geek

geek, a word used to describe a person who is socially awkward and unpopular, usually because of the person’s perceived intelligence. This definition entered the modern American lexicon in the mid-20th century and is used somewhat interchangeably with the term nerd. However, geek also has a more positive connotation as a person who has a particular interest in or expert knowledge of a certain field, especially technology.

Origin

The first known appearance in print of the word geek is found in Capt. John Harland’s A Glossary of Words Used in Swaledale, Yorkshire (1873), where it is listed as “Gawk, Geek, Gowk, or Gowky, a fool; a person uncultivated; a dupe.” Despite these origins in a British source, geek is primarily used in American slang, according to The Oxford English Dictionary (OED). However, the etymology for geek is believed to be the Dutch word gek or the Middle or Low German word geck, both meaning “fool.” Geck found its way into English by the 1500s; it appears in William Shakespeare’s play Twelfth Night (c. 1600–02), where it also means “fool.”

Circus and carnival associations

In the United States in the early 20th century, geek primarily referred to a circus or carnival performer who would bite the heads off of live animals (often a chicken or a snake) to shock an audience. This very particular usage was further popularized by William Lindsay Gresham’s mesmerizingly lurid novel Nightmare Alley (1946), which centers on a scheming carnival worker and begins with the sentence, “Stan Carlisle stood well back from the entrance of the canvas enclosure, under the blaze of a naked light bulb, and watched the geek.” As the geek prepares to bite the head off of a snake, a carnival barker tells the crowd, “My friends, in this enclosure you will see one of the unexplained mysteries of the universe. Is he man or is he beast?” Indeed, given that the carnival geek act required little skill beyond carnivorous ferocity (and perhaps, as Gresham portrayed it, desperation), geeks were considered the lowest of the social outcasts who typically worked carnival and circus sideshows.

“Classy” Freddie Blassie and “pencil neck geeks”

About the same time that Gresham’s novel was published, the phrase pencil neck geek was coined by a professional wrestling heel (i.e., villain) named “Classy” Freddie Blassie, who had started his career working carnivals in the 1930s. In his autobiography (ghostwritten by Keith Elliot Greenberg), Listen, You Pencil Neck Geeks (2003), Blassie describes this moment of invention, which occurred after another carnival employee advised him to check out the geek’s act: “I told him, ‘Did you see what that guy looks like? He’s got a neck like a stack of dimes. He’s what you call a real pencil neck geek.’ And that’s how my most famous catchphrase originated.”

Blassie developed a cult following among wrestling fans and won the World Wrestling Association heavyweight championship in 1961. He gave colorful interviews on television, during which he would disparage other wrestlers as “pencil neck geeks.” In 1974 he retired as a wrestler, though he continued to work in wrestling as a manager of such stars as Hulk Hogan and Jesse Ventura. In 1977 Blassie recorded a hit novelty song titled “Pencil Neck Geek.” Some historians credit the song and Blassie’s usage of the term in general with having helped to shift the meaning of the term geek from a carnival worker to a socially awkward person.

Mid-century shift in meaning

Some evidence that the term had begun to change in meaning by the mid-20th century is found in letters between Beat Generation novelist Jack Kerouac and his friend, the poet Allen Ginsberg. In 1957 Kerouac complained to Ginsberg about “eager students and big geek questions” at a lecture he had given at Brooklyn College. Kerouac’s use signifies that the word no longer referred exclusively to an unskilled outcast or a circus act but had also come to mean someone who was both socially inept and “brainy” or intelligent.

Rise of the computer geeks

By the 1980s geek was most often used to describe a person who was more interested in new technology than in socializing. In the 1990s the word exploded in popular usage with the rise of personal computers. By this time it had begun to lose some of its negative connotation as so-called “computer geeks” were able to capitalize on novel markets and earn respect. Influential (and incredibly wealthy) people such as Microsoft cofounder Bill Gates and Apple impresario Steve Jobs were being referred to as geeks, but in a way that acknowledged their impressive technical skills and business savvy in a field that was transforming many industries. Meanwhile, the lingo of computer hackers had entered the mainstream and provided a new definition of the phrase geek out, which had previously meant “to lose one’s nerve” or to bite the head off an animal in a circus. Now geeking out signified the act of engaging in a complex technical discussion or task to the point of obsession.

Geeks versus nerds

By the late 20th and early 21st centuries some people had begun to make distinctions between geek and nerd, with the former being applied to those whose eclectic interests and enthusiasm are “more community-oriented” and “fannish,” and the latter referring to those whose knowledge is more technical and has less to do with popular culture. These distinctions between the two words have been hotly debated, however. Either way, both geek and nerd have become more positive in usage.

(Read Britannica’s essay “The Bizarre Origins of the Words Nerd and Geek.”)

Geek culture

The modern geek has often appeared as a major character in many television shows and films, such as Sixteen Candles (1984), Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985), Family Matters (1989–98), The IT Crowd (2006–13) and The Big Bang Theory (2007–19). Some experts have even argued that “geek culture,” formerly defined as outside conventional trends, has become the mainstream. Formerly geeky interests such as comic books, science fiction, and fantasy have been turned into multimillion-dollar movie franchises. In the early 2010s geek chic, the name for a style often characterized by heavy-rimmed glasses and humorous T-shirts that proudly self-identify the wearer as a geek or “dork,” was added to the OED. Such developments suggest that while being called a geek can still be an insult, for many people geekdom is a badge of honor.