shitgibbon

English

Etymology

• (insult): Shitgibbon compound of shit +‎ gibbon. Coined by journalist David Quantick in British music magazine NME in January 1990.
• (linguistics): Coined by linguist Taylor Jones in a blog post from February 2017 (see quote), which followed an earlier blog post by linguist Ben Zimmer about the insult's origin and linguistic qualities. The posts were written shortly after the prominent use of shitgibbon as an insult by politician Daylin Leach on Twitter directed at then-US president Donald Trump. Leach's tweet may have been inspired by a similar 2016 viral tweet by user @MetalOllie, who also directed the term at Trump.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /ˈʃɪtɡɪbən/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

Examples (linguistics)
cockwomble douchecanoe fucknugget shitgibbon more at Category:English shitgibbons

shitgibbon (plural shitgibbons)

2. (slang, humorous, vulgar) A contemptible person.

   Synonyms: see Thesaurus:jerk

   • 1990 January 13, David Quantick, Steven Wells, “Ride the Puffin”, in New Musical Express‎^[5], archived from the original on 2017-02-13, page 28:

     ’Tis the Mozzer and Mark E Smith! Yes, in the year 2000, Sir Morrissey del Manc and Shitgibbon Smith will be tired old buckers, fit for the scrapheap ever since some student NME reader got to see their poetry part of the English GCSE and finished so-called “serious rock” for, in the words of Alice Cooper, “EVAH!”

   • 2000 March 21, EvilJam32, “Re: Shall I film the Hip in London 8th June?”, in alt.music.tragically-hip‎^[6] (Usenet), retrieved 2016-08-12, message-ID <20000321082112.00798.00000750@ng-fl1.aol.com>:

     Good luck and goodbye to the most sick-making,hypocritical bunch of shitgibbons i've yet encountered on the Web!

   • 2000 November 28, Master8 uk, “Re: MORRISSEY- "Battersea Park" 1997 VIDEO!”, in alt.music.morrissey‎^[7] (Usenet), retrieved 2016-08-12, message-ID <20001128140501.06012.00002242@ng-ck1.aol.com>:

     get the f*ck off this newsgroup,shitgibbon!!

   • 2001 September 26, Master8 uk, “Re: good trader: LIVIDZ”, in alt.music.bootlegs‎^[8] (Usenet), retrieved 2016-08-12, message-ID <20010926142505.23968.00000849@mb-ms.aol.com>:

     So they should be,when he's the feller "what" films them.If you want cheap then feel free to buy from any one of 10,000 shitgibbons out there "who film from their computer keyboards" (as it were) thereby saving so much $$,that they can cut you a GREAT deal for a 4th gen mastepiece!

   • 2018, Sara Wylde, Truth Or Dare, Sara Wylde, →ISBN, page 3:

     Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. In short, don't be a shitgibbon.

   • 2018 November 2, Pronouns‎^[9], ContraPoints (actor):

     And of course, cis people, you legally have the freedom to refuse to do that, but if you refuse you are being a shitgibbon.

   • 2019, Laura Legge, Cala, Head of Zeus Ltd., →ISBN, page 147:

     They were riled that they couldn't get a rise from him. Witless fucking cocksplat. Shitgibbon.

4. (linguistics) A type of compound word used as an insult, consisting of a single-syllable expletive, followed by an absurd or innocuous two-syllable noun that usually forms a trochee.
   • 2017 February 9, Taylor Jones, “Linguists have been discussing "shit gibbon." I argue it's not entirely about gibbons.”, in languagejones.com‎^[10], archived from the original on 2017-02-16:

     How to make a shitgibbon in two easy steps

   • [2017 February 13, Gretchen McCulloch, “The orgin and constraints of “shitgibbon” compounds”, in All Things Linguistic‎^[11], archived from the original on 2022-10-24:

     At any rate, since this now seems to be an active area of linguistics research, I think we need a name for this construction. I'm going to propose "shitgibbon compounds".]

   • 2017 February 16, Daniel Midgley, danielmidgley.com‎^[12], archived from the original on 2018-01-05:

     For this post, I’m showing the frequency of many possible shitgibbon compounds, measured in raw Google hits, as a way of getting an idea of their popularity. […] Per Zimmer, each of these shitgibbons start with a monosyllabic sweary word, and the other two syllables are a trochee; a two-syllable word with the stress on the first syllable.

   • 2018, Anne-Michelle Tessier, Michael Becker, “Vowel but not consonant identity and the very informal English lexicon”, in Proceedings of the 2017 Annual Meeting on Phonology, →DOI, page 3:

     Participants judged shitgibbons with matching vowels as more satisfying (2.79 vs. 2.49) and funnier (2.80 vs. 2.46) than shitgibbons without matching vowels, while the effect of matching consonants was minuscule – less than a hundredth of a point on either of the 1–5 scales.

   • 2019 August 1, @ampepers, Twitter‎^[13], archived from the original on 2022-07-22:

     At @GalaxyKate’s challenge I have made a bot that generates shitgibbon compounds - @shitgibbon_bot. Check it out if you find that amusing, though warning, it is by definition explitive-ridden 😅