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[maries]

I was wondering about the "demographics of nerdiness" as well, as this article didn't seem to take into account regional/ethnic differences (e.g., I think these were all Californian white nerds, no?). Yes, the Asian/American thing is an interesting question...but what came to my mind was Jewishness.

Prof. Frink (sp?) on the Simpsons was revealed as Jewish, and the hyper-nerdy cousin of Kyle (?) on "South Park" is also hyper-Jewish (as opposed to hyper white).

I've always found it ironic that Jews, who were not white at all fifty years ago, are now a kind of hyper-white.   

[namazu]

There's also "bluestocking," used to describe a bookish female. I'm not sure if it carries a connotation of nerdiness.

Greetings to all from a longtime lurker who finally decided to toss in her $0.02!

Welcome, Violet!  It's always entertaining to see which threads draw people out of lurkerdom.

[nightowl]

Greetings to all from a longtime lurker who finally decided to toss in her $0.02!

Welcome to Lurker Violet!  Wow, you hit us with the whole two cents all at once!  Hope you have more sense to contribute to the forum in the future.  Glad to see a new face. 

(Don't worry, just like your email address, no one can really see your face. It was just a figure of speech.)

[daniel_von_flanagan]

Good grief, didn't Normal Mailer cover all this 50 years ago?

BTW, Gary Marx says (The White Negro and the Negro White
In Phylon. Summer 1967, vol. 28, no. 2, pp.168-177) that Norman Mailer's 1957 discussion of whites coopting black "hipness" was nothing new even then, and goes back at least to the early 19th century, eg A.C. Carmichael, Domestic Manners of the West Indies (London: Whitaker, Treacher & Co., 1833). - DvF