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Frak (expletive)

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For the Swiss ice skater, see Frick and Frack. For the computer game, see Frak!
Look up frak or frack in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
A vanity plate displaying the revised spelling

Frak is a minced oath version of "fuck" first used (with the spelling "frack") in the original Battlestar Galactica series. In the "re-imagined" version it appears with greater frequency and with the revised spelling "frak", as the producers wanted to make it a four-letter word.[1] In that framework it seems to function as a substitute for "fuck" in several different forms, as an interjection ("Frak!"), inquisitive idiom ("What the frak?"), verb ("You're not still frakking Dualla, are you?"), adjective ("You frakking crazy idiot!"), a noun ("You miserable frak"), ("A good frak") or in compound words ("What a clusterfrak."),("Motherfrakker!").

Other uses

"Frak" is used in the same sense as in Battlestar by characters in the early 21st century "Ciaphas Cain" series of Games Workshop Warhammer 40,000 novels by Sandy Mitchell, probably like an expression from the character's unknown birth world.[2]

Fräck (spelled with the umlaut ä) is also the product name of a shaving mirror produced by IKEA, a multinational home products retailer.[3] Most IKEA product names are in Swedish, and fräck is the Swedish word for audacious, shameless or bold (while frack, without ä, would translate to tailcoat). In the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica series, a mirror of this type is installed in the cabin of William Adama.[4]

Frak is a Dutch word for a long coat for men, not often used anymore in the Netherlands, but still commonly used in the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, used for all sorts of coats, both for men and women.[5]

In the Slovak, Russian, Czech and Polish language as well as Belgian Dutch, the word frak (pronounced the same way as written, with hard "r" and phonetic "ʌ") stands for a tailcoat (a black coat with coat-tails). In Spanish, the word 'frac' has the same meaning, as does the word Frack in German.

Frakk is the most ordinary word used in west Scandinavia meaning a coat for both men or women.

Fracking (also "fracing") may refer to hydraulic fracturing of oil or gas wells, in which a slurry of sand and chemicals is injected into the rock formation at high pressure. The fracking fluid weakens and fractures the surrounding rock, making it more permeable and thus easier to pump the oil or gas from the well. However, use of fracking chemicals[fn 1] have been blamed for environmental pollution and serious illness such as cancer.[6]

Frak Party

Fans of the re-imagined Battlestar Galactica series have come to term group viewings of episodes as "Frak Parties".[1][7]

See also

Footnotes

  1. ^ http://www.earthworksaction.org/FracingDetails.cfm

References

  1. ^ a b Talbott, Chris (2008-09-02). "What the `frak'? Faux curse seeping into language". Associated Press.
  2. ^ Mitchell, Sandy (2003), For the Emperor (extract), Black Library, p. 13, ISBN 9781844160501, OCLC 52946642, archived from the original (PDF) on unknown {{citation}}: Check date values in: |archivedate= (help)
  3. ^ "FRÄCK Mirror". Ikea.com. Retrieved 2009-07-14.
  4. ^ "Battlestar Galactica's Cylon Dream Kit". PC Magazine. (cited to IMDB)
  5. ^ "Frak at Het Vlaams Woordenboek (Dutch)". Retrieved 2009-01-25.
  6. ^ "EPA to citizens: Frack you". salon.com. Retrieved 2006-05-05.
  7. ^ http://blog.scifi.com/battlestar/archives/2006/09/#001323
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