Git (slang)

''Git'' is a term of insult denoting an unpleasant, silly, incompetent, annoying, senile, elderly or childish person.
As a mild oath it is roughly on a par with ''prat'' and marginally less pejorative than '' berk''. Typically a good-natured admonition with a strong implication of familiarity, ''git'' is more severe than ''twit'' or ''idiot'' but less severe than ''wanker'', '' arsehole'' or ''twat'' when offence is intended.

The word ''git'' first appeared in print in 1946, but is undoubtedly older. It was popularly used by the British army in the First World War at Gallipoli, the Egyptian and Mesopotamian campaigns where the British would abuse their Turkish adversaries by shouting the vulgar, “siktir git!”; (fuck you) the soldiery (mistakenly) believing that “git” was part of the offensive expression meaning “you” (but in a derogatory way). An alternative suggestion for the etymology is that it is an alteration of the word ''get'', dating back to the 14th century. A shortening of ''beget'', ''get'' insinuates that the recipient is someone's misbegotten offspring and therefore a bastard. In parts of northern England, Northern Ireland and Scotland ''get'' is still used in preference to ''git''.

The word has been ruled by the Speaker of the House of Commons to be unparliamentary language.

Notable usage

John Lennon calls Walter Raleigh "such a stupid get" in The Beatles song, "I'm So Tired".

" Randy Scouse Git" is a song written by Micky Dolenz in 1967 and recorded by The Monkees. It was the first song written by Dolenz to be commercially released, and it became a number 2 hit in the UK where it was retitled "Alternate Title" after the record company (RCA) complained that the original title was actually somewhat "taboo to the British audience".

It was in self-mocking spirit that Linus Torvalds named his Git version control system.

References

English, British
British English
British slang
Pejorative terms for people
English profanity
English words

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