language is stored in the Broca’s and Wernicke’s areas in the brain. Curse words, however, are stored in the limbic system — a complex system of neural networks that control emotions and drives.
This is why one patient who suffered from severe aphasia (damage to the language center in his brain after a stroke) could still say “well,” “yeah,” “yes,” “no,” “goddammit” and “shit” — even though he had otherwise lost all faculties of speech. He could even produce these words in the appropriate context, but when asked by researchers to read them off a page, he was unable to do so.
This neurological insight helps explain why every effort to eradicate swearing throughout history has failed. Banning words that are actually linked to emotions is just as impossible as banning the emotions themselves. Knowing human nature, that will never fucking work.