"Jinx" is also a term used when two people say the same thing at the same time and the person who says jinx first makes the other person not speak until somebody says his or her name. The only prevention for this state is to yell the word "buttercup" after the jinx. This can be countered by "Jinx no buttercups".This shows up a limitation of Wikipedia--the rules here are undoubtedly the rules that the author has experienced, but there are plenty of other rules too, since regional variation is rife in children's games and playground activities. (So go now and add your own rules to Wikipedia!) In Suzannah's experience:
When I was in school, if two people said the same thing at the same time you hurried to say "jinx" first - whoever lost wasn't supposed to talk until someone said their name. A bystander could also say it, and both of the people involved would be caught. I learned from a friend who grew up in another area that "pinch poke you owe me a coke" was the answer to this situation, or sometimes just "jinx you owe me a coke". I saw in an old movie (and another friend said she'd seen it in person) where the two people stopped for a second in their conversation and linked pinkies when this happened, then kept going.(I think we played with something like Suzannah's rule--but usually we just got bored with our friend not being able to talk so we'd unjinx them.) Over at The Law of the Playground there are some more versions. OED doesn't have this sense of jinx but does note that the word is 'orig. U.S.'.
Better Half says that he knows jinx from his days on a South London playground, where they said jinx and fainites. (Though BH remembered the word as "fainlights", making it difficult to look up. Some kind folks at the American Dialect Society set us straight on the spelling.) Fainites (and variations on it--OED lists fains, fains I, fainit...) gives the sayer immunity from jinxing or touching.
Off the playground in BrE, one is more likely to hear snap, which is, as the OED puts it, 'an exclamation used when two similar objects turn up or two similar events take place'. This doesn't have the cursing connotations of jinx and is used off the playground as well. For example, when playing Scrabble, if I announce my score and my opponent has the same score, she might say Snap! or if you reach for something at the same time as someone else, one of you could say it.
This use of snap comes from a card game of the same name, which is similar to the game I played as a child called slapjack--but there are many variations of this game (and other names for it) that are of varying similarity to snap. (Here are two--including one in which one actually slaps jacks.) Essentially, one splits a deck of cards between two people; both lay a card face up on the table and continue doing this, piling the cards on one another, until two cards match (e.g. two jacks). The first one to slap the pile and say (BrE) Snap!/(AmE-dialectal) Slapjack! gets to keep the pile (or in some versions not keep it--depending on whether the aim is to have all the cards or none of them). For young children, one can buy snap cards with pictures.
In my house, slapjack always ended in tears and accusations, and sometimes with being sent to one's room. The name snap sounds much more civili{s/z}ed. But is the game?
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That's excellent, Lynne, thanks! My curiosity is so much more satisfied now. I didn't know there was such a thing as immunity from jinxing. And I like that snap can be used for other things, like your same score in scrabble example. I wish there were a word here for that kind of thing! The best we can do is "hey we're twins" but it wouldn't work in all the examples you gave.
ReplyDelete"moot": I don't understand when an American says that something is moot.
ReplyDeletePlease see: https://separatedbyacommonlanguage.blogspot.com/2006/11/moot.html
DeleteIn the midlands we used to say snap then link little fingers (pinkies) and make a wish.
ReplyDeleteExactly the same thing we did in Australia and I've spent the last half hour trying to think of it!
DeleteI don't think, from the sounds of it, that Snap is any more genteel a game than Slapjack! It usually ended up in low-to-medium levels of violence between me and my brothers when we were young. When 'snap' is used in other contexts (Scrabble scores or two people wearing the same jumper or whatever), it doesn't tend to come to blows, which is fortunate.
ReplyDelete(Does AmE use 'moot' differently from BrE, then? I have heard it on US telly shows and it seems to have a pretty identical meaning, but maybe there's another sense.)
Yesterday in a meeting I said that I'd been doing my new job for a month and a day, and someone else said snap, meaning that he'd been doing his job for a month and a day too. That kind of usage you never get with jinx. Snap is more of a solidarity-builder.
ReplyDeleteDearieme--if you'd like to request new topics, can I ask you to use my e-mail link? For organisational purposes, I'd like to keep the comments sections related to the topics of their entries as much as possible.
Fair do's.
ReplyDeleteI think in Britain the saying of the same thing simultaneously as someone else is regarded as a lucky thing, not 'jinxed' at all. There is a little-finger linking, eye-closing and wish-making ritual associated with it, which I'll try to look up for you.
ReplyDeleteI love your site! I must add you to my blogroll. What fun!
ReplyDeleteLinking pinkies I recall. It was the result of any two in a group saying the same thing at the same time. But our variation was that you mustn't say anything until you'd each said a poet's name. That poet must not be Goldsmith.
ReplyDelete"Snap," of course, is said in a totally different situation in African-American English: it means, "Wow, you just got insulted!"
ReplyDeleteOne does that while snapping one's fingers though, right?
ReplyDeletePerhaps originally it was accompanied with a snapping of the fingers, but I've never seen that done.
ReplyDeleteIt's not even used exclusively as an insult or exclusively by African-Americans anymore, either. I've heard planty of black and white people my age (20s) use it as a spontaneous expression of anythign unexpected, from dismay ("Oh, snap! I forgot to pay the rent!") to joy ("Snap! She a hottie!").
In my childhood, one had to count to ten before a jinx could take effect, with the slower counter not allowed to speak until their name is said.
ReplyDeleteI really like the idea of using "Snap!" to mean "Me, too." It does remind me of an annoying practice in office conversation. When two people are dressed similarly, such as brown pants and blue shirts, one will invariably remark, "Oh, I see you got the memo!" The meaning, of course, is that someone sent out reminders about how everyone should dress the next day.
I grew up saying "jink" too, and then when you both said "jinx" at the same time it would just go on and on. My boys say "double jinx." There is no pinky link, though. We link pinkies when we "pinky promise" to mean than it is a promise that will NOT be broken (I guess ordinary ones can?)
ReplyDeleteThere is a game that sounds similar to slapjack (but with many more rules) called Egyptian Ratscrew (or ERS or Egyptian War) that was popular at my high school (in Evanston, IL). The fact that people at my summer camp from all around the US were well aware of it would seem to indicate that it was not just a Midwest or a Chicago thing.
ReplyDeleteKeeping one's rings on when playing ERS was seen as the equivalent of arming one's nuclear missiles and putting half the launch codes in: all but mutual annihilation assured.
I think I'm going to start using "(BrE) snap" in everyday conversation. It just seems all-around useful.
When I was a child and someone wanted a fight or game to end they crossed their fingers and shouted 'feinites' Children were honour bound to stop when that happened. I never really knew how it was spelled but that's what it sounded like.
ReplyDeleteGreat article!!
ReplyDeleteI am a bit confused how the 'buttercup' thing works - is anyone able to explain it a bit more.
Thanks!
In Tasmania around 1950 we used to link little fingers, wish and say the name of a poet. We could not say Shakespeare because this would 'spear the wish.
ReplyDeleteI was having a lovely game of online scrabble with an American when she suddenly turned all abusive. I was really taken aback and said something like "What the f was that for?" After it a bit it transpired that I had "started it" by saying "Snap". All I meant of course was that she had just played the the same word as I had. I had no idea of the negative connotation and so it was some time before I understood what had happened. A gesture of solidarity rebuffed. I wish she had been the one to say "What was that for?" before getting abusive.
ReplyDeleteI know that no one will probably see this but if you do and are like me please respond. I Googled "being able to say the same thing that someone else does at the same time." I can repeat what someone says at the exact time they say it. I can also do it in foreign languages that I do not speak. Is there anyone out there that can do this. It has no socially redeeming value not to mention it is highly annoying to the person being repeated. I only know of two people that can do this one being Merv Griffin and another man I saw on TV a long time ago.
ReplyDelete'Anonymous :I have been experiencing this quite often recently. Three times today. For example, I type or text a word, and someone says the same word on the television or beside me. In the caribbean when this happens we say " Die before me but don't kill me " instead of "jinx".
ReplyDeleteAt school we just used to say "SNAP" and that was that. However my kids say "Jinx", if they say it together they quickly say "PADAWAN 123", I guess this is a corruption of "PADLOCK" which is mentioned on Wikipedia.
ReplyDeleteI'm not sure if the variation is a North, South one, or simply that American English has snook in via Movies and TV.
What happens if someone is renegade jinxing and they’re saying Jinx when there is no jinx is there a punishment?
ReplyDeleteAs a child we had a version (in Dutch) "first pinch red" where you try to be the first to pinch the other and then touch something red after you both say something at the same time. I don’t believe there was a penalty for the one who was too late. But you were only to pinch the other if the other one didn't pinch you first.
ReplyDeleteFunny how there are versions of these games in different countries.
I have always played with the no jinx under roof rules. You get out of being jinxed if you can say the other person’s name before they say yours.
ReplyDeleteI grew up in Dallas (area) in the 70's and 80's. It's always been "Jinx - you owe me a coke" whomever says it first is the recipient; no further 'penalties'. We picked this up from our parents, who grew up here in the 40's, 50's, etc....and according to them, that's the only way they'd ever heard it as well. I have friends from the South and SW, and that's the only way (for the most part) I've ever heard from any of them as well.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up the first person would yell “Jinx!” and then follow it by saying “Pinch, poke, you owe me a coke.” (While gently pinching/poking the jinxed friend).
ReplyDeleteThe other person could counter with a pinch to the jinxer and saying “Pinch back you owe me a six pack.”
The counter to THAT was “Slap in the face you owe me a case.” There was no slapping with that one and no one ever received any cokes to my knowledge.
In 1950s and 60s we locked little fingers if we both said the same. My parents used feignites (from 'feign' meaning do or pretend to do) back in the 1930s to avoid being caught in Tig. By 1950s you said scribs and / or crossed your fingers.
ReplyDeletemy family would say 'jinx you owe me a soda pop and 25 cents' (or other variations of teh same) and occasionally the person would have to count to ten before the jinxed person said 'stop' or the jinx wouldn't stick
ReplyDeleteIn my grade school we had the same jinx rules, except that the counter-jinx word was "bence" or something like it. I've never encountered this word anywhere else, and might have just been local to that particular grade school at that particular time, but I've learned that words don't always come from somewhere. This one has bothered me for about 40 years.
ReplyDeletelovely. Was talking to a brit and i said jinx and he said snap! Came here to find out why <3
ReplyDelete