Faggot
Faggot, often shortened to fag in American usage, is a term, usually considered a slur, used to refer to gay men.[1][2] In American youth culture around the turn of the 21st century, its meaning extended as a broader reaching insult more related to masculinity and group power structure.[3]
For other uses, see Faggot (disambiguation).The usage of fag and faggot has spread from the United States to varying extents elsewhere in the English-speaking world (especially the UK) through mass culture, including film, music, and the internet.
Etymology
The first recorded use of faggot as a pejorative term for gay men was in the 1914 A Vocabulary of Criminal Slang, while the shortened form fag first appeared in 1923 in The Hobo by Nels Anderson.[4]: 301 Its immediate origin is unclear, but it is based on the word for "bundle of sticks", ultimately derived, via Old French, Italian and Vulgar Latin, from Latin fascis.[5][6]
The word faggot has been used in English since the late 16th century as an abusive term for women, particularly old women,[6] and reference to homosexuality may derive from this,[5][7] as female terms are often used with reference to homosexual or effeminate men (cf. nancy, sissy, queen). The application of the term to old women is possibly a shortening of the term "faggot-gatherer", applied in the 19th century to people, especially older widows, who made a meager living by gathering and selling firewood.[7] It may also derive from the sense of "something awkward to be carried" (compare the use of the word baggage as a pejorative term for old people in general).[5]
An alternative possibility is that the word is connected with the practice of fagging in British public schools, in which younger boys performed (potentially sexual) duties for older boys, although the word faggot was never used in this context, only fag. There is a reference to the word faggot being used in 17th-century Britain to refer to a "man hired into military service simply to fill out the ranks at muster", but there is no known connection with the word's modern usage.[5]
The Yiddish word faygele, lit. "little bird", itself a pejorative term for a gay man, has been claimed by some to be related to the American usage. 'Faygele' (pronounced 'Faiggelleh') is the nickname for a young girl named Faigie ("bird") after Moses' wife Zipporah (Hebrew: "bird"). The similarity between the two words makes it possible that it might at least have had a reinforcing effect.[5][7]
There is an urban legend, called an "oft-reprinted assertion" by Douglas R. Harper, creator of the Online Etymology Dictionary, that the modern slang meaning developed from the standard meaning of faggot as "bundle of sticks for burning" with regard to burning at the stake. This is unsubstantiated; the emergence of the slang term in 20th-century American English is unrelated to historical death penalties for homosexuality.[5]