
Etymology of “dude” is traced to "doodle," as in Yankee Doodle Dandy - santigepigon
http://chronicle.com/blogs/linguafranca/2013/10/21/dude/
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ScottBurson
It says that "Immense!" was a common dude expression in 1883 -- it doesn't say
for what, exactly, but I presume appreciation. I like it, actually! I'm going
to start using it and see if I can start a trend.

Immense!

~~~
PhasmaFelis
I'm kind of excited about "but aw."

I'd like to imagine it means "I know, right?"

~~~
evincarofautumn
I don’t know the true origin, but it sounds like Scots to me. “Aw” = “all”,
and “but aw” would presumably be like “after all”, or “though” in Bristol (or
maybe Yorkshire?) dialects.

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ewzimm
In summary: dude originally meant "hipster."

~~~
ChuckMcM
Apparently. Which tells you that nothing new actually is. It also makes you
wonder what a Roman hipster would have been like in Caesar's time.

~~~
beachstartup
a greek.

~~~
guscost
"I used to make burnt offerings to Athena before it was cool."

~~~
DrewRWx
You mean Minerva.

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jonnathanson
_" For a correct definition of the expression the anxious inquirer has only to
turn to the tight-trousered, brief-coated, eye-glassed, fancy-vested, sharp-
toes shod, vapid youth who abounds in the Metropolis at present."_

I submit that this definition is as true today as it was in 1887.

~~~
evincarofautumn
The contemporary term is “hipster”.

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jjdro
Dude! what doth my tattoo read? Sweet! what doth my tattoo read? DUDE! What
doth mine read?

Dude Where's My Horseless Carriage

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flurie
I never thought that I'd have the chance to submit on topic one of my favorite
figures from history. Behold the king of the dudes:
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evander_Berry_Wall](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evander_Berry_Wall).

ed. This is actually a better link:
[http://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/node/1907811](http://www.newyorksocialdiary.com/node/1907811)

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tenderLoins
I always thought "dude" meant: The crusty tuft of hair on a horse's asshole?

Seriously, a science teacher in high school read that definition from a
dictionary, and handed out photocopies of it to my class, in the hopes that it
would discourage us from using the word, because he got sick of hearing it. It
had the opposite effect, obviously.

...but anyway, that's why I laughed when The Stranger in The Big Lebowski
implied, with subtlety, the same meaning when he said it was a name "no one
would self-apply" where he came from.

I'm sticking with "hairy horse anus."

~~~
bcoates
I don't know about the horse's ass part, but 'dude' is supposedly similar to
'yankee' in the rural western US, in the sense of being a useless, helpless
outsider.

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joejohnson
Google needs to update their database then:
[https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+dude](https://www.google.com/search?q=etymology+dude)

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stiles
Dudine is my new favorite word. I think it has a very pleasant sound when used
as a greeting.

~~~
noonespecial
I'm trying to figure out: Should it be dood-eye-n (like wine), dood-een, or
dood-een-eh (like a german might say)?

~~~
evincarofautumn
As an English & French speaker I would say [du̵ːˈdiːn] (dood-EEN).

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tokenadult
I'm curious about how the Hacker News duplicate detector is working today,

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6677539](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6677539)

and how the policy about titles of submissions is being implemented by the
moderation team. The article kindly submitted here is a very interesting
article.

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Kudos
I always thought dude came from the Irish word "Dúd" or "Dúdaire".

[http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/08/nyregion/08irish.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2007/11/08/nyregion/08irish.html)

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scoot
_Etymology of “dude” is traced to "doodle," as in Yankee Doodle Dandy_

Which tells us nothing of what the 'doodle' in Yankee Doodle Dandy means.
Yankee fine; Dandy, a foppish hipster type; Doodle???

~~~
scoot
To answer my own question: _' The word doodle first appeared in the early 17th
century to mean a fool or simpleton. It may derive from the German Dudeltopf
or Dudeldop, meaning simpleton or noodle (literally "nightcap").'_ [1]

Not sure why the author of this article couldn't be bothered to complete the
etymology he started.

[1] [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doodle](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doodle)

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DateK
doodle -> dude

google -> guge

(sorry that must have come)

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basyt
lol

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squirejons
the Doodle abides....and somehow I take comfort in that...

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kimonos
Thanks for the info Dude! (",)

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cstavish
He peed on your fucking rug.

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thrillgore
Cue a hundred "Dude" jokes.

~~~
csixty4
Fuck it, Doodle, let's go bowling.

~~~
McKittrick
the dood abides.

