Why ‘schlub’ seems to be the word of the year
In an election year, a Yiddish word teaches us how to separate the competent from the incompetent
From Left: Andy Roddick, Paul Giamatti, Doug Emhoff Photo by Getty Images
I was eavesdropping on two older ladies in Chicago. They were discussing Second Gentleman Doug Emhoff, and the fact that he wasted no time asking Kamala Harris on a first date.
“He’s no schlub,” one woman said to the other.
With everything going on in the world — beepers, walkie-talkies, interest-rate cuts, attempted assassinations of Presidential candidates — you may be forgiven for not noticing that the word “schlub” has been having an extended moment this year.
Last month in the run-up to the U.S. Open, the last American male champion, Andy Roddick, was quoted in The Athletic, as referring to his own tennis game as something played by “schlubs like us.”
Earlier this year, actor Paul Giamatti was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor for the role he played in The Holdovers. Vulture noted that, though Giamatti can play a wide range of characters, he has a particular “talent for playing unglamorous slobs and schlubs.”
The Roots of the Schlub
The truth is, schlub is often an appropriate word choice, when dealing with a certain kind of person. Does anyone really need a dictionary to understand the word, when the sound says it all?
But in case you need things spelled out, here’s what Merriam-Webster says schlub means: “a stupid, worthless, or unattractive person.”
The Oxford English Dictionary calls schlub a slang term for “oaf”. And it says the word is slang.
And, according to Urban Dictionary, a good source for slang, a schlub is “someone crude and/or stupid; a blockhead.”
The Jewish-English Lexicon, run by The Jewish Language Project — full disclosure, I am on the board of this word-obsessed organization — says “schlub” comes from Yiddish. Specifically, “the Yiddish zhlob meaning ‘boor, brute’.”
Yiddish dictionaries often define “schlub” as a “hick, yokel, peasant.”
That rural connotation of the Yiddish word actually comes from Polish żłób, meaning trough or blockhead, just as the Urban Dictionary said.
This move of the schlub from Polish to Yiddish to English has fascinated Polish cultural commentators. “Could it be that Polish words somehow made it into global English with the help of Yiddish?” Mikołaj Gliński wrote in Culture.pl.
Gliński points out that the original version of “schlub” has a noun, and a related verb.
“One highly plausible etymology refers the Yiddish ‘schlub’ to the Polish ‘żłób.’ a word for ‘trough’ or ‘manger.’ but it could also describe a primitive and dull person, one lacking manners, which is very close to the English meaning of ‘schlub.’ As for the Polish, ‘żłób’ is related to the verb ‘żłobić.’ meaning ‘to carve’,” Gliński wrote.
Schlubs and Gender Roles
While the Polish seems to emphasize a manger and a trough as the background for the meaning of “schlub” — in other words, its rural roots — now might be a good time to point out that there is something gendered going on with schlubs, or shlubs, depending on your spelling preference.
Think about it — have you ever heard a woman described as a “schlub?”
The Cambridge Dictionary just says it: “a person, usually a man, who is not very intelligent or attractive, or who has nothing special about him.”
I think that was why the two ladies I eavesdropped on chose “schlub” to explain what, in their minds, Doug Emhoff is not. They were talking about a type of maleness, along with a lack of suaveness. When they claimed the Second Gentleman wasn’t a schlub, they were suggesting that he knows how to be a man who can get things done. In other words, he’s a real man, what Israelis call a gever, which is the word for male in Hebrew.
Why Schlubs Are in the Spotlight Now
Roddick and Giamatti get stuff done in real life. Winning the U.S. Open? Getting nominated for an Oscar? Not exactly slouches. But part of their charm is that they embrace the persona — at least a little bit of the time — of someone who can’t do that kind of thing, constitutionally, because of their personality. Because of the way they dress, talk, and move through the world. Because, at root, they are a hick, someone who belongs near a manger or a trough. And so a schlub also means someone who can’t do things that are remotely complex, or which require any bit of flair.
Determining interest rates in this unpredictable economy? Figuring out what to do in a war where every option seems awful? Coming up with a strategy in a tied presidential race where everything is on the line?
These are not jobs for schlubs, which might be why pop culture — and elderly ladies — are, whenever possible, taking refuge in Yiddish, by way of Polish, and in using the word schlub, the ultimate in innate incompetence.
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