The F-Word (54 page)

In phrases:

ham and mothers
, see
ham and motherfuckers
under
MOTHERFUCKER
.

1973
(quotation at
ham and motherfuckers
under
MOTHERFUCKER
).
1978
G. Hasford
Short-Timers
86 [refers to Vietnam War]: Ham and mothers.… I hate…ham and lima beans.
1990
G.R. Clark
Words of Vietnam War
52: Ham and lima beans…“ham-and-mothers.”
1996
D. Jauss
Black Maps
27: You look like you’ve put on a couple of pounds since yesterday.… Maybe you had an extra helping of ham and mothers?
2004
R. E. Peavey
Praying for Slack
251: Nobody eats ham and mothers up here.

your mother!
Especially
Juvenile
. (used as a derisive retort). [It is widely perceived that the phrase abbreviates
go fuck your mother
and is therefore especially provoking; it is also reminiscent of the “dozens,” a game of ritually exchanging insults.]

[
1891
in J. F. Dobie
Rainbow in the Morning
(1965) 172: Talk about one thing, talk about another;/But ef you talk about me, I’m gwain to talk about your mother.] [
1929
E. Hemingway in
Selected Letters
298: In a purely conversational way in a latin language in an argument one man says to another “Cogar su madre!”]
1937
C. Odets
Golden Boy
243: [On telephone:] I’ll bring him right over…you can take my word—the kid’s a cock-eyed wonder
…your
mother too!
1939
in A. Dundes
Mother Wit from the Laughing Barrel
(1990) 288: An upper-class Negro woman [in a northern city] said…[that] in her high school group…a simple reference to “your ma” or “your mother” was a fighting challenge. The woman herself did not know why one had to fight when she heard this but did know that fight one must.
1953
“F. Paley”
Rumble on the Docks
86: “Your mother!” Pooch murmured with thick lips.
1957
H. Simmons
Corner Boy
79:
Your mother, your mother
.
1968
K. Hunter
Soul Brothers
39: If a Southside boy wanted to start a fight, all he had to say…was, “Your mother—.” He didn’t even have to finish the sentence. The other boy would tear into him…in a blind fury.
1972
in W. King
Black Anthology
145: “Your motha’!” she yelled.
1973
Lucas, Katz & Huyck
America Graffiti
23: “What happened to you, flathead?” “Ah, your mother!”
1974
V. C. Strasburger
Rounding Third & Heading Home
159: Carter turned around. “Your mother,” he said to the guy who had just finished talking.
1977
E. Bunker
Animal Factory
29: “I’m gonna bust you someday.” “You’ll bust your mother.” “Your mother wears combat boots!”
1978
P. Schrader
Hardcore
65: “You’re thinking about your father.”…“Keep him out of this or I’ll break your balls.” “Who?” “Your mother, smart-ass.”
1985
Cheers
(NBC-TV): Ya mother!
1999
F. McCourt
’Tis
xv. 118: Weber
gives him the finger and says, Your mother, and Buck has to be stopped from attacking him by the duty sergeant who tells us all get out.

mother
adjective

(a partial euphemism for)
MOTHERFUCKING
.

1958
Meltzer & Blees
High School Confidential
(film): You’re the swingin’est chick in the whole mother kingdom.
1962
T. Reiter
Night in Sodom
134: You a fool, Chollie. A rotten muvva fool.
1966–67
P. Thomas
Down These Mean Streets
201: What a sick mudder scene!
1968
G. Vidal
Myra Breckinridge
98: I am going to sell the whole mother score.
ca
1969
D. Rabe
Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel
23: Jesus God Almighty I hate this mother army stickin’ me in with weird people!
1970
La Motta, Carter, & Savage
Raging Bull
(film) 25: Everybody down on his knees, you mothers, down on your fuckin’ mother knees!
1971
Go Ask Alice
102: The fuzz has clamped down till the town is mother dry.
1976
J.W. Thomas
Heavy Number
44: Wait a mother-minute!
Ibid.
115: I…can’t use them…in the middle of the mother desert!
1988
D. Ing
Chernobyl Syndrome
113: A bigmotha’ windmill, with 4-meter epoxy-coated high-aspect ratio blades and a capstan drive made from a wheelchair.

motherfather
noun

(a partial euphemism for)
MOTHER-FUCKER
.

1991
Redd Foxx on
Royal Family
(CBS-TV): Oh, motherfather!
1993
S. Womack
Dead Folks’ Blues
231: What the motherfather you talking about?
2005
C. Coleman
Cage’s Bend
204: You son of a bitch. You don’t care about me. You motherfather!

motherfouler
noun

(a partial euphemism for)
MOTHER-FUCKER
.

1947–52
R. Ellison
Invisible Man
422: Coolcrack the motherfouler!
1962
L. Hughes
Tambourines to Glory
238: Sister Laura’s going to crack-up and all over Buddy Lomax—who everybody knows is a motherfouler.

motherfuck
noun

1
. =
MOTHERFUCKER
,
noun
, sense 1.a., 1.b.

1964
R. Gover
Here Goes Kitten
110: I hop back in bed beside this great big mountain of a mothahfug, an I get down t’bizness.
1967
N. Mailer
Why We Are in Vietnam
54: Don’t come near, motherfuck.
1970
E. E. Landy
Underground Dictionary
135:
Mother fuck,
greeting to another person. It has a positive connotation… Negative connotation when used in anger to express hostility—e.g.
You mother fuck!
1972
N.Y.U. Cold Duck
(Apr. 17): Fuck you, motherfuck, you’re trying to censor my work!
1978
P. Schrader
Hardcore
99: You muthafuck!
1986
D. Tate
Bravo Burning
96: Hey, motherfucks, you don’t have to treat him like that.
a
1990
E. Currie
Dope & Trouble
14: She a grown motherfuck.
2000
T. A. Kessler
D-Girl
in
Sopranos
((TV shooting script) 2nd Ser.) 42: You miserable motherfuck, I’m the kid’s [confirmation] sponsor!

2
. a thing or state of affairs, esp. if hateful or infuriating; =
MOTHERFUCKER
,
noun
, sense 2.a., 2.b.

1967
N. Mailer
Why Are We in Vietnam?
82: How’d you get this motherfuck?
1982
J. M. Del Vecchio
13th Valley
271: How they gonna get a bird inta the middle a dis mothafuck?

3
.
a
. a damn.

1967
“Iceberg Slim”
Pimp
277: I wouldn’t give a mother-fuck.
1970
in B. Jackson
Get Your Ass in the Water & Swim Like Me
232: This is my friend,/this is my kin,/I don’t give a motherfuck/if he don’t come in.
1972
W. Pelfrey
Big V
106: And I don’t
give
a motherfuck.
1984
S. P. Smith
American Boys
147: Tell ’em I’m like Donald Duck—got web feet and don’t give a motherfuck!
1992
S. Frazier
I Married Vietnam
94: You ever do that again motherfucker I’ll kill you. I don’t give a motherfuck if you got one day and a wakeup.
2006
R. Shydner & M. Schiff
I Killed
49: We’re not leaving until we get our motherfucking money. I don’t give a motherfuck.

b
. (used as an emphatic expletive); hell;
FUCK
.—used with
the
.

1975
N. De Mille
Smack Man
70: How the motherfuck do a pimp’s girl get jealous, man?
1973–76
J. Allen
Assault
188: You better get the motherfuck out of my place.
1982
J. M. Del Vecchio
13th Valley
309: Where the motherfuck is the C-4?
1986
T. Philbin
Under Cover
120: Who the motherfuck are you?
1988
J. Norst
Colors
22: What the motherfuck was that you just did.
1994
S. Hunter
Dirty White Boys
150: You got nothing
but a staff of assholes what hates their goddamned jobs and ain’t about to die for no Denny, whosoever the motherfuck he may be.
2006
J. Burke
On the Road to Kandahar
143: I’m on fucking patrol.… Why do you think I am wearing my body armor, motherfucker? For the motherfucking fun? So shut the motherfuck up.

motherfuck
adverb

(used for emphasis); =
MOTHERFUCKING
.

1970
E. Sanders in Padgett & Shapiro
New York Poets
386: And don’t you motherfuck forget it!!!
1971
S. Stevens
Way Uptown in Another World
54: The motherfuck whites don’t never look close enough at a black man to tell how old he is.

motherfuck
verb

1
. (used to express rejection, dismissal, hatred, etc.); God damn;
FUCK
,
verb
, definition 4a; curse; to hell with.

1942
in W. N. Hess
B-17
32: [Inscription on U.S. bomber, with picture of Japanese Prime Minister Hideki Tojo receiving an obscene gesture:] MFUTU [
i.e.
mother fuck you too].
1965
in
Social Problems
XIII 351: Mother Fuck the Police!
1969
Black Panther
(Oakland, Calif.): Well, motherfuck the police.
1972
B. Davidson
Cut Off
29 [refers to 1944]: Mother-fuck this fuckin’ war.
1968–73
M. Agar
Ripping & Running
137: Aw man, mother-fuck it.
1975
S.P. Smith
American Boys
37: “Three tears in the bucket,” he yelled. “They don’t flow, mother fuck it!”
1977
E. Torres
Q & A
16: Motha fuck you, ain’t tellin’ you shit. Who the hell’re
you!
1989
C. Ridenhour et al.
Fight the Power
(song, perf. “Public Enemy”) in L. A. Stanley
Rap: the Lyrics
(1992) 259: Straight up racist that sucker was simple and plain/Mother-fuck him [
sc.
Elvis] and John Wayne/’Cause I’m black and I’m proud.
1994
J. Berendt
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil
114: If I offended anyone, two tears in a bucket, honey. Motherfuck it.
2000
J. Womack
Going, Going, Gone
23: Half the room turned to look, and then the same half of the room turned deaf mute. “Motherfuck you,” she broadcast.

2
. to destroy, confuse,
FUCK UP
; to treat with hostility, insult.

1975
in
Urban Life
IV (1976) 489: We’ll motherfuck the bastard’s mind!
1990
L. Rooke
Good Baby
136: That bitch who tried to
motherfuck and hogtie me.
1991
Vanity Fair
Aug. 169/1: I don’t know if he was “motherfucking” them—if he was still being verbally aggressive.
2000
R. Barger et al.
Hell’s Angel
vii. 128: We motherfucked them for a while until they finally gave up and drove away.
2007
J. R. Daniels
Mr. Pleasant
3: I could read her lips. She was motherfucking me to her little brother.