shit

I. n

a.

excrement. This word of Anglo-Saxon origin has parallels in other Germanic languages (e.g. in modern German Scheisse). It derives from an ancient common verb, imitative of the sound of defecation.

In English shit is now a mild vulgarism, although in rustic speech it has been the standard term for centuries.

b.

an act of defecation, usually in phrases such as 'have/take a shit'

c.

a contemptible person. This usage conveys real dislike or disapproval and has been common, particularly in upper-and middle-class speech in Britain since the 1920s.

► 'Tiny 19-year-old Mark Aldrich beat up two youths who called him "a little shit" -but the comment "could be appropriate" a judge said yesterday.' (Daily Mirror, 10 September 1988)

d.

an illicit drug, especially hashish. In the 1950s heroin users referred to their drug as shit; by the mid-1960s the word usually designated hashish (which is characteristically brown) or marihuana.

When used in this context the word is synonymous with 'stuff' and carries virtually no pejorative overtones.

► Hey, this is excellent shit, man. 'P.S. I cannot get any shit, my friends have split to other lands, they are free.' (Reader's letter in Oz magazine, February 1970)

e.

rubbish, something worthless or inferior

f.

nonsense, lies or deceitful talk. This is a specific use of shit as something worth-less, or simply a shortening of bullshit.

► Come on, don't give me that shit, I wasn't born yesterday.

g.

unnecessarily hostile behaviour or ill-treatment

► 'I'm definitely not going to take any more shit from any of them.' (Recorded, disgruntled office worker, London, 2005)

II. vb

1.

to defecate. The verb probably pre-dates the noun form. Both seem to have existed in Old English, deriving from a common Germanic ancestor, itself cog-nate with the Greek skat- (later giving 'scatological'). Used intransitively the verb is now probably rarer than phrases such as 'have a shit'. (The usual past form in British English is 'shat', in Ameri-can 'shit'.)

2a.

to deceive, bamboozle, confuse (someone)

2b.

to browbeat or annoy (someone) These transitive usages may originate as short forms of the verb bullshit, but have taken on separate identities as a designa-tion, usually in American speech, of time-wasting or harassment by lies or deceit.

III. adj

1.

awful, inferior. A simple transference of the noun form, popular especially in British youth parlance of the 1980s.

► a shit record

2.

American

excellent, admirable. In the hip language of the street, of rap and hip hop practitioners and their teenage imitators, shit has been used with this unexpected sense. The probable explanation is that it is a shortening of shit-hot.