Culturally significant words and phrases from The Simpsons

Several memes (often neologisms) that started on The Simpsons have now become mainstream words or sayings. The most famous of which is Homer's saying: "D'oh!", which is referred to in scripts, as well as several episode names, as "annoyed grunt". D'oh is now listed in the OED. Other memes are:

Scotchtoberfest

Scotchtoberfest is a fake Scottish festival which featured in a Simpsons episode. It was invented by Principal Seymour Skinner to catch Bart Simpson red-handed in the act of perpetrating a prank, as is Bart's perennial wont. Groundskeeper Willy, the Scottish school janitor, plays the bagpipes whilst wearing a kilt. Bart lifts his kilt with helium balloons, and since Willy wears his kilt without underpants, at least one woman faints at the sight.

Since its appearance, some Scots have made Scotchtoberfest into a real festival, held on the third Friday of every October. For most people who celebrate it, it is simply "a celebration of all things Scottish". It is obviously a pun on the Bavarian Oktoberfest.

Kwyjibo

Kwyjibo is a fictitious word made up by Bart Simpson during a game of Scrabble with his family. In the episode Bart the Genius, Bart puts "Kwyjibo" on the board and scores upwards of 150 points (50 of those points having been obtained by using all his letters). When Homer Simpson asks Bart what a Kwyjibo is, Bart replies, "A big, dumb, balding North American ape. With no chin." Marge Simpson adds in, "…and a short temper". At this point, Homer chases Bart away, causing him to exclaim, "Uh oh! Kwyjibo on the loose!". Humorously enough, earlier in that same episode, Homer moans words to the effect of "How could anyone form a good word out of these letters?" His Scrabble letters spell OXIDIZE, and were arranged in that order.

Kwyjibo acquired some later notoriety as an alias used by the writer of the Melissa worm.

Kwyjibo was also adopted as the name of a relatively advanced and popular yo-yo string trick in 1999 by Taylor Whitley, the trick's creator. The trick is often misspelled as Kwijibo, possibly as a result of a webboard poster who went by that handle.

Embiggen and cromulent

When schoolteacher Edna Krabappel hears the Springfield town motto "A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man," she comments that she never heard embiggens before moving to Springfield. Another teacher, Miss Hoover, replies that "it's a perfectly cromulent word".

Later in the same episode, while talking about Homer's audition for the role of town crier, Principal Skinner states "He's embiggened that role with his cromulent performance."

Based on the context in which Miss Hoover uses the word cromulent, we can interpret that it means "legitimate" or "appropriate". Lisa uses it later in that episode in a similar manner. Among Simpsons fans, the word cromulent has taken on an ironic meaning, to say that something is not at all legitimate and in fact spurious.

Embiggens can be interpreted to mean "to improve and make nobler" from the context in which the word is used. For example, a sentence that uses the word embiggens could be: "The spirit of Jebediah Springfield embiggens us all."

Both embiggens and cromulent were quickly adopted and used by Simpsons fans.

Yvan Eht Nioj

Yvan Eht Nioj is a catchy chorus from the hit song Drop Da Bomb by the Party Posse. It is actually a subliminal message encouraging listeners to join the navy. "Yvan Eht Nioj" backwards is "Join the navy". Lisa Simpson discovers this while viewing a video of the Party Posse. The United States Navy operative Lt. L.T. Smash later reveals to Lisa that the Navy had a "three-pronged" plan for advertisement: the subliminal messages, their regular "liminal" messages, and super-liminal messages. Lisa does not understand what Smash means by "Super-liminal", so he demonstrates: Smash opens his office window and shouts to Lenny and Carl, who are passing on the street, "Hey you! Join the Navy!" They do.

Tomacco

Tomacco is a fictional fruit that is half tomato and half tobacco.

Main article: Tomacco.

Smarch

In the Halloween episode Tree House of Horror VI, the thirteenth month is Smarch. Smarch was, according to Marge Simpson, just a misprinted word on a calendar.