crunk

[Jonathan Lighter]

Our knowledge of the original usage of "krunk/ crunk" places a special burden on us to use the word correctly, _i.e._,  solely as "a swear word...so new that no one knows how vile and filthy it really is."

  And Grant, won't you help us protect the precision of our English language by restricting the use of "half-assed" to describe persons having but one buttox?

  JL

Grant Barrett <gbarrett at WORLDNEWYORK.ORG> wrote:
  ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Grant Barrett
Subject: Re: crunk
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The preferred spelling of the word by the Conan O'Brien crowd is
"krunk," at least judging by the crowd at alt.fan.conan-obrien and
similar newsgroups. Through February 1995 I find only 10 "crunks" in
association with his name in Google Groups. For the same period I find
248 "krunks." One of the earliest uses, for what it's worth, is
someone correcting "crunk" to "krunk":

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.fan.conan-obrien/msg/172612612b4ef06a

I looked into the Conan connection in 2004 when I did an entry for
"crunk," though it probably needs revisiting. I found that "Krunk" is
a multipurpose curse word created by the Conan O'Brien writers. I
found no connection to "crunk" and did not put it in an editorial
note, but instead replied to comments about Conan. (This was when I
had yet to learn that the public will suggest any half-assed theory
each time you talk about the history of a word.)

http://dtww.org/index.php/dictionary/crunk/

Grant Barrett
Double-Tongued Dictionary
http://www.doubletongued.org/
editor at doubletongued.org

On Feb 12, 2008, at 20:17, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

> If you don't know what "crunk" means, you gotta be over thirty or at
> least closin' in!
>
> Here's an interesting historical quote that may or may not mean
> squat.. I found it on a scrawled slip of paper I was about to ditch:
>
> 1994 Conan O'Brien on _Showbiz Today_ (CNN-TV) (Apr. 4): Use our
> new swear word "crunk" ! It's so new that no one knows how vile
> and filthy it really is!
>
> Go for it.
>
> JL
>
>
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