Egghead

2025-05-27T08:08:16Z

2A02:908:1C14:7F80:155E:AEF7:92B0:BA3D: Replaced Youtube link to Philip K. Dick's speech; the original video has been removed

{{Short description|American slang or epithet}}
{{About|the American slang or epithet}}
[[File:AdlaiEStevenson1900-1965.jpg|thumb|[[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]] was called an "egghead" by [[Richard Nixon]] during the [[U.S. presidential election, 1952|1952 U.S. presidential race]].]]
In [[American English|U.S. English]] slang, '''egghead''' is an [[epithet]] used to refer to [[intellectual]]s or people considered out-of-touch with ordinary people and lacking in realism, common sense, sexual interests, etc. on account of their intellectual interests. A similar, though not necessarily pejorative, British term is ''[[boffin]]''.<ref>Chris Roberts, Heavy Words Lightly Thrown: The Reason Behind Rhyme, Thorndike Press,2006 ({{ISBN|0-7862-8517-6}})</ref> The term ''egghead'' reached its peak currency during the 1950s, when vice-presidential candidate [[Richard Nixon]] used it against [[United States Democratic Party|Democratic]] Presidential nominee [[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]]. It was used by Bill Clinton advisor [[Paul Begala]] in the 2008 presidential campaign to describe Senator [[Barack Obama]]'s supporters when he said, "Obama can't win with just the eggheads and African-Americans."<ref>{{cite web | url = http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/may/09/broken-eggheads-make-no-omelets | title = Broken eggheads make no omelets | work = Washington Times | date = May 9, 2008
}}</ref>

== Origins ==
In his [[Pulitzer Prize]]-winning historical essay on U.S. anti-intellectualism, historian [[Richard Hofstadter]] wrote: "During the campaign of 1952, the country seemed to be in need of some term to express that disdain for intellectuals which had by then become a self-conscious motif in U.S. politics. The word ''egghead'' was originally used without invidious associations, but quickly assumed them, and acquired a much sharper tone than the traditional ''[[highbrow]]''. Shortly after the campaign was over, [[Louis Bromfield]], a popular novelist of right-wing political persuasion, suggested that the word might someday find its way into dictionaries as follows:

<blockquote>''Egghead:'' A person of spurious intellectual pretensions, often a professor or the protégé of a professor. Essentially confused in thought and immersed in mixture of sentimentality and violent evangelism. A doctrinaire supporter of Middle-European socialism as opposed to Greco-French-U.S. ideas of democracy and liberalism. Subject to the old-fashioned philosophical morality of [[Nietzsche]] which frequently leads him into jail or disgrace. A self-conscious prig, so given to examining all sides of a question that he becomes thoroughly addled while remaining always in the same spot. An anemic bleeding heart.</blockquote>

{{quote|"The recent election," Bromfield remarked, "demonstrated a number of things, not the least of them being the extreme remoteness of the 'egghead' from the thought and feeling of the whole of the people"|(''Anti-Intellectualism in American Life'' [New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1963], pp. 9-10).}}

In their ''Dictionary of American Slang'' (1960; 2nd supplemented ed. 1975), [[Harold Wentworth (lexicographer)|Harold Wentworth]] and [[Stuart Berg Flexner]] cite two earlier meanings of ''egghead'', one referring to baldness, the other to stupidity. Wentworth and Flexner note that the meaning under discussion here was "[p]op.<ref>"pop." = "popular"</ref> during presidential campaign of 1952 when the supporters of Adlai Stevenson, Democratic candidate, were called eggheads. Thus orig. the term carried the connotation of 'politically minded' and 'liberal'; today its application is more general. May have originated in ref. to the high forehead of Mr. Stevenson or of the pop. image of an academician" (p. 171).

[[Philip K. Dick]] claimed in a 1977 interview that, while researching his Nazi-themed novel ''[[The Man in the High Castle]]'', he discovered that an equivalent term (''Eierkopf'') had been used by the [[Sturmabteilung]] because "when they attacked people who were defenseless, [...] their skulls cracked readily against the pavement".<ref>{{cite web | url = https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkaQUZFbJjE| title=Philip K. Dick speech in Metz, France, 1977| website=[[YouTube]]| date=2021-05-17}}</ref>

==See also==
*[[Atel (slang)]], another derogatory term for intellectuals, in [[Bengali culture]].
*[[Geek]], a related term for an obsessive enthusiast
*[[Nerd]], another (sometimes) derogatory term for intellectuals, in [[American culture]].
*[[Obrazovanshchina]], another derogatory term for intellectuals, in [[Russian culture]].

==References==
{{reflist}}

==Further reading==
* Lecklider, Aaron. ''Inventing the Egghead: The Battle over Brainpower in American Culture'' (2013) [https://www.amazon.com/Inventing-Egghead-Brainpower-American-Culture/dp/0812244869/ Excerpt and text search]
** Rubin, J. S. ''Inventing the Egghead: The Battle over Brainpower in American Culture.''(2014).
{{Authority control}}
[[Category:Anti-intellectualism]]
[[Category:Pejorative terms for people]]
[[Category:Adlai Stevenson II]]

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