paddy wagon

Why are police vans sometimes referred to as paddy wagons?

Paddy, short for the Irish name Pádraic (or Patrick), was once a common pejorative form of address for an Irishman. The prominent theory is that the term paddy wagon arose at a time when Irish-Americans constituted a large percentage of the police force in many major cities, to the point that "police" and "Irish" were largely synonymous.

(Paddy wagon, 1909)

(Modern paddy wagon)

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mullet

"Business in the front, party in the back"

The name of this oft-ridiculed hairstyle was vaulted into popular American culture after the musical group The Beastie Boys released the song "Mullet Head," lampooning the ridiculous 'do. A year later, the band also ran an article in their self-published magazine Grand Royal titled "Mulling Over the Mullet."

While the Beastie Boys are often credited with coining the term mullet, the origin of the word is actually uncertain. It has been suggested that it bears a relationship with the 19th-century insult mullet-head, "a stupid person." Another humorous possibility is that it derives from the now-obsolete verb mullet, "to pluck with tweezers."

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(Click the 'play' button to hear the Beastie Boys "Mullet Head" while gazing upon gorgeous mullet mugshots.)

autism

The name of the mental condition was coined by Swiss psychiatrist Eugen Bleuler, who called it autismus (from Greek autos "self" + ismos "an action or state") after the symptomatic "morbid self-absorption" exhibited by those afflicted.

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army fatigues

Why is the loose-fitting clothing worn by soldiers called army fatigues?

Army fatigues (such as those worn in the picture below) are donned by soldiers when performing menial, nonmilitary tasks. These tasks themselves were once referred to as fatigues, which is where the G.I. garb got its name (originally: fatigue dress, "outfit worn when performing fatigues").

The chores (and thus the clothing) were so-called for being tiresome and laborious.

(Camouflage fatigues)

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barbie (grill)

At cookouts, why do Australian English-speakers often refer to the grill as the barbie?

Barbie is a shortened form of barbecue, another word for a grill. In fact, the word barbecue comes from Spanish barbacoa, "wooden frame on posts," originally referring to a wooden framework upon which a person could sleep, or where meat was stored to be dried.

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bagel (Jew)

Why are members of the Jewish population sometimes referred to derogatorily as bagels?

Today one of America's most popular breakfast items, bagels were introduced to the United States by Jewish-American immigrants, whose ancestors are credited with the invention of the popular bakery item back in Poland. The bagel is considered a staple of traditional Jewish-American cuisine, and its prevalence among Jewish communities in the New World gave rise to the metonymical racial slur.

The word bagel comes from the Yiddish beygl, which in turn is believed to derive from Old English bēag, "ring."

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AT&T

The name of the large U.S. phone company stands for American Telephone & Telegraph.

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asteroid

Also sometimes referred to as minor planets, asteroids get their name from the Greek word asteroeidēs, "starlike" (astēr, "star" + eidos, "form").

Literally: "starlike"

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