Welcome to NewsFeed’s weekly highlight of our vocabulary — including useful, new, hilarious and surprising words (as well as some that are just fun to roll off the old tongue).
New term for oglers: dudesploitation
In a New York Magazine piece, the author questions whether this is “the golden age of male objectification.” Her answer: Sure seems like it. We’re living in a time of super-buff super heroes with “superwaxed superchests” where whole scenes are dedicated to the abs of actor Ryan Gosling (See: Crazy, Stupid Love). She presents this as evidence that the male gaze has reversed—that we’ve entered “the realm of dudesploitation.”
Exploits past: The word is a play on blaxploitation, a term that refers to the exploitation of black people in films, particularly in films meant to appeal to black audiences. The bulk were flicks made in the 1970s, in which super-fly, super-sly working-class heroes starred. (For a satirical crash-course, watch this preview for Black Dynamite, a 2009 blaxploitation spoof. Telling quote: “He super cool and he know Kung Fu.”)
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Best political promise: a slam-dunk guarantee
In Monday night’s GOP debate, Texas Gov. Rick Perry said he “slam-dunk guaranteed” that people currently promised Social Security benefits would get them. The phrasing was all the more amusing given his accompanying drawl and smirk. Not to mention the image it conjures of the candidates playing a game of pick-up basketball. (You know Ron Paul’s got some moves.)
In years past: TIME’s Michael Scherer points out that slam dunk “has been an awkward phrase in national politics ever since CIA director George Tenet used it to describe the certainty of weapons of mass destruction in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq.” Awkward, indeed.
Latest lingo (for parents): OMG
In a Good Housekeeping quiz, parents are invited to see how sick their knowledge of teen slang is. Some of the questions are on the outdated side, but most are on the priceless side. Take #4. Your daughter sends you an email fuming about her teacher’s unfairness. She begins her litany of complaints with “OMG!” What do the three letters stand for? A. On my grave, B. Oh my god (or gosh), C. One more gripe. “One. More. Gripe.”
Speaking of awkward: In Scotland, a radio station was recently reprimanded by a media regulator for using sexual slang on the radio: the f-word and “punani” (a slang term for lady parts). In their defense, they tried to convince the regulator that the f-word was part of their local dialect and that what sounded like “punani,” was in fact “panini,” as in a sandwich. Nice one, Brick FM.
MORE: Previous Wednesday Words Columns
Katy Steinmetz is a reporter at TIME. Find her on Twitter at @KatySteinmetz. You can also continue the discussion on TIME’s Facebook page and on Twitter at @TIME.