Dictionary of Contemporary Slang (64 page)

fry
vb American

a.
to execute someone by electrocution in the electric chair

b.
to punish or chastise someone. A college students' and armed-forces recruits' term, used in such expressions as ‘he got fried' or ‘they fried her ass'.

FTR
phrase

‘for the record'. This abbreviation is usually written, e.g. in text messages or online, rather than spoken.

fubar
n

a spectacular instance of incompetence, a hopeless mess. The term originated as an acronym standing for ‘fucked up' or ‘fouled up beyond all recognition'. It probably originated in armed-forces usage like the similar
snafu
and is now heard particularly in US campus and office speech.

fuck
¹
vb

1.
to have sex with. The most commonly used ‘four-letter' word, used intransitively (‘let's fuck') and transitively (‘he fucked her/him'); now also used of women (‘she fucked him/her'). Surprisingly, the age and origins of this word are obscure. It may not be Anglo-Saxon as is often supposed (it was not recorded in writing until the 16th century) and does not occur in Chaucer and Shakespeare, but may have been borrowed from Norse (
fukkar
in Norwegian,
fockar
in Swedish). Wherever and whenever the word entered English, it is undoubtedly related to a pattern of words in Indo-European languages which give, among many others, the Latin
pungere
(meaning to prick), the German
ficken
(meaning to fuck or strike) and the French
foutre
(meaning to fuck). The common semantic feature of these words is that they all contain the meanings strike, push or prick.

Fuck has always been a taboo word in all English-speaking countries and is still omitted from broadcasts and generally asterisked if written in the press. In the late 20th century the verb often had the more specialised sense of ‘habitually copulate' or ‘be sexually willing' as in ‘does she fuck?'.

2.
to make a mess of, destroy. A 1980s shortening of
fuck up
with slightly more emphatic or drastic connotations.

They fucked the experiment totally.

3.
to damn or disregard

‘Fuck art, let's dance!'
(T-shirt slogan of the 1970s)

fuck
²
n

a.
an act of sexual intercourse. The noun postdates the verb by at least three hundred years.

b.
a person when evaluated as a sexual partner
a good fuck/an easy fuck

c.
a person, especially when viewed as a fool, victim, villain, etc.

The poor dumb fuck didn't have a chance.

fuck-a-duck!
exclamation

a virtually meaningless expression of surprise or disbelief

fuck-all
n British

nothing or almost nothing. An emphatic vulgarism.

‘He walked away with two hundred thousand and I got fuck-all.'
(Recorded, businessman, London, 1987)

fuck around/about
vb

to play the fool, behave irresponsibly or irresolutely

OK, let's stop fucking around and get down to work.

fucked
adj

a.
(of things) ruined, destroyed, rendered useless

This typewriter is completely fucked.

b.
(of people) completely exhausted, beaten or at a loss

I'm feeling fucked.

fucked-up
adj

a.
(of things or situations) in a mess, destroyed, spoilt or ruined. Originally the expression meant seduced and abandoned.

b.
(of people) psychologically disturbed, traumatised

‘Sadowitz will soon revert to being the fucked-up nonentity he must have been before people like you started dressing him up in the Emperor's New Clothes.'
(Letter to
Time Out
, December 1987)

c.
(of people) temporarily deranged by drugs or drink (not necessarily a negative term)

I got really fucked-up on that dope.

fucker
n

a person. The word does not invariably imply dislike or contempt, although it may.

The poor fucker never stood a chance.

See also
motherfucker

fuckhead
n

a stupid or unpleasant person. A term of abuse popular since the 1980s and usually applied to males.

fucking
adj

an intensifier used with other adjectives for emphasis. Like
bloody
it is also one of the very few examples of an ‘infix' (a word component inserted before the stressed syllable in the middle of a polysyllabic word) in English.

Jesus, it's fucking cold in here.
Abso-fucking-lutely!

fuck-me shoes
n pl

provocative female footwear. This obscure term received extensive publicity at the end of 1995 when the former feminist writer Germaine Greer accused the
Guardian
columnist Suzanne Moore of betraying feminist principles by wearing ‘fuck-me shoes' among other items. The phrase probably originated in American usage but may be a confusion with ‘fuckyou shoes', implying a disregard for convention or propriety, or ‘fuck-off shoes', where fuck-off means both outsize and aggressive.

fucknuckle
n

a term of abuse, used of males. The second component is included merely for the purpose of reduplication of sound and signifies nothing.

fuck off
vb

to leave, go away. A vulgarism that is used in regular verb forms and as an interjection.

Why don't you just fuck off!

fuckoff
n American

a useless, hopeless or idle person

fuck-off money
n

funds with which to escape, retire, etc.

fuck (someone) over
vb

to humiliate, discomfit, distress or destroy someone or something

‘Once the income tax guys get their hands on you they can really fuck you over.'
(Recorded, self-employed male, London, 1988)

fuckpig
n

a very unpleasant, worthless or contemptible person. It has been part of the London working-class slang repertoire since the 19th century.

fucktard
n

a despicable person. The word, originally an Americanism but used recently in the UK, too, blends
fucking
and
retard
(or, perhaps, as understood in the UK,
bastard
). A Dr S. C. Martin posted it online as an example of British medical slang in December 2007, defining it as ‘Any manager in the NHS'.

fuck-ton
n American

a huge amount.

Compare
ass-load(s)
;
shitload

fuck truck
n

another term for
passion wagon

fuck up
vb

1.
to make a mess of things, commit a serious error or blunder

Don't tell me, you've fucked up yet again.

2.
See
snafu

3.
also
fuck (someone) up
to create an emotional disturbance (in someone), traumatise

‘They fuck you up, your mum and dad.'
(Philip Larkin,
This be the Verse
)

fuck-up
n

a.
a disaster, blunder, error or failure

b.
a bungler or blunderer

c.
someone who is emotionally or psychologically disturbed

fuckwit
n

an idiot, a halfwit. An Australianism which has caught on in British use since the late 1970s. It usually expresses exasperated contempt.

The guy's a complete fuckwit.

fudge
n British

a very stupid person indeed. Teenage users commented that these letters are likely to represent the GCSE grades achieved by the pupil in question.

fudge-nudger
n British

a male homosexual. The term was one of many synonyms based on the notion of excrement (others include
turd burglar, chutney-ferret
and
jobbie-jabber
), denoting ‘active' or ‘predatory' homosexuality, heard since the 1990s.

fudgepacker
n British

a homosexual. A derisive late 1980s term employing fudge as an image for excrement and equating homosexuality with buggery, on the same pattern as
brownie-hound
,
chocolate bandit
, etc.

fudge-tunnel
n British

the anus. The vulgar euphemism was adopted as the name of a British
grunge
band in the early 1990s.

fudi
n

vagina. The jocular nickname or disguising form is a version of the Asian
phudi
, although users of the word in the UK and US may not realise this.

fufu
n

the vagina. The term has been recorded in the USA and UK since 2000. It may originate as, or imitate, baby talk.

fuggin'
adj

a euphemism for
fucking

fugly
adj American

ugly, repellent. Although the word, which is popular in campus speech, is blended from ‘fucking ugly', it is generally milder than its components imply.

God, that's some fugly dog she's got.

full (as a boot/bull/bull's bum)
adj Australian

drunk. Full or ‘full as a tick' were euphemisms for drunk in Britain in the 19th century, but are now obsolete. Earlier Australianisms on the same pattern were ‘full as an egg' and ‘full as a goat'.

full as a state school
adj Australian

drunk. A more recent variation of expressions based on the notion of full (of drink), heard during the late 1980s, but perhaps older.

full monty, the
n British

all that is desired and/or required. The previously obscure phrase suddenly became extremely popular in 1990 and 1991 and many derivations were proposed, ranging from a nickname given to inhabitants of the Potteries region of England to a comment on the quality of the wartime briefings given by the British General Montgomery in North Africa. In fact, the most likely explanation of the phrase is that it is a piece of gamblers'
jargon meaning the entire kitty or necessary ‘pot' to be bet, from the Spanish
monte
(mountain). In the US ‘monte' was adopted as the name of a risky card game, while in Australian horseracing circles ‘monty' used to mean an accurate tip or certain bet.

‘We had starters, main course, wine, you name it – the full monty…'
(Recorded, financial consultant, London, May 1993)

full-on
adj
,
adv British

exciting, powerful, with maximum effort. The expression is used in the same way as the colloquial ‘all-out'.

funbag
n

a.
a woman, particularly an attractive woman or a potential sexual partner

b.
American
a prostitute, in 1980s police jargon

funbags
n pl Australian

female breasts. A vulgar term from the 1960s inspired by children's ‘lucky dip' sweet packets on the same lines as
mystery bags
.

fundage
n

money. One of many formations using
-age
for mock pomposity. This example was not confined to North America and was recorded among British students in the 1990s.

fundamental
adj American

excellent. A fashionable usage, often in the form of an exclamation, among adolescents from the early 1990s.

funk
n

1a.
heavily rhythmic, ‘earthy' music, particularly soul or disco music. A term applied to varieties of urban black music since the 1950s.

1b.
an authentic feeling, earthiness, a quality of unsophisticated, raw vitality. The noun form is a back-formation from the adjective
funky
.

2.
British
cowardice, fearfulness, a fit of panic. A word which is quite unrelated to the musical sense. Funk here comes from the Flemish
fonck
, meaning worry or agitation. (A blue funk is a state of extreme fear.) It has been in use since the 18th century.

3.
British
skunk
marihuana. The term has been in use since around 2000.

funky
adj

1a.
earthy, raw in the style of
funk
music (characteristically having heavy rhythm and bass and simple repeated melodies). This term, applied to urban soul-music which contained elements of African, jazz, blues and rock music, has been heard since the 1950s.

1b.
vital, raw, energetic in an unsophisticated way. A term of approval applied to people, objects, ideas, etc. by extension from the musical sense.