Random Neural Firings

the inner workings of a restless creative brain

O.K. – So What Does O.K. Stand For?

July30

ok

I never thought about it until I was typing “O.K.” in a sentence the other day. I wondered if it was O.K. to type O.K. in lowercase letters (o.k.) and so I did what any sensible person would, I Googled it. Along the way, I stumpled upon this Wikipedia entry for “Okay” (a/k/a/ “O.K.” or “OK” but not “o.k.”). It turns out nobody’s quite sure what it stands for or how it got started. There are theories of course. Quoting Wikipedia:

There are four proposed etymologies which have received material academic support since the 1960s. They are:

  1. the Greek words “Ola Kala” meaning “everything’s good” used by Greek rail-road workers in America
  2. the acronym of the “comically misspelled” oll korrect
  3. the Choctaw word okeh
  4. the Wolof and Bantu word waw-kay or the Mande (aka “Mandinke” or “Mandingo”) phrase o ke

Read the whole entry if you’re curious.

O.K., so that clears up “O.K.” Nobody knows, including me. Now I’m trying to understand my friend Vesatee’s version: “Obekabe,” which she tells me is a Fat Albert/Cosby show thing.

Hey, I warned you this blog was random!

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One Comment to

“O.K. – So What Does O.K. Stand For?”

  1. On July 30th, 2009 at 11:12 am Vesatee Turk Says:

    Ok, Terri remembers obekabe from Fat Albert- does anyone else. This blog was totally random and very funny- while being somewhat insightful!

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