Ok, that last one isn't true, but I will do my best to assuage your curiosity on the previous counts. As I have mentioned before, my roommate Allison is one of my best friends and a person I consider a member of my family. She and I were randomly assigned roommates in the Honors dorm at UF our freshman year, and we've been living together, thick as thieves ever since then (going on three years, woo hoo!)
The Shakespeare socks are from the internet (where else?) and of course, you may have my autograph, preferably on the frontispiece of my Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, release date TBD.
But Anna, I can hear you asking, what about the most important question, the one which holds the key to all the mysteries of life: why did you make this video in the first place? Patience, young padawans. You will learn when you are ready.
As I have mentioned before, I am taking a one credit (fun credit, really) class called Talk Nerdy to Me, and our first project was to make a vlog about when we became a nerd. Blessed with both beauty and talent, not to mention excellent chemistry, Allison and I decided to make this video together, little knowing what a hit it would be.
Fast forward a bit and you'll find me today in the midst of a conversation with my friend Sean about what it means to be a nerd, specifically as distinct from being a geek or a dork.
Like any word nerd worth her salt, I decided to begin by looking it up in the Oxford English Dictionary, which defines a nerd as "An insignificant or contemptible person, one who is conventional, affected, or studious; a 'square,' a 'swot.'" The first recorded incidence of the word "nerd" was in the 1950 picture book If I Ran the Zoo by Dr. Seuss, who wrote, "And then, just to show them, 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!"
Despite this delightful lilting lyric, I do not think of myself as either insignificant or contemptible, so I moved on to the word "geek," which predates "nerd" by at least fifty years, appearing for the first time in the late nineteenth century. Alas, the dictionary informed me that a geek is "an unfashionable or socially inept person." "Dork" didn't give me too much luck either--it is defined as "a dull, slow-witted, or socially inept person" and derives from an American slang term for "penis" in the 1960's.
With pejoratives on the brain, I at last hearkened to that great fount of internet knowledge, the webcomic xkcd, whose author constructed a very helpful Venn diagram for those of us who care about our stance on these issues:
You can guess which category of the three I fall into. Here's another, more serious, Venn from the folks over at Laughing Squid:
According to this system, my combination of intelligence and obsession makes me a geek rather than a nerd, which is the word I usually use to describe myself.
Knowing that self-diagnosis had failed me, I took my quest to the next level and found a test purporting to solve my identity crisis once and for all. I scored 91% nerd, 61% geek, and 39% dork, according to the test's definitions of the words, earning me the title of modern, cool nerd. (Spoiler alert: I have no idea what that means, since I don't think of myself as particularly modern or cool. The explanation below is merely my cut-and-paste attempt at sounding smart.)
"The Modern, Cool Nerd is intelligent, knowledgable and always the person to call in a crisis (needing computer advice/an arcane bit of trivia knowledge). They are the one you want as your lifeline in Who Wants to Be a Millionaire (or the one up there, winning the million bucks)! "
Great, I'll take it! My takeaway from all of this is less finding a particular word to describe myself than it is embracing an identity once thought of as an insult. I'm glad I live in a world where geek is chic and nerds can be modern and cool, or at least a world where I can be among fellow geeks and nerds. Remember, make fun of nerds at your own peril: you'll be working for us someday!
Last but not least, the all-important Venn of the Apocalypse:
I can't decide whether I'm pleased or concerned by the fact that my preferences place me squarely into the "death to humans" category.
Until next time,
Anna
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