“I was in blobby answering some blitzes, but it was too facetimey so I’m moving to 3FB @now… Wanna grab LNC soon with some of my trippees? Or are you going to flair-themed tails tonight?”
Confused? If so, welcome to the dialect of what many call the “Dartmouth Bubble.” Incoming students are often puzzled by the seemingly enigmatic or strange slang words of the dialect on campus. Here is an extensive list of Dartmouth lingo so that, if anyone ever asks you the aforementioned question, you won’t need help putting words in your (Dart)mouth.
@now: right now; emphasizes the urgency of the situation. Frequently used, for example, in the 1000+ person “Free Food @Now” GroupMe to describe free food on campus to which students will soon flock from every direction.
A-side/B-side: describes the status of Greek houses. Roughly, and arguably, associated with being “cool” and “not as cool.”
BEMA: the Big Empty Meeting Area located behind the Ripley/Woodward/Smith housing cluster off of East Wheelock Street. Commonly known as one of the Dartmouth Seven locations.
Big Weekend: refers to Homecoming (fall term), Winter Carnival (winter term) or Green Key (spring term).
Blitz: Dartmouth’s email system. Can be either a noun (“I just sent you a blitz.”) or a verb (“Will you blitz out about the meeting later?”). And just a quick tip: check your blitzes frequently, and read through all of them. Otherwise bad things happen.
Blobby: Baker Library lobby. Avoid studying there if you ever need to be seriously focused.
-Cest: a hook-up or relationship between members of the same group, such as “tripcest” and “floorcest.”
Dark side: the seating area in Foco (see Foco entry) to the right of the door when you enter. Usually swamped with sports teams.
Dartmouth Seven: a challenge accomplished when people have been “intimate” in seven well-known locations on campus: the 50-yard line, the BEMA, the Green, the stacks, the steps of Dartmouth Hall, the Top of the Hop and the president’s front lawn. Attempt at your own risk.
Dartmouth X: refers to a supposed phenomenon among students in which men get more attractive and women get less attractive as time progresses at the College.
DBA: Declining balance account, or DBA, is essentially money that you can use to buy food if you can’t or don’t want to use a meal swipe. Pro tip: the only food place on campus that uses DBA exclusively is KAF (see KAF entry) so if you want to avoid a classic rookie mistake, do not ask the KAF workers to use a meal swipe.
DDS: Dartmouth Dining Services, which includes Foco, Collis, Novack and the Hop. People tend to develop a love-hate relationship with DDS, as exemplified by certain DDS items such as a delicious and popular Hop item, the tasty General Tso’s special, on one end and the questionable Novack vending machine sandwiches on the other.
Dirt: the Dirt Cowboy Cafe located on Main Street across from Collis.
Drill: fifty-minute foreign language sessions involving fast-paced questions and lots of finger snapping. Tip: don’t sign up for the 7:45 a.m. time slot. You will be perpetually sleep-deprived.
EBAs: Everything But Anchovies, a pizza place located in town. The food is mediocre at best, but it’s cheap, convenient and available until closing time at 2:10 a.m.
Facetimey: describes someone who likes to be seen. People who want “facetime” study on FFB or in Novack, eat at center tables in Foco and sit in Collis during 11:00 p.m. and 1:00 a.m. (prime LNC hours).
FFB, 2FB, 3FB, 4FB: First-floor Berry, second-floor Berry, third-floor Berry and fourth-floor Berry. The floors supposedly get quieter as you progress upwards in the library. FFB is known for being one of the most facetimey places on campus — there’s probably more chatter than work that happens there.
Flitz: flirty blitz. Sometimes contains clever questions, GIFs or even poems and is always highly stress-inducing for the sender.
Foco: the main dining hall on campus. “Foco” stands for Food Court, though the official name is Class of 1953 Commons. It’s the only all-you-can eat place at Dartmouth and thus the most likely source for the Freshman 15.
Good Sam: a Dartmouth policy that allows someone to call S&S (see S&S entry) for help in dealing with an intoxicated friend. Students and organizations that Good Sam a student will not be subject to disciplinary action with regards to the alcohol policy.
HPo: Hanover Police. They’re not quite as forgiving as S&S (see S&S entry).
KAF: the King Arthur Flour café in the library, and arguably the best place for coffee on campus. But be careful – frequent KAF-goers usually find themselves in negative DBA halfway through the term.
Ledyard Challenge: an act, usually attempted during sophomore summer, in which someone swims naked across the Connecticut River to Vermont and runs back (still naked) on the Ledyard Bridge. Public nudity is illegal in New Hampshire, however, so the challenger is in trouble (and very embarrassed) if S&S catches him or her.
Libs: the library. Almost always refers to Baker-Berry.
Light side: the left of Foco. It’s definitely the NARP-ier (see NARP entry) side seating area.
Listserv: large email lists for certain groups. Tip: be careful not to reply all to listserv blitzes — people tend to get irrationally annoyed.
LNC: Late Night Collis, or often the only place to find DDS food after midnight. Especially famous for mac and cheese bites, mozzarella sticks and chicken tenders.
Lou’s Challenge: an act accomplished when one pulls an all-nighter and goes to Lou’s Restaurant and Bakery on Main Street for breakfast when it opens in the morning. Tip: allot a day or so for recovery afterwards (aka do not attempt if you have an exam the next day).
MDF: Moving Dartmouth Forward, or College President Phil Hanlon’s plan for improving Dartmouth. Includes a new housing system, a hard alcohol ban and increased #AcademicRigor.
Meetings: gatherings within Greek houses from roughly 10:00 to 11:00 p.m. every Wednesday night. People don’t really know what happens at Meetings other than their own.
NARP: Non-Athletic Regular Person. Commonly used in reference to the NARP gym or Zimmerman Fitness Center.
Off-Campus Houses: Grandma’s House, Loveshack, Panarchy, Red Barn, Speakeasy, The Pebble, The Rock and Thugz.
Pong: Dartmouth’s classic frat basement game, which basically involves hitting a ping-pong ball back and forth on a table, with handle-less paddles. Each team, comprised of two people, tries to hit or sink the ball in cups of ~liquid~ on the other side.
*Golden-treed: refers to a pong team that lost without hitting a single cup on the other side. Usually associated with feelings of shame or embarrassment.
*Line: the amount of people who are waiting to play pong at a specific table.
*Masters: the campus-wide pong tournament that takes place over sophomore summer.
*“Need one”: translates to “I need one person to play pong with me — will you play?”
Prof: professor. Even profs refer to themselves as so.
Prospie: a prospective Dartmouth student.
Robo: Robinson Hall, the building next to Collis. It’s home to the Dartmouth Outing Club, The Dartmouth newspaper, the Student Wellness Center and Dartmouth Broadcasting Radio, but might be better known as the place with the lawn where you learned all those weird dances during Trips.
Rocky: the Rockefeller Center, which generally contains offices and classrooms for public policy and the social sciences.
S&S: Safety and Security, or Dartmouth’s own police force. They have a tendency to patrol anytime you don’t want to see them (on the way home from frat row) but are nowhere to be found when you actually need them (such as when you’ve locked yourself out of your room yet again).
Shmob: freshmen mob. Most commonly seen during the first few weeks of fall term.
Self-call: a comment in which one brags about oneself (and is usually then called out on it, despite whether or not it was intentional).
Shopping: searching for classes. When people “shop,” they sit in on classes they might want to take (contrary to what one might assume, it does not refer to shopping in stores of the bustling metropolis that is Main Street).
SWUG: Senior Washed-Up Girl. Often, the only people who identify SWUGs are senior girls referring to themselves. For example, “Ugh, I never have any fun anymore. I feel like such a SWUG.”
Tails: Greek house gatherings that usually take place on Wednesday, Friday and Saturday nights. The name originated from “cocktails.”
Townies: Hanover locals and usually the biggest Dartmouth fans at sporting events.
Trippee: a member of your first-year Dartmouth Outing Club Trip. You’ll probably cling to your trippees for the first week or so of freshman year and then never see them again, except for an occasional reunion dinner at Foco. Or, if you’re lucky, they’ll become your first best friends here at Dartmouth.
Warm-cut: during the winter, a path that allows someone to walk through a building and warm up for a minute. Often may be completely out of the way, but sometimes in negative degree weather, it’s necessary.
“Worst Class Ever”: a phrase that upperclassmen shout at freshmen while they run around the bonfire at Homecoming. Accompanies a demand to touch the fire (don’t).
’17, ’18, ’19, ’20: nouns that Dartmouth students use to identify people by their class year. For example, “He’s an ’18,” translates to, “He’s a junior.”
