Neil Serven:A listener named Allen writes that he is curious about words that become associated with a particular region. And Allen is thinking, in particular, about the word wicked. It's used as an adverb in New England. He cites L.L.Bean, the outdoor company, advertises something called "wicked good slippers." In this usage, Allen notes, it means "extremely," extremely good slippers. He asks, "Is this more recent than its more common meaning of evil or fierce? And how prevalent is this sort of usage need to be to get in the dictionary as a definition?"Well, first of all, I want to say that Allen has lobbed me one that's right in my wheelhouse. Because this is a word that was very common to my vocabulary growing up, because I grew up in New England. I grew up north of Boston. I used wicked as an adverb all the time. "That was a wicked cool show I saw." "That was a wicked hard test that teacher just gave us."
Neil Serven:Wicked smaht. And so, this is very common to me, and it's something that I grew up using all the time. And I think there's even an added wrinkle, in that Alan notes when he cites the wicked good slippers is that this is a term that has actually become a signifier of New England parlance. When you use it, you're trying to identify yourself as someone who lives in New England or is associated with New England a lot. There's wicked good slippers. In the movie Good Will Hunting, which is set at MIT, one of the character's friends, talking about Matt Damon's character says, "My boy's wicked smart." It's not only as a signifier of where he's growing up, it's a signifier of the kind of friends he has, the ones that are not using academic speak around him. They're just talking as they talk.
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Neil Serven:In this case, one of the theories behind this word, and maybe a pretty good theory, when you think that wicked being associated with New England, New England's also home of the Salem witch trials. And so when you associate wicked, you think of fairy tales, you think of evil, of stepmothers and witches and curses and all that. So to then have that word, associated with that locality, then be used in this show-offy way, kind of way that is meant to be for something impressive. It's almost as though you're using this reference to curse the way we use swear words sometimes, but maybe not quite as a swear. We're co-opting this word that we associate with evil to then use for something impressive.
Neil Serven:We do. Allen touches upon a broader question, which is about regional uses. And wicked is definitely associated with New England so much, that when it's used adverbially outside of New England, and almost gets noticed as something that any New Englander might not think is even correct. When you go around New England, you see things advertised as being wicked awesome. There's a network of news publications called Wicked Local that's associated with each town.In Salem, there's actually a bookstore called Wicked Good Books. Obviously, that they're making this coy allusion to this association of wicked with New England. And so you think of other uses that might be so pinned to a location. There aren't many, but one that comes up is hella, which we associate with the West Coast in the same way, it's adverbial. It means "very or extremely"... That ride was hella-
Once upon a time, there was an Ogre (Mike Myers) whose swamp got overrun by intruders from fairy tales and Disney movies, including Pinocchio, three little pigs, and a big, bad wolf. All are refugees from the kingdom of the wicked Lord Farquaad (John Lithgow). With the help of an articulate donkey (Eddie Murphy), Shrek sets things right and, along the way, wins the love of Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz), who has a secret but endearing flaw. Computer animation with great humor and, even rarer, heart, makes it a great cartoon movie for family night. 2ff7e9595c
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