The origins of "meh" are murky, but the term grew in popularity after being used in a 2001 episode of "The Simpsons" in which Homer suggests a day trip to his children Bart and Lisa.Now if we can only get some love for "stilo," "dunnie," and "weak-sauce."
"They both just reply 'meh' and keep watching TV," said Cormac McKeown, head of content at Collins Dictionaries.
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Doesn't "meh" first appear in The Simpsons in the fourth season episode "Homer's Triple Bypass"? (c. 1992)
* Bart: Nothing you say can upset us. We're the MTV generation.
* Lisa: We feel neither highs or lows.
* Homer: Really? What's it like?
* Lisa: Meh.
Linguistically, it's just a creep of the bilabial "m" into the dismissive interjection "ehh." Like you can't even be bothered to totally open your mouth.
Stilo:
You know the stilo when the Diggy-Dawg is on the scene,
I dedicate this to all the MC's outta Queens.
That goes for Onyx, LL, Run DMC;
Akinyele, Nasty Nas, and the Extra P.
Dunnie was coined by Mobb Deep. I saw an interview on MTV years ago where Havoc explained how there was a retarded kid on their block that use to say 'What up son', but when it came out, it was 'What up dun'.
So Mobb ran with it, and apparently the rest of Queens did too.
As for dunny, someone once told me there was ONE dude (yeah, urban legend alert) in New York somewhere who had a propensity to substitute "D" for "S." Ergo, "dun," "dunny," "dolo," "delf."
And apparently around '92 or '93 he met Q-Tip, Nas and Method Man, leading to the usages in "Award Tour," "Represent" and "Release Yo Delf" (respectively). And that mystery Dolo Dunny Dude fought E-40 in issue #147 for the King of Slang belt.
OK, Neville remembers that story better than I did. That's what I heard.
I like the sound of "weak-sauce," but I think that particular niche has been taken up by the far more established "thin gruel." Pick your poison, as it were.
Benjamin Zimmer on Language Log has a pretty extensive discussion of meh, including uses on The Simpsons, and its extension meh-ness.
Wow. I totally thought it was a Jewish/NY thing. Like "not so much" - wait, is "not so much" also from the Simpsons or something?
I was certain that my fellow Coates fans would know that this was not the first instance of the use of "meh" in the Simpsons.
I'm still waiting for a correction in Time, Mr. Coates, on your mis-spelling of Azeroth in your article "Confessions of a 30-Year-Old Gamer."
Bleh. What about the origins of ROFLcopter? How about RARWasorus? TNC, weak-sauce is cool, but what about leet-sauce? I got some leet-sauce...
Ima j4x up some nebs with my leet h4x to teh m4x biatch! (This was me circa 2000...).
I used to say "meh" all the time, not sure of where I'd gotten it. I've started using "guh" more frequently these days. As for "weak sauce," I thought that was already fully embraced. It certainly has been by me and mine, at least. Also, "fuck that noise." One I'm sure isn't used by anyone but myself and a friend is, "What's up with those birds?" That one was gotten from a 2nd grader's photo caption entry, which I saw while working in my university's art museum. My friend and I use it for, "What's that all about?" It's infinitely more fun to say.
Oh, that reminds me ... I'd like to know the origins of "blerg." I started saying it about three years ago and now it's on 30 Rock all the time. What's up with those birds?
Damn, I'm with Phoebe. Thought it was a yiddishism.
"Fuck that noise," or more precisely, "fuck this noise" was said by Jake Blues (Ackroyd) when he finally decides to get away from the nun who's smacking hell out of him with a stick.
It might originally have been a yiddishism, since Matt Groening used other yiddishisms like "feh" back in his "Life in Hell" cartoons pre-Simpsons.
First time I ever heard "weak sause" was a baseball player's insult of an opposing pitcher's fastball. "That's some weak sause the dude was throwing." Doubt that qualified as etymology, but hey, maybe it'll lead to someone doing some research my lazy ass ain't doin.
BTW TNC, re: a post a couple weeks ago: Giants could be on their way to their 4th. "Worthy of hate" then?
'Dunny' is also Australian slang for toilet (or as you guys insist on calling it, 'bathroom').
Notice the gratuitous slander of Canada:
The dictionary defines "meh" as an expression of indifference or boredom, or an adjective meaning mediocre or boring. Examples given by the dictionary include "the Canadian election was so meh."
Good grief ...
Re: "Not so much."
I think this particular NYC/Jewish expression hit the maintstream with the sitcom Mad About You. All the characters, even Helent Hunt (to channel another sitcom: could she **be** any more WASP?) used it a lot.
You know I thought Bugs Bunny used "meh" but I guess not. At least when I saw it on "The Simpsons" it didn't really seem new to me. (Although possibly it's because it's sort-of a variation on "feh")
"Weak-sauce" is better than "thin gruel" because Jonah Goldberg uses the latter profusely, because it is faux-literate imagery, the currency of lazy pundits.
I do, though, support hyphen removal: "weak sauce" could then be further modified as needed.
oh, I think weak-sauce is much, much better than thin gruel. See, I take it like this: it's a type of sauce. "Thin" is not a type of gruel. But when you put "weak-sauce" on something, it weakens it all up. It's like "powerful-potion" would make things powerful. Or "awesome-sauce" would awesome things up quite a bit. It's sauce with weakening power, and I just love the inherent contradiction in that.