As it’s the end of a short workweek, I wanted to dive back into the blog with something on the lighter side of things and what could be an easier topic to bring up than a discussion of a fictitious profanity word. As the title of this entry infers, I’m talking about that BSG colloquialism – frak.

In case you haven’t caught it, the Associated Press is carrying a news story about the prolific nature of this invented swear word. The article has its beginnings from a blog entry by writer Lee Goldberg appropriately titled “The Power of Frak“. In his entry, Goldberg applauds “Battlestar Galactica” series creator Glen Larson for doing what few writers/TV show creators have been able to do – create a random meaningless word to replace a contemporary profane one so that it passes by network censors and yet still retains the intensity and meaning of the actual word it’s replacing. And he’s right – when you watch BSG and one of the characters says “frak off”, there’s no question what word the character is really saying. But at the same time, this made-up word works brilliantly in the context of the show in that it creates another layer of realism to the show’s backdrop, of these people being from another planet like Caprica, Picon, or Gemenon – after all, it’s only natural being from another civilization that they would have their own swear words. Click here to continue reading »”What the Frak! – Our Ever-Evolving Language For New Profanities”