"You're not a nerd, you're just... coolness-challenged."
A Nerd is someone who... actually, it is easier to describe a nerd as what they are
not. Not smooth, not handsome, not someone you would instantly describe as 'attractive'. Not, above all else,
popular outside a very narrow grouping of fellow-nerds. Oftentimes, a walking, talking fashion-disaster. One definition of a nerd is someone who not only didn't attend his high school prom, but would be offended at the suggestion that he would want to. Most nerds portrayed in the media actually fail this test, but real-life nerd
Joss Whedon passes.
The term gets conflated with
geek fairly frequently, as it happens that a nerd can be fairly obsessive/informed about a particular topic.
The nerdiest nerd is a nerd who isn't even a
geek.
One of the odd features of the nerd on TV is that they will be over-formally dressed (probably as a result of the
Hollywood Dress Code;) usually, at
least a plaid polo shirt and slacks. In fact, in real life, both nerds and
geeks tend to dress
more casually than the average person, because they usually don't care as much about clothes or appearances.
Most people may have first heard this term from the
Sit Com Happy Days, where it was Fonzie's pejorative of choice, but etymological studies have traced it back to 1951 Detroit; it was originally just a term for social ineptitude.
See also
Geek,
Hollywood Nerd,
Emo Teen.
Examples:
- 'Napoleon Dynamite'' is pure nerd. No geek-ness at all, no skills, knowledge or, quite possibly, any understanding that there might be such things as skill and knowledge.
- Apart from funky dancing.
- And sweet nunchuck skills.
- The movie series Revenge of the Nerds, which describe themselves as including the Nerd, the Geek and the Spazz as their heroes (not to mention the slob, in Booger's case)..
- The TV series Freaks And Geeks featured nerds more than geeks, mostly because freaks and nerds don't rhyme.
- Likewise Square Pegs.
- The Simpsons referenced the difference when Milhouse insists to Bart he's "Not a nerd. Nerds are smart."
- ...which is actually roughly the reverse of the definitions being used here, although "smart" is an attribute commonly associated with nerds.
- Note the Geeky Wobbler's ambitions in Terry Pratchett's Johnny and the Bomb: "Wobbler wanted to be a nerd, but they wouldn't let him join. He wanted to be the kid in a deformed anorak and milk-bottom glasses who designs killer software and is a millionaire at thirty. Failing that he'd settle for being someone whose computer didn't smell of burning plastic whenever he touched it."
- They Might Be Giants, kings of the nerd rock genre, wrote a song called "The Mesopotamians", which portrays Sargon, Hammurabi, Ashurbanipal, and Gilgamesh as a cross between The Monkees and Gorillaz.
- Spencer from lonelygirl15 is a scientist who likes to wave a lightsaber around and claims he can't exercise because he suffers from nociception. All together: "What Up, Blogosphere!"
- Eric of the webcomic Loserz. See here
. He might still be a geek, though, and later manages to get a girlfriend and get laid. Wish fulfillment?.
- In this Dinosaur Comics strip, T-Rex conflates nerds and geeks when he speculates that God's omniscience must make him the Ultimate Nerd.
- In my experience, the definitions used to contrast Nerd with Geek usually imply that Nerds are just socially inept whereas Geeks have specialist knowledge and focus, esp. for IT. Sometimes Dork is used as the 'loser' category and Nerds are Academia Geeks (and who will dress over-formally). Both of these reflect what I've learnt that Nerd originated in on the US East Coast and became associated with established education, and Geek on the West Coast, so it became a positive term with the emergence of glitzy high-tech companies in that region.
- When Terry of KateModern joins the Hymn of One, he becomes a cheerful, mild-mannered nerd, complete with a cardigan and, inexplicably, Nerd Glasses. In "Precious Blood" it is revealed that the nerd persona was all an act. One of the first things he does after being discovered is to get rid of the cardigan and the glasses - he can see just fine without them.
- Weird Al's White & Nerdy. The song had such profound impact on This Troper's dad that he ordered a "White & Nerdy" hoodie from across the Atlantic and wears it all the time.
- The Angry Video Game Nerd. And here, we speak about the character, not the actor James Rolfe, who actually got a life on his own. And even the Nerd character only has the look of nerds in the general, his popularity is immense. Just don't imitate his style in real life.
