Bugger
Encyclopedia
Bugger is a slang
word used in the vernacular British English
, Australian English
, Canadian English
, New Zealand English
, South African English
, Caribbean English
, Sri Lankan English
and occasionally also in Malaysian English
and Singaporean English, and rarely American English
. It is derived from Anglo-Norman bougre, which has also given the term buggery
, a term originally used to describe either anal intercourse
by a man with a man or woman, or sexual intercourse
by either a man or a woman with an animal
. Today, the term is a general-purpose expletive
, used to imply dissatisfaction, or used to describe someone or something whose behaviour is in some way displeasing, or sexual intercourse between a man and a woman, though in general Canadian, Australian, and New Zealand English the sense of profanity
has largely disappeared; the word there now has a 'catch-all', almost humorous, quality similar to a minced oath
.
The name of the Bogomil movement was bulgarus in Latin (meaning "Bulgarian"), which included Paulicians, Cathar
s, Patarenes and Albigenses. It became boulgre, later bougre in Old French
meaning "heretic, traitor". It entered German
as Buger meaning "peasant, blockhead" (and went on to English as bugger) and the French term also entered old Italian
as buggero and Spanish
as bujarrón, both in the meaning of "sodomite", since it was supposed that heretics would approach sex (just like everything else) in an "inverse" way. The word went on towards Venetian
Italian as buzerar, meaning "to do sodomy" (the sexual acts performed by homosexuals). This word entered German again (see reborrowing
) as Buserant and went on to Hungarian
as buzeráns, becoming buzi around the 1900s, a form still in use as a sexual slur
for male homosexuals. The word also entered Swedish, through the mediation of August Strindberg
, as bög, meaning male homosexual.
However, others note that the word Bogomil and Bulgaria are not cognates - Bogomil does not come from the word Bulgaria or vice versa. Bogomil comes from the slavonic words for God and dear. While Bulgar describes the people from central Asia who conquered modern day Bulgaria.
noun
in order to imply that one is very fond of something (I'm a bugger for Welsh cake
s). It can also imply a negative tendency (He's a silly bugger for losing his keys) [i.e., He's a fool for often losing his keys].
In some English speaking communities the word has been in use traditionally without any profane connotations. For instance, within the Anglo-Indian
community in India
the word "bugger" has been in use, in an affectionate manner, to address or refer to a close friend or fellow schoolmate. In the United States it can be a rough synonym to whippersnapper as in calling a young boy a "little bugger."
In 1978 Judge Aubrey Melford Steed Stevenson famously called the British Sexual Offences Act 1967
a buggers' charter.
The Bugger Factor is another name for the phenomenon of Sod's Law
or Murphy's Law
: "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."
for 'broken', as in "This PC's buggered," "Oh no! I've buggered it up," or "It's gone to buggery."
The phrase bugger off (bug off in American English
) means to go, or run, away; when used as a command it means "go away" ["get lost" or "leave me alone"] and can be seen to be used in much the same type of relatively softly 'offensive' manner.
"I'm buggered" or "I'll be buggered" is used as a colloquial phrase in the UK (and often in New Zealand and Australia as well) to denote or feign surprise at an unexpected (or possibly unwanted) occurrence. "I'm buggered" can also be used to indicate a state of fatigue. In this latter form it found fame in New Zealand in 1956 through rugby player Peter Jones, who - in a live post-match radio interview - declared himself "absolutely buggered", a turn of phrase considered shocking at the time.
It is famously alleged that the last words of King George V
were "Bugger Bognor
", in response to a suggestion that he might recover from his illness and visit Bognor Regis. Variations on the phrase bugger it are commonly used to imply frustration, admission of defeat or the sense that something is not worth doing, as in bugger this for a lark or bugger this for a game of soldiers
.
As with most other expletives its continued use has reduced its shock value and offensiveness, to the extent the Toyota car company in Australia
and New Zealand
ran a popular series of advertisements where "Bugger!" was the only spoken word (frequently repeated) then, a censored version of the ad in which Bugger! was bleeped out as a joke against those who spoke out against the ad, claiming it was offensive. The term is generally not used in the United States
, but it is recognised, although inoffensive there. It is also used in Canada
more frequently than in the United States but with less stigma than in other parts of the world. In the pre-watershed
television version of Four Weddings and a Funeral
the opening sequence is modified from repeated exclamations of "Fuck!" by Hugh Grant
and Charlotte Coleman
when they are late for the first wedding to repeated exclamations of "Bugger!".
of Papua New Guinea
, Brokan (Torres Strait Creole) of Australia and Papua and others, meaning "broken", "hurt", "ruined", "destroyed", "tired", and so on, as in Tok Pisin "kanu i bagarap", Brokan "kenu i bagarap", "the canoe is broken" or Tok Pisin/Brokan "kaikai i bagarap", "the food is spoiled." Tok Pisisn "mi bagarap pinis" ("me bugger-up finish") means, "I am very tired," or "I am very ill", while the Brokan equivalent, "ai pinis bagarap" is more "I'm done in", "I'm finished/I've had it". The term was put to use in the album Bagarap Empires by Fred Smith
, which was made to capture the peace process in Bougainville, an island province of Papua New Guinea
; in a number of the songs he uses Melanesian pidgin
, the language used in Bougainville and elsewhere.
Common usage includes "bugger me dead" and "bugger me blind".
."
in phrases which do not actually refer literally in any sense to buggery itself, but just use the word for its informal strength of impact, e.g. Run like buggery, which is equivalent to Run like hell. but would be regarded by most listeners as more obscene.
Slang
Slang is the use of informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's language or dialect but are considered more acceptable when used socially. Slang is often to be found in areas of the lexicon that refer to things considered taboo...
word used in the vernacular British English
British English
British English, or English , is the broad term used to distinguish the forms of the English language used in the United Kingdom from forms used elsewhere...
, Australian English
Australian English
Australian English is the name given to the group of dialects spoken in Australia that form a major variety of the English language....
, Canadian English
Canadian English
Canadian English is the variety of English spoken in Canada. English is the first language, or "mother tongue", of approximately 24 million Canadians , and more than 28 million are fluent in the language...
, New Zealand English
New Zealand English
New Zealand English is the dialect of the English language used in New Zealand.The English language was established in New Zealand by colonists during the 19th century. It is one of "the newest native-speaker variet[ies] of the English language in existence, a variety which has developed and...
, South African English
South African English
The term South African English is applied to the first-language dialects of English spoken by South Africans, with the L1 English variety spoken by Zimbabweans, Zambians and Namibians, being recognised as offshoots.There is some social and regional variation within South African English...
, Caribbean English
Caribbean English
Caribbean English is a broad term for the dialects of the English language spoken in the Caribbean, most countries on the Caribbean coast of Central America, and Guyana. Caribbean English is influenced by the English-based Creole varieties spoken in the region, but they are not the same. In the...
, Sri Lankan English
Sri Lankan English
Sri Lankan English is the English language as spoken in Sri Lanka.The earliest English speakers in present-day Sri Lanka date back to the days of the British Empire, the era of Royal Navy dominance, and the British colonial presence in South Asia....
and occasionally also in Malaysian English
Malaysian English
Malaysian English , formally known as Malaysian Standard English , is a form of English used and spoken in Malaysia as a second language...
and Singaporean English, and rarely American English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
. It is derived from Anglo-Norman bougre, which has also given the term buggery
Buggery
The British English term buggery is very close in meaning to the term sodomy, and is often used interchangeably in law and popular speech. It may be, also, a specific common law offence, encompassing both sodomy and bestiality.-In law:...
, a term originally used to describe either anal intercourse
Anal sex
Anal sex is the sex act in which the penis is inserted into the anus of a sexual partner. The term can also include other sexual acts involving the anus, including pegging, anilingus , fingering, and object insertion.Common misconception describes anal sex as practiced almost exclusively by gay men...
by a man with a man or woman, or sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse
Sexual intercourse, also known as copulation or coitus, commonly refers to the act in which a male's penis enters a female's vagina for the purposes of sexual pleasure or reproduction. The entities may be of opposite sexes, or they may be hermaphroditic, as is the case with snails...
by either a man or a woman with an animal
Zoophilia
Zoophilia, from the Greek ζῷον and φιλία is the practice of sex between humans and non-human animals , or a preference or fixation on such practice...
. Today, the term is a general-purpose expletive
Expletive attributive
Expletive comes from the Latin verb explere, meaning "to fill", via expletivus, "filling out". It was introduced into English in the seventeenth century to refer to various kinds of padding—the padding out of a book with peripheral material, the addition of syllables to a line of poetry for...
, used to imply dissatisfaction, or used to describe someone or something whose behaviour is in some way displeasing, or sexual intercourse between a man and a woman, though in general Canadian, Australian, and New Zealand English the sense of profanity
Profanity
Profanity is a show of disrespect, or a desecration or debasement of someone or something. Profanity can take the form of words, expressions, gestures, or other social behaviors that are socially constructed or interpreted as insulting, rude, vulgar, obscene, desecrating, or other forms.The...
has largely disappeared; the word there now has a 'catch-all', almost humorous, quality similar to a minced oath
Minced oath
A minced oath is an expression based on a profanity or a taboo term that has been altered to reduce the objectionable characteristics.Many languages have such expressions...
.
Etymology
Etymologically, a "Bugger" was a "Bulgre" (French Bougre). Originally, it was derived from the French word "Boulgrerie" ("of Bulgaria"), meaning the medieval Bulgarian clerical sect of the Bogomils.The name of the Bogomil movement was bulgarus in Latin (meaning "Bulgarian"), which included Paulicians, Cathar
Cathar
Catharism was a name given to a Christian religious sect with dualistic and gnostic elements that appeared in the Languedoc region of France and other parts of Europe in the 11th century and flourished in the 12th and 13th centuries...
s, Patarenes and Albigenses. It became boulgre, later bougre in Old French
Old French
Old French was the Romance dialect continuum spoken in territories that span roughly the northern half of modern France and parts of modern Belgium and Switzerland from the 9th century to the 14th century...
meaning "heretic, traitor". It entered German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
as Buger meaning "peasant, blockhead" (and went on to English as bugger) and the French term also entered old Italian
Italian language
Italian is a Romance language spoken mainly in Europe: Italy, Switzerland, San Marino, Vatican City, by minorities in Malta, Monaco, Croatia, Slovenia, France, Libya, Eritrea, and Somalia, and by immigrant communities in the Americas and Australia...
as buggero and Spanish
Spanish language
Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...
as bujarrón, both in the meaning of "sodomite", since it was supposed that heretics would approach sex (just like everything else) in an "inverse" way. The word went on towards Venetian
Venice
Venice is a city in northern Italy which is renowned for the beauty of its setting, its architecture and its artworks. It is the capital of the Veneto region...
Italian as buzerar, meaning "to do sodomy" (the sexual acts performed by homosexuals). This word entered German again (see reborrowing
Reborrowing
Reborrowing is the process where a word travels from one language to another and then back to the originating language in a different form or with a different meaning.This is indicated by A→B→A, where A is the originating language....
) as Buserant and went on to Hungarian
Hungarian language
Hungarian is a Uralic language, part of the Ugric group. With some 14 million speakers, it is one of the most widely spoken non-Indo-European languages in Europe....
as buzeráns, becoming buzi around the 1900s, a form still in use as a sexual slur
Sexual slur
A sexual slur is a term of disparagement used to refer to members of a given sexual minority, gender, sex, or sexual orientation in a derogatory or pejorative manner...
for male homosexuals. The word also entered Swedish, through the mediation of August Strindberg
August Strindberg
Johan August Strindberg was a Swedish playwright, novelist, poet, essayist and painter. A prolific writer who often drew directly on his personal experience, Strindberg's career spanned four decades, during which time he wrote over 60 plays and more than 30 works of fiction, autobiography,...
, as bög, meaning male homosexual.
However, others note that the word Bogomil and Bulgaria are not cognates - Bogomil does not come from the word Bulgaria or vice versa. Bogomil comes from the slavonic words for God and dear. While Bulgar describes the people from central Asia who conquered modern day Bulgaria.
Noun
The word may be used amongst friends in an affectionate way and is used as a vernacularVernacular
A vernacular is the native language or native dialect of a specific population, as opposed to a language of wider communication that is not native to the population, such as a national language or lingua franca.- Etymology :The term is not a recent one...
noun
Noun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...
in order to imply that one is very fond of something (I'm a bugger for Welsh cake
Welsh cake
Welsh cakes are traditional Welsh snacks.The cakes are also known as bakestones within Wales because they are traditionally cooked on a bakestone , a cast iron griddle about 1.5 cm or more thick which is placed on the fire or cooker; on rare occasions, people may refer to them as griddle...
s). It can also imply a negative tendency (He's a silly bugger for losing his keys) [i.e., He's a fool for often losing his keys].
In some English speaking communities the word has been in use traditionally without any profane connotations. For instance, within the Anglo-Indian
Anglo-Indian
Anglo-Indians are people who have mixed Indian and British ancestry, or people of British descent born or living in India, now mainly historical in the latter sense. British residents in India used the term "Eurasians" for people of mixed European and Indian descent...
community in India
India
India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...
the word "bugger" has been in use, in an affectionate manner, to address or refer to a close friend or fellow schoolmate. In the United States it can be a rough synonym to whippersnapper as in calling a young boy a "little bugger."
In 1978 Judge Aubrey Melford Steed Stevenson famously called the British Sexual Offences Act 1967
Sexual Offences Act 1967
The Sexual Offences Act 1967 is an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom . It decriminalised homosexual acts in private between two men, both of whom had to have attained the age of 21. The Act applied only to England and Wales and did not cover the Merchant Navy or the Armed Forces...
a buggers' charter.
The Bugger Factor is another name for the phenomenon of Sod's Law
Sod's law
Sod's law is a name for the axiom "Anything that can go wrong, will". "Toast will always land butter side down" is often given as an example of Sod's law in action...
or Murphy's Law
Murphy's law
Murphy's law is an adage or epigram that is typically stated as: "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong". - History :The perceived perversity of the universe has long been a subject of comment, and precursors to the modern version of Murphy's law are not hard to find. Recent significant...
: "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."
Verb
As a verb, the word is (potentially accidentally) used by the British to denote sodomy. In the UK, the phrase Bugger me sideways (or a variation thereupon) can be used as an expression of surprise. It can be used as a synonymSynonym
Synonyms are different words with almost identical or similar meanings. Words that are synonyms are said to be synonymous, and the state of being a synonym is called synonymy. The word comes from Ancient Greek syn and onoma . The words car and automobile are synonyms...
for 'broken', as in "This PC's buggered," "Oh no! I've buggered it up," or "It's gone to buggery."
The phrase bugger off (bug off in American English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
) means to go, or run, away; when used as a command it means "go away" ["get lost" or "leave me alone"] and can be seen to be used in much the same type of relatively softly 'offensive' manner.
"I'm buggered" or "I'll be buggered" is used as a colloquial phrase in the UK (and often in New Zealand and Australia as well) to denote or feign surprise at an unexpected (or possibly unwanted) occurrence. "I'm buggered" can also be used to indicate a state of fatigue. In this latter form it found fame in New Zealand in 1956 through rugby player Peter Jones, who - in a live post-match radio interview - declared himself "absolutely buggered", a turn of phrase considered shocking at the time.
It is famously alleged that the last words of King George V
George V of the United Kingdom
George V was King of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions, and Emperor of India, from 6 May 1910 through the First World War until his death in 1936....
were "Bugger Bognor
Bognor Regis
Bognor Regis is a seaside resort town and civil parish in the Arun district of West Sussex, on the south coast of England. It is south-south-west of London, west of Brighton, and south-east of the city of Chichester. Other nearby towns include Littlehampton east-north-east and Selsey to the...
", in response to a suggestion that he might recover from his illness and visit Bognor Regis. Variations on the phrase bugger it are commonly used to imply frustration, admission of defeat or the sense that something is not worth doing, as in bugger this for a lark or bugger this for a game of soldiers
Tin soldier
Tin soldiers are miniature figures of toy soldiers that are extremely popular in the world of collecting. They can be bought finished or in a raw state to be hand-painted. They are generally made of pewter, tin, lead, other metals or plastic...
.
Interjection
As an interjection, "bugger" is sometimes used as an expletive or interjection.As with most other expletives its continued use has reduced its shock value and offensiveness, to the extent the Toyota car company in Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
and New Zealand
New Zealand
New Zealand is an island country in the south-western Pacific Ocean comprising two main landmasses and numerous smaller islands. The country is situated some east of Australia across the Tasman Sea, and roughly south of the Pacific island nations of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga...
ran a popular series of advertisements where "Bugger!" was the only spoken word (frequently repeated) then, a censored version of the ad in which Bugger! was bleeped out as a joke against those who spoke out against the ad, claiming it was offensive. The term is generally not used in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, but it is recognised, although inoffensive there. It is also used in Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
more frequently than in the United States but with less stigma than in other parts of the world. In the pre-watershed
Watershed (television)
In television, the term watershed denotes the time period in a television schedule during which programs with adult content can air....
television version of Four Weddings and a Funeral
Four Weddings and a Funeral
Four Weddings and a Funeral is a 1994 British comedy film directed by Mike Newell. It was the first of several films by screenwriter Richard Curtis to feature Hugh Grant...
the opening sequence is modified from repeated exclamations of "Fuck!" by Hugh Grant
Hugh Grant
Hugh John Mungo Grant is an English actor and film producer. He has received a Golden Globe Award, a BAFTA, and an Honorary César. His films have earned more than $2.4 billion from 25 theatrical releases worldwide. Grant achieved international stardom after appearing in Richard Curtis's...
and Charlotte Coleman
Charlotte Coleman
Charlotte Ninon Coleman was an English actress best known for playing Scarlett in the film Four Weddings and a Funeral , Jess in the television drama Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, and her childhood roles of Sue in Worzel Gummidge and the character Marmalade Atkins...
when they are late for the first wedding to repeated exclamations of "Bugger!".
Bagarapim
"Bagarap" (from "buggered up") is a common word in Pacific pidgins such as Tok PisinTok Pisin
Tok Pisin is a creole spoken throughout Papua New Guinea. It is an official language of Papua New Guinea and the most widely used language in that country...
of Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...
, Brokan (Torres Strait Creole) of Australia and Papua and others, meaning "broken", "hurt", "ruined", "destroyed", "tired", and so on, as in Tok Pisin "kanu i bagarap", Brokan "kenu i bagarap", "the canoe is broken" or Tok Pisin/Brokan "kaikai i bagarap", "the food is spoiled." Tok Pisisn "mi bagarap pinis" ("me bugger-up finish") means, "I am very tired," or "I am very ill", while the Brokan equivalent, "ai pinis bagarap" is more "I'm done in", "I'm finished/I've had it". The term was put to use in the album Bagarap Empires by Fred Smith
Iain Campbell Smith
Iain Campbell Smith is an Australian diplomat, singer/songwriter and comedian. He performs under the stage name Fred Smith in Australia and his full name in the United States.-Diplomatic career:...
, which was made to capture the peace process in Bougainville, an island province of Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea
Papua New Guinea , officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, is a country in Oceania, occupying the eastern half of the island of New Guinea and numerous offshore islands...
; in a number of the songs he uses Melanesian pidgin
Pidgin
A pidgin , or pidgin language, is a simplified language that develops as a means of communication between two or more groups that do not have a language in common. It is most commonly employed in situations such as trade, or where both groups speak languages different from the language of the...
, the language used in Bougainville and elsewhere.
Bugger all
Bugger all means "nothing" as in You may not like paying taxes, but there's bugger all you can do about it. See also fuck all, sweet FA, and Llareggub.Bugger me
The phrase "Bugger Me" is a slang term used to describe a situation that has either yielded an unexpected or undesirable result.Common usage includes "bugger me dead" and "bugger me blind".
Bugger's muddle
Colloquial military term for a disorderly group - either assembled without formation or in a formation that does not meet the standards of the commentator: "just form a bugger's muddle", "there's a bugger's muddle of civvies hanging around the gate", "Get that bugger's muddle of yours fallen in properly".Bugger off
The phrase "bugger off" is a slang or dismissive term meaning "leave". See also "fuck offFuck off
Fuck off may refer to:* "Fuck Off" , a notorious art exhibition which ran alongside the Shanghai Biennial Festival in 2000* Fuck Off!, a solo EP by Joseph Utsler* "Fuck off and die", a track from Backyard Babies...
."
Buggery
The word 'buggery' today also serves as a general expletive (mild, moderate or severe depending on the context and company), and can be used to replace the word 'bugger' as a simple expletive or as a simileSimile
A simile is a figure of speech that directly compares two different things, usually by employing the words "like", "as". Even though both similes and metaphors are forms of comparison, similes indirectly compare the two ideas and allow them to remain distinct in spite of their similarities, whereas...
in phrases which do not actually refer literally in any sense to buggery itself, but just use the word for its informal strength of impact, e.g. Run like buggery, which is equivalent to Run like hell. but would be regarded by most listeners as more obscene.