Word: terming
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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Many clamor to differ. Andre DiMino, president of UNICO, the national Italian-American service organization, objects to the term, whether it's self-described or not. He told the New Jersey Star-Ledger: "It's a derogatory comment. It's a pejorative word to depict an uncool Italian who tries to act cool." But is it a generational pejorative? Do younger Americans of Italian descent have a different relationship to the G word? According to Donald Tricarico, a sociology professor at City University of New York/Queensborough, "Guido is a slur, but Italian kids have embraced it just as black kids...
There's no date stamp on when the term Guido came into play, but Tricarico theorizes that it very well may have originated as an insult from within the Italian-American community, confering inferior status on immigrants who are "just off the boat." It clearly references non-assimilation in its use of a name more at home in the old homeland. In fact, in different locales, the same slur isn't Guido: in Chicago the term is "Mario" and in Toronto it goes by "Gino." Guido is far less offensive, among Italian-Americans, than another G word, which is also...
Tricarico traces the mainstreaming of the term Guido to what he frames as a "moral panic" racing through the media in relation to a 1989 racial incident in the predominantly Italian neighborhood of Bensonhurst in Brooklyn. But he pinpoints the real birth of the Guido subculture to the 1970s. If the movement has any guiding icon, it's young John Travolta and his many incarnations: Tony Manero in Saturday Night Fever, Vinnie Barbarino in Welcome Back, Kotter and Danny Zuko in Grease. Today, there are message boards for self-described Guidos and Guidettes to chatter (www.njguido.com...
...from a guy who was deeply concerned about Harvard’s budgetary situation. He took it upon himself to provide 13 pages of concrete recommendations for how we can all scrimp and save, including having all students brush their teeth more often so as to avoid the long-term costs of serious dental work and cavity fillings. I should have forwarded that one to Dean Smith...
...long term, Yan hopes to apply to an M.D./Ph.D. program. “It’s a big focus in my life to do something that’s good for people, and something that’s helpful for society,” he says...