Rubbernecking

Rubbernecking
Long Beach, Washington, circa 1909, looking north along the line of the Ilwaco Railway and Navigation Company at an early tourist area called "Rubberneck Row"
A crowd of onlookers gathers to observe routine police activity at a minor vehicle collision.

Rubbernecking describes the act of gawking at something of interest. It is often used to refer to drivers trying to view the carnage resulting from a traffic accident. The term refers to the craning of a person's neck in order to get a better view.[1]

Rubbernecking has also been described as a human trait that is associated with morbid curiosity.[2] It can be the cause of traffic jams (sometimes referred to as "Gapers' blocks"), as drivers slow down to see what happened in a crash. It is also a cause of accidents as drivers become distracted and change their rate of travel while other drivers are also distracted. Rubbernecking has also come to be used more generally to describe voyeuristic interest in someone else's "business" or difficulties.

Contents

History

The term rubbernecking was an Americanism coined in the 1890s to refer to tourists.[3] H.L. Mencken said the word rubberneck is "almost a complete treatise on American psychology" and "one of the best words ever coined".[3]

By 1909 rubbernecking was used to describe the wagons, automobiles and buses used in tours around American cities,[3] and through their Chinatowns.[4] The tours included a megaphone-wielding individual offering commentary on the urban landscape.[4] Chinese Rubbernecks was the title of a 1903 film.[4]

One writer described the "out-of-towners" stretching their necks to see New York while having misinformation shouted at them, and artist John Sloan depicted them as geese in a 1917 etching called Seeing New York.[3] Tickets were sold by hawkers, touts and steerers were used to market the rubbernecking tours, also known as "gape wagons" or "yap wagons."[3]

When phone lines were shared as "party lines" the term rubbernecking applied to someone who listened in on the conversation of others. [5]

The term "rubberneck" is used in Ireland to refer to a person acting in a foolish or silly manner.

Rubbernecking and the automobile

The term is often used to refer to the activity of motorists slowing down in order to see something on the other side of a road or highway, often the scene of a traffic accident. According to a 2003 study, rubbernecking was the cause of 16 percent of distraction-related traffic accidents.[6] It features in the book 100 Most Dangerous Things in Everyday Life and What You Can Do About Them and is said to be factored into highway design.[6] The book advises that the safest course when there are flashing lights and an accident is to keep moving, "there is nothing to see here". Rubbernecking's impact on traffic has been the subject of studies.[7]

Prevention

In the Netherlands and the United Kingdom, incident screens have been designed that can be erected around vehicle accidents to discourage rubbernecking.[8][9]

References

  1. ^ Rosalind Fergusson, Eric Partridge, Paul Beale Shorter slang dictionary Routledge, 1994 ISBN 0-415-08866-6, 9780415088664 241 pages page 178
  2. ^ Daniel P. Franklin [Politics and film: the political culture of film in the United States] Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, 2006 University of Michigan ISBN 0-7425-3808-7, 9780742538085 223 pages page 96
  3. ^ a b c d e Irving Lewis Allen The City in Slang: New York Life and Popular Speech Oxford University Press US, 1995 ISBN 0-19-509265-1, 9780195092653 320 pages
  4. ^ a b c Peter X. Feng [Screening Asian Americans] Rutgers University Press, 2002ISBN 0-8135-3025-3, 9780813530253 308 pages
  5. ^ Frederic Gomes Cassidy, Joan Houston Hall Dictionary of American regional English Harvard University Press, 2002 ISBN 0-674-00884-7, 9780674008847 1040 pages page 657
  6. ^ a b Laura Lee 100 Most Dangerous Things in Everyday Life and What You Can Do About Them July 1, 2004 Murdoch Books ISBN 1-74045-422-7 ISBN 978-1-74045-422-3 240 pages page 161
  7. ^ Jonathan P Masinick An Analysis on the Impact of Rubbernecking on Urban Freeway 2004 University of Virginia
  8. ^ "Rubbernecking prevention using incident screens"
  9. ^ "Incident Screens - Functional Specification"

Wikimedia Foundation. 2010.

Игры ⚽ Поможем написать курсовую

Look at other dictionaries:

  • rubbernecking — noun a) The act of slowing down whilst driving a vehicle, so as to look at the scene of an accident. The resulting wreckage blocks the entire southbound side of the Interstate, while the inevitable rubbernecking slows traffic on the northbound… …   Wiktionary

  • rubbernecking — n. one who is curious; tourist, sightseer, visitor v. look at with curiosity, gawk at …   English contemporary dictionary

  • Call Me What You Like — «Call Me What You Like» …   Википедия

  • Call Me What You Like — Infobox Single Name = Call Me What You Like Artist = Keane B side = Rubbernecking Closer Now Released = January 31, 2000 [citeweb|url=http://www.keaneshaped.co.uk/disco/zoo call.htm|title=Keaneshaped.co.uk on Call Me What You Like… …   Wikipedia

  • Call Me What You Like — Saltar a navegación, búsqueda «Call Me What You Like» Sencillo de Keane Publicación Febrero del 2000 Formato CD …   Wikipedia Español

  • rubberneck — 1. noun a) Someone who engages in rubbernecking, or turning and staring. A suitable washer B1 and rubberneck B2, both of well known description, are provided to form with clapper arm B3 a watertight joint... b) Someone or something with a… …   Wiktionary

  • 2009 U.S. state dinner security breaches — President Barack Obama greeting the Salahis in the Blue Room of the White House. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is in the background. On November 24, 2009, Michaele and Tareq Salahi (pronounced …   Wikipedia

  • Distracted driving — Distracted driving, a replacement phrase for the more popular terms texting while driving and talking while driving, is what occurs when a driver has something other than driving on his mind.[1] Driving becomes subsequent in importance to another …   Wikipedia

  • rubberneck — [[t]rʌ̱bə(r)nek[/t]] rubbernecks, rubbernecking, rubbernecked also rubber neck VERB (disapproval) If someone is rubbernecking, they are staring at someone or something, especially in a rude or silly way. [INFORMAL] [V n] The second accident was… …   English dictionary

  • rubberneck — 1. n. one who stares at something or someone; a tourist. □ At noon the sidewalks are crowded with rubbernecks. □ See if that rubberneck over there has the correct time. 2. in. to stare (at something or someone). □ What are all those people… …   Dictionary of American slang and colloquial expressions

Share the article and excerpts

Direct link
Do a right-click on the link above
and select “Copy Link”