Back when I was in elementary and middle school, being a nerd was a bad thing.
Being a nerd meant you were one of those kids who sat in the corner and played games on your calculator. Being a nerd meant wearing sweatpants and T-shirts, dragging a rolling backpack behind you. Being a nerd meant you had no social skills whatsoever but employed a deep knowledge of intellectual understanding instead.
I remember hearing kids talk about the nerds and how weird they were and how nobody liked them. I was terrified of being labeled as a nerd. Luckily, my high school was an art school, so I was free to frolic through the Meadows of Artistic Nerdiness without a Bullying Storm O’ Doom to ruin my days.
And upon leaving my safe haven of art nerds and entering a community of 20,000-plus individuals where you have to carefully craft a personality to stand out from the crowd, all of my nerdy endeavors have suddenly started to bubble to the surface, just so I can be a little different. Now, as I spend my days in the EMU Fishbowl, pretending to study and actually being a huge voyeur, I’ve noticed the abundance of nerds who have come out to shine unashamedly in their nerdy glory, and I commend them.
The history of the word “nerd” is a mysterious one. There are contradicting stories about its origins and original definitions. It seems to have always been a synonym for “square” or “drip,” but it eventually evolved into a label for that awkwardly smart kid who can’t carry on a normal conversation without referencing something obscurely technological.
The word “nerd” was first seen by the public back in 1950, in a Dr. Seuss story called “If I Ran the Zoo.” It was about a little boy named Gerald McGrew who had unique ideas about how he’d travel around the world and bring back Elephant-Cats and other exotic animals. At one point he exclaims, “I’ll sail to Ka-Troo/ and bring back an It-Kutch, a Preep and a Proo/ a Nerkle, a Nerd and a Seersucker, too!”It is unclear whether this is just a coincidence, or whether people really did take this word and give it new meaning.
From there it is seen sporadically around the world — in a Scottish newspaper column, which defined “nerd” as a synonym for “square,” or in a 1951 Newsweek article, again being called a synonym for “square” or “drip.” Some nerd experts say the original spelling was actually “knurd,” which is “drunk” spelled backwards, because knurds were the lame kids who didn’t drink.
These days, “nerd” is officially defined as an “unstylish, unattractive or socially inept person; especially: one slavishly devoted to intellectual or academic pursuits,” according to theMerriam-Webster Dictionary.
When I see that negative definition of the word “nerd,” I couldn’t agree less. In my eyes and brain, a nerd is a really awesomely smart person who is an expert in a particular field, and if you’re any kind of lucky, you are friends with this person. The “particular field” can range anywhere from deep, intimate knowledge of things like comic books, Magic, Dungeons & Dragons or Pokemon, to things like physics, math, language or history.
Sometimes it’s all of the above, and more.
I especially like one of Urban Dictionary’s definitions: “a person who does not conform to society’s beliefs that all people should follow trends and do what their peers do. Often highly intelligent but socially rejected because of their obsession with a given subject, usually computers.”
I was inspired by a quote I read one day while trolling the popular blogging website Tumblr. It was credited to the New York Times bestselling author John Green (Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns, among others). He says that nerds “are allowed to love stuff, like, jump-up-and-down-can’t-control-yourself love it,” and “When people call people nerds, mostly what they’re saying is ‘you like stuff,’ which is not a good insult at all.” And of course, my favorite line is, “Like, ‘You are too enthusiastic about the miracle of human consciousness.’”
The trueness of this statement is what hit me the most. I never really thought I fit the label of “nerd” before I read this quote.
Now, I know better. I love stuff. I can talk about science for three hours straight; I get really excited when I see the word “dinosaur;” and I can have a long, in-depth conversation about the BBC show “Doctor Who” and not suffer any qualms whatsoever.
So this is my message for the nerds out there: You’re cool. Being a nerd these days means being ironically cool, intelligent and just a little eccentric.
The knowledge you employ or whatever it is you get excited about, whether it’s Harry Potter, computers, or the weather patterns of subtropical jungles, is something to be immensely proud of.
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