While outsiders use the word nerd in a derogatory sense, at M.I.T. the generally accepted definition is someone interested in absolutely everything, except dress.

Like most great hip-hop albums, "Reasonable Doubt" is designed to delight word nerds.

In 2013 Mike Sutton the dysologist and criminologist discovered that nard was also called nerd back in 1799, making this discovery the first known published use of the word nerd, predating earlier etymological knowledge by 151 years.

Linguaphiles and word nerds around the world, give the gift of gab.

Scrabble's word nerds are a forgotten minority, a quiet contemplative bunch that can cackle with self-congratulation and read dictionaries for fun.

Koleszar recalled the word nerd from the historical fiction of which he was fond.

One of its creators chooses the name on seeing the word "nerd" spelled out backwards in scrabble letters.

He's a word nerd, and he likes nothing more than finding unexpected rhymes: "Last seen in Brooklyn, they found him by a Bronx lot/Rifles on the roof - yeah, we got him by a longshot."

Nobody--not William Safire, not the Oxford English Dictionary --has concretely pinned down the origin of the word nerd .

Page 117 has a cartoon with a caption showing the word nerd .