History of Bad Language: Profanity Part II

Profanity and spoken indecencies have existed since the birth of language. Across history and cultures, gestures, phrases, and single words have stirred controversy. Even today, such "bad language" is under continual scrutiny for censorship by governments and groups. Most would agree that they themselves, or other people in general, only utter expletives under extreme circumstances, e.g., pain, surprise, fear, anger, etc. Others use curse words as part of everyday speech, which may be common practice in the region they live or environment they work.

In America these word battles rage on, but there is absolutely no reason to fear or abhor the use of said "foul language." Since when have certain words risen through the ranks to become taboo? Where did they originate? Have their meanings changed and evolved over time? To demonstrate the importance of why people need not fear the use and tolerance of such words, this short series aims to examine the etymology (history and origin of words) of bad language.

In this second installment, the word s - - t will be examined, its true origin revealed, and the many phrases that have spawned from the word will also be covered. (For the remainder of this article, in order to adhere to the submission guidelines of AC, the word s- - t will be written as such with censoring dashes.)

First, let's cover some uncontroversial ground. To understand how the word has changed, the denotations of the word itself should be reviewed. Here is the modern dictionary definition of the word s - -t: