Introduction

Very little has been written about the word 'cunt'. The longest account so far published is an entry in Hugh Rawson's Dictionary Of Invective, in which he calls 'cunt' "The most heavily tabooed of all English words" (1989). Rawson's article is five pages long, though I feel that 'cunt' deserves a more extensive analysis. Therefore, what follows is intended as a definitive study of this ancient and powerful word.

Pentti Olli succintly defines 'cunt' as "the bottom half of a woman or a very despicable person" (1999). According to Francis Grose's scurrilous definition in his Classical Dictionary Of The Vulgar Tongue, it is "a nasty name for a nasty thing" (1796). While essentially a gynaecological term, is now more often uttered as a swearword; it is rarely employed in its literal, anatomical sense, and is instead found in abusive ('fucking cunt'), misogynist ('you cunt!'), and pornographic (cunt.com) contexts.

In his definitive Cassell's Dictionary Of Slang (2005), Jonathon Green itemises the various definitions of 'cunt'. As a noun, it has sixteen distinct meanings: "the vagina", "a derog[atory] term for a woman", "a woman considered purely as a sex object", "copulation with a woman", "a joc[ular] 'bitchy' term of address", "the mouth [...] as a sexual receptacle", "the [...] rectum as a sexual receptacle", "the buttocks", "prostitution", "a sexually attractive woman", "any thing, object, or place", "an unpleasant person", "an infuriating object", "something very difficult to do", "the area of a vein into which one injects narcotics; the crease inside the elbow", and "a syn[onym] for FUCK or DAMN". Green also lists 'cunt' as an adjective ("a general term of abuse"), a verb ("to destory, to defeat"), and as an exclamation ("a general excl[amation] of annoyance").

'Cunt' is a short, monosyllabic word, though its brevity is deceptive. Like many swearwords, it has been incorrectly dismissed as merely Anglo-Saxon slang, as the anonymous Ode To Those Four-Letter Words cautions:

"friend, heed this warning, beware the affront
Of aping a Saxon: don't call it a cunt!" (----).

The prefix 'cu' is one of the oldest word-sounds in recorded language. It is an expression quintessentially associated with femininity, and is the basis of 'cow' ('female animal'), 'queen' ('female monarch'), and, of course, 'cunt' ('female genital'). The word's second most significant influence is the Latin term 'cuneus', meaning 'wedge', from which comes 'cunnus' ('vagina').

The Oxford English Dictionary, the foremost authority on the English lexicon, clarifies the word's commonest contexts as the two-fold "female external genital organs" and "term of vulgar abuse" (RW Burchfield, 1972). At the heart of this incongruity is our culture's negative attitude towards femininity. 'Cunt' is a primary example of the multitude of tabooed words and phrases relating to female sexuality, and of the misogyny inherent in sexual discourse. Kate Millett sums up the word's uniquely despised status: "Somehow every indignity the female suffers ultimately comes to be symbolized in a sexuality that is held to be her responsibility, her shame [...] It can be summarized in one four-letter word. And the word is not fuck, it's cunt. Our self-contempt originates in this: in knowing we are cunt" (1973).

When used in a reductive, abusive context, female genital terms such as 'cunt' and 'twat' are notably more offensive than male equivalents such as 'prick' and 'cock'. This linguistic inequality is mirrored by a cultural imbalance that sees images of the vagina obliterated from contemporary visual culture: "The vagina, according to many feminist writers, is so taboo as to be virtually invisible in Western culture" (Lynn Holden, 2000). Censorship of both the word 'cunt' and the organ to which it refers is symptomatic of a general fear of - and disgust for - the vagina itself. The most literal manifestation of this fear is the myth of the 'vagina dentata', symbolising the male fear that the vagina is a tool of castration (the femme castratrice, a more specific manifestation of the Film Noir femme fatale).

There have been attempts, however, to reappropriate 'cunt', investing it with a positive meaning and removing it from the lexicon of offence, similar in effect to the transvaluation of 'bad', 'sick', and 'wicked', whose colloquial meanings have also been changed from negative to positive - what Jonathon Green calls "the bad equals good model" of oppositional slang (Jennifer Higgie, 1998). The Cunt-Art movement used traditional 'feminine' arenas such as sewing and cheerleading as artistic contexts in which to relocate the word. A parallel 'cunt-power' ideology, seeking to reclaim the word more forcefully, was instigated by Germaine Greer, a spirit later recalled by Zoe Williams, who encouraged "Cunt Warriors" to reclaim the word (2006).

What 'cunt' has in common with most other contemporary swearwords is its connection to bodily functions. Genital, scatological, and sexual terms (such as, respectively, 'cunt', 'shit', and 'fuck') are our most powerful taboos, though this was not always the case. Social taboos originally related to religion and ritual, and Philip Thody contrasts our contemporary bodily taboos with the ritual taboos of tribal cultures: "In our society, that of the industrialised West, the word 'taboo' has lost almost all its magical and religious associations" (1997). In Totem Und Tabu, Sigmund Freud's classic two-fold definition of 'taboo' encompasses both the sacred and the profane, both religion and defilement: "The meaning of 'taboo', as we see it, diverges in two contrary directions. To us it means, on the one hand, 'sacred', 'consecrated', and on the other 'uncanny', 'dangerous', 'forbidden', 'unclean'" (1912).

Taboos relating to language are most readily associated with the transgressive lexicon of swearing. William Shakespeare, writing at the cusp of the Reformation, demonstrated the reduced potency of blasphemy and, with his thinly veiled 'cunt' puns, slyly circumvented the newfound intolerance towards sexual language. Later, John Wilmot would remove the veil altogether, writing "some of the filthiest verses composed in English" (David Ward, 2003) with an astonishingly uninhibited sexual frankness and a blatant disregard for the prevailing Puritanism. Establishment "prudery [...] in the sphere of sex", as documented by Peter Fryer (1963), continued until after the Victorian period, when sexually explicit language was prosecuted as obscene.

It was not until the latter half of the twentieth century, after the sensational acquittal of Lady Chatterley's Lover, that the tide finally turned, and sexual taboos - including that of 'cunt' - were challenged by the 'permissive society'. During the Lady Chatterley obscenity trial, the word 'cunt' became part of the national news agenda, and indeed the eventual publication of Lady Chatterley can be seen as something of a watershed for the word, marking the first widespread cultural dissemination of "arguably the most emotionally laden taboo term" (Ruth Wajnryb, 2004).

The word has since become increasingly prolific in the media, and its appearances can broadly be divided into two types: euphemism and repetition. Humorous, euphemistic references to 'cunt', punning on the word without actually using it in full, represent an attempt to undermine our taboo against it: by laughing at our inability to utter the word, we recognise the arcane nature of the taboo and begin to challenge it. By contrast, the parallel trend towards repetitive usage of 'cunt' seeks to undermine the taboo through desensitisation. If 'cunt' is repeated ad infinitum, our sense of shock at initially encountering the word is rapidly dispelled. With other swearwords (notably 'fuck') gradually losing their potency, 'cunt' is left as the last linguistic taboo, though even the c-word can now be found adorning badges, t-shirts, and book covers. Its normalisation is now only a matter of time.

Cunt is...

'Cunt' is probably the most offensive and censored swearword in the English language: "Of all the four-letter words, CUNT is easily the most offensive" (Ruth Wajnryb, 2004). Martin Samuel calls it "one of the best words" (2007). Our taboo surrounding the word ensures that it is rarely discussed, though, when it is, the superlatives come thick and fast. Accordingly, Zoe Williams writes: "It's the rudest word we've got, in the entire language" (2006). Jacqueline Z Wilson also piles on the superlatives: "'Cunt' is the most confronting word [...] probably in every major variety of English spoken anywhere [and is] the most offensive word in the English language" (2008).

Sara Gwin (2008) calls it "the most offensive word for women" and "one of the most offensive words in the English language, if not the worst". Specifically, she problematises the word's reductivism: "It objectifies women by reducing them down to their body part that has been defined by male usage [...] there is a whole history of misogyny packed in to that one-syllable word". She cautiously acknowledges the potential for feminist reclamation: "Women have every right to reclaim the word for themselves or for a particular group. However, there has to be the acknowledgement that this word is still incredibly insulting to many and we have to respect that".

'Cunt' is "one of the most foul and insulting [words] in the English language" (Megan Goudey and Ashley Newton, 2004) and "a word so hateful it can scarcely be uttered" (Jennifer Baumgardner and Amy Richards, 2000). M Hunt [no relation] calls it "the most taboo word in the English language" (2006). Libby Brooks views it as "the most shocking word in the English language [...] the grossest insult you can use" (2008). Andrew Goldman calls 'cunt' "the mother of all nasty words" and "the most controversial word of all" (1999). Victoria Coren calls it "the word which is still considered the most offensive in the language" (Deborah Lee, 2006). Alex Games sees it as "still the ultimate taboo utterance" (2006). Geoffrey Hughes calls it "the most seriously taboo word in English" (2006). For Tom Aldridge, it is "unarguably the most obscene [and] most forbidden word in English", "the ultimate obscenity", and "the nastiest four-letter word" (2001). Jack Holland notes that "the word 'cunt' expresse[s] the worst form of contempt one person could feel for another" (2006). John Doran describes it as "The most offensive word in the world", "the worst word that anyone has ever been able to think of", and "[the] most terrible of terrible words" (2002). It is, according to Sue Clark, "far and away the most offensive word for the British public. [...] If it is used aggressively towards women it is absolutely the last word in swearing" (Anthony Barnes, 2006). Beatrix Campbell calls it "a radioactive word [...] impregnated with hostility".

Deborah Orr provides a neat summary of the word's central functions, invective and empowerment: "Attitudes to this powerful expression, especially among women, are changing. For many centuries now, the word has been elaborately veiled under the weird and heavy drapes of a disapproval so strong that it has become pre-eminent among forbidden words. "Cunt" remains, for the vast majority of people, pretty much the worst, the ugliest, the most barbaric, crude and filthy English word there is. For others, though, its use is a mark of worldly and liberal sophistication" (2006). Further attitudes towards 'cunt' were included in the BBC3 television documentary The C-Word: How We Came To Swear By It, broadcast on 30th July 2007.