Homer Simpson exclaiming the famous quote

"D'oh!" is a catch phrase first used in the United States in the 1960s and spelled "duh", but made globally popular by the fictional character Homer Simpson, from the long-running animated series The Simpsons (1989–present). Homer's ubiquitous catch phrase was famously added to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2002,^[1] without the apostrophe. The spoken word "D'oh" is a trademark of 20th Century Fox.^[2] It is typically used when Homer injures himself, realizes that he has done something stupid, or when something bad has happened or is about to happen to him. Other members of his family-including Bart, Lisa, Grampa, and even his mother and brother have all been known to use it themselves. Other characters have also used this phrase. Homer Simpson is also a character in the book and film The Day of the Locust. ... A catch phrase is a phrase or expression that is popularized, usually through repeated use, by a real person or fictional character. ... The 1960s decade refers to the years from the beginning of 1960 to the end of 1969. ... A fictional character is any person, persona, identity, or entity that is created from ones imagination or from an adaption of an existing entity. ... Homer Simpson is also a character in the book and film The Day of the Locust. ... An animated series or cartoon series is a television series produced by means of animation. ... Simpsons redirects here. ... The Oxford English Dictionary print set The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a dictionary published by the Oxford University Press (OUP), and is the most successful dictionary of the English language, (not to be confused with the one-volume Oxford Dictionary of English, formerly New Oxford Dictionary of English, of... A sound trademark is a non-conventional trademark where sound is used to perform the trademark function of uniquely identifying the commercial origin of products or services. ... Twentieth (20th) Century Fox Film Corporation (known from 1935 to 1985 as Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation) is one of the six major American film studios. ... For the comic book series of the same name, see Bart Simpson comics. ... Lisa Marie Simpson is a character in the animated television series The Simpsons, voiced by Yeardley Smith; Lisa is the only character Smith voices on a regular basis. ... Abraham J. Simpson also known as Grampa Simpson is a fictional character featured in the animated cartoon television series The Simpsons, voiced by Dan Castellaneta. ... This article is about a character from The Simpsons. ... Herbert Anthony Herb Powell is a fictional character on The Simpsons, voiced by Danny DeVito. ...

Origin

It is typically represented in the show's script as "(annoyed grunt)", and is so spelled out in the official titles of several episodes.^[3]

When Dan Castellaneta, the voice of Homer, was first asked to voice the exclamation, he rendered it as a drawn out "dohhhh" (pronounced the same as dough, but slightly stretched out), inspired by Jimmy Finlayson, the mustachioed Scottish actor who appeared in 33 Laurel and Hardy films. Finlayson coined the term as a minced oath for suggesting the word "Damn!" without actually saying it.^[4] The show's creator Matt Groening felt that it would better suit the timing of animation if it were spoken faster so Castellaneta shortened it to "D'oh!" (pronounced dough)^[5] Daniel Louis Dan Castellaneta (born October 29, 1957) is a three-time Emmy Award-winning American voice actor, actor and comedian, perhaps best known for providing the voice of Homer Simpson and other characters on the long-running FOX animated series The Simpsons. ... A voice actor (also a voice artist) is a person who provides voices for animated characters (including those in feature films, television series, animated shorts), voice-overs in radio and television commercials, audio dramas, dubbed foreign language films, video games, puppet shows, and amusement rides. ... Actor Jimmy Finlayson James Jimmy Finlayson (born August 27, 1887 in Falkirk, Scotland; died October 9, 1953 in Los Angeles) was a Scottish-American actor who worked in both silent and sound comedies. ... This article is about the country. ... Laurel and Hardy, in a promotional still from their 1937 feature film Way Out West. ... A minced oath, also known as a pseudo-profanity, is an expression based on a profanity which has been altered to reduce or remove the disagreeable or objectionable characteristics of the original expression; for example, gosh used instead of God, darn instead of damn,heck instead of hell and freaking... dAmn (deviantART messaging network) is the name of the real-time chat system implemented on deviantART version 4. ... Matthew Abram Groening is an American cartoonist (Life in Hell) and the Emmy Award-winning creator of the animated series, The Simpsons and Futurama. ...

It was first heard on a Tracey Ullman Show short entitled "Punching Bag", which first aired on November 27, 1988. When Bart and Lisa try to hide a punching bag with Homer's face on it, it knocks him out. Homer's reaction is "D'oh!" The next occasion it was heard was in the first episodes of The Simpsons, "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire", which first aired on December 17, 1989. The Simpsons made their TV debut on The Tracey Ullman Show in 1987 The Simpsons shorts are a series of 48 one-minute shorts that ran on the variety show The Tracey Ullman Show for three seasons, before the characters spun off into their own half-hour prime time show... is the 331st day of the year (332nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1988 (MCMLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Friday (link displays 1988 Gregorian calendar). ... Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire, also known as The Simpsons Christmas Special,[2] was the first full-length episode of The Simpsons to air despite originally being the eighth episode produced for season one. ... December 17 is the 351st day of the year (352nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1989 (MCMLXXXIX) was a common year starting on Sunday (link displays 1989 Gregorian calendar). ...

Prior to its use on the Simpsons, the word "D'oh!" appears in the movie It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) at the 1 hour 23 minute mark when J. Russell Finch (played by Milton Berle) uses it repeatedly after stubbing his toe on a rock while attempting to kick Lt. Col. J. Algernon Hawthorne (played by Terry Thomas). Its a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World is a 1963 American comedy film directed by Stanley Kramer about the madcap pursuit of $350,000 of stolen cash by a diverse and colorful group of strangers. ... Milton Berle (July 12, 1908 - March 27, 2002) was an Emmy-winning American comedian who was born Milton Berlinger. ... Terry-Thomas (left) and Clive Morton in Lucky Jim (1957) Terry-Thomas (July 14, 1911 – January 8, 1990) was a distinctive English comic actor. ...

Variations

Homer framing his catchphrase without the aid of speech, in "Jaws Wired Shut".

Variations of the catch phrase have appeared in some episodes of The Simpsons. Image File history File links Homer_doh2. ... Image File history File links Homer_doh2. ... Jaws Wired Shut is the ninth episode of the thirteenth season of The Simpsons. ...

• In "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire" (1989), when being a mall Santa, after Homer bumps his head he says, "Ho-ho-d'oh!"

• In "Burns' Heir", (1994), Mr. Burns decides to make Bart his heir and tries to convince Bart that his family doesn't want him anymore. He allows Bart to watch his "family", actually actors hired by Burns, on closed-circuit television. The Homer impersonator (who bears an uncanny resemblance to Michael Caine) drops his sandwich and exclaims "b'oh!" Bart comments that something about his family doesn't seem quite right. At this, Burns switches off the monitor, scurries onto the set and tells the actor "Homer Simpson doesn't say 'B'oh', he says...(looks through script)...'D'oh'!"; when "Homer" tries again, he says it nearly correctly (da oh), if unconvincingly.

• In "Bart of Darkness" (1994), Homer accidentally builds a large barn, when intending to build a pool. An Amish man comments, "'Tis a fine barn, but sure 'tis no pool, English." Homer responds with a "D'oheth!"

• In "Bart Gets an Elephant" (1994), when forced to clean the Simpson home, Homer tries to duck out quickly by volunteering to clean the basement. When everybody agrees without hesitation, Homer exclaims "D'oh?" (with a rising inflection, as if he is asking a question). When he opens the basement door, he exclaims a normal "D'oh!" when he sees what a mess the basement is.
• Also in "Bart Gets an Elephant", when Homer crashes their car into a preserved deer statue, he, Lisa, and Marge say, in sequence, "D'oh!" (doe), "A deer!", "A female deer!", an allusion to the "Do-Re-Mi" song in The Sound of Music.

• In "Raging Abe Simpson and His Grumbling Grandson in "The Curse of the Flying Hellfish", when the assassin hired to kill Grampa is disguised (badly) as Homer, Grampa escapes and he says "D'ò!" (A variation of "D'oh", without the abrupt ending.)

• In "Thirty Minutes over Tokyo" (1999), on a family trip to Japan, Homer said something in Japanese along the lines of "shimatta-baka-ni," which was translated in subtitles as "D'oh!" Shimatta in Japanese is roughly equivalent to "damn it!", whereas Baka ni is, by Japanese grammar, more literally taken as an adverb (pointed out by the particle ni after a na adjective radical), meaning "stupidly", with the root word baka being used traditionally to describe an idiotic or foolish person or thing. Japanese speakers normally use baka in relation to silly animals or inanimate things; it is considered extremely rude when used in reference to humans. In the actual Japanese dub, "D'oh" is not translated, but is written in hiragana as どっ！(do!!).

• In The Simpsons Movie, when Homer finds out Springfield is being enclosed in a dome, he yells "D'ooooooohme!".

Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire, also known as The Simpsons Christmas Special,[2] was the first full-length episode of The Simpsons to air despite originally being the eighth episode produced for season one. ... Burns Heir is the eighteenth episode of The Simpsons fifth season, first aired on April 14, 1994. ... Mr. ... This article refers to a surveillance system. ... This article is about the English actor. ... Bart of Darkness is the first episode of The Simpsons sixth season, which originally aired September 4, 1994. ... This article is about Old Order Amish, but also refers to other Amish sects. ... Bart Gets an Elephant is the seventeenth episode of The Simpsons fifth season. ... Bart Gets an Elephant is the seventeenth episode of The Simpsons fifth season. ... Do Re Mi is a theater musical with music by Jule Styne, lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green and book by Garson Kanin. ... For other uses, see The Sound of Music (disambiguation). ... Raging Abe Simpson and His Grumbling Grandson in The Curse of the Flying Hellfish is the 22nd episode of The Simpsons seventh season. ... Abraham J. Simpson also known as Grampa Simpson is a fictional character featured in the animated cartoon television series The Simpsons, voiced by Dan Castellaneta. ... Thirty Minutes over Tokyo is the season finale of The Simpsons tenth season, which originally aired on May 16, 1999. ... Hiragana ) is a Japanese syllabary, one component of the Japanese writing system, along with katakana and kanji; the Latin alphabet is also used in some cases. ... The Simpsons Movie is a 2007 animated comedy film based on the animated television series The Simpsons, directed by David Silverman, and scheduled to be released worldwide by July 27, 2007. ...

Episode names

When originally created, the word didn't have an official spelling. Instead, it was written as "(Annoyed Grunt)". In recognition of this, several episodes feature the phrase "(Annoyed Grunt)" in the episode title where one would usually expect the hear "D'oh!" (because it rhymes and sounds better). Such episodes include:

• "I, (Annoyed Grunt)-Bot"
  … a play on I, Robot,
• "Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(Annoyed Grunt)cious"
  … a parody of the song Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious in Mary Poppins,
• "E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt)"
  … a parody of Old MacDonald Had a Farm, and
• "G.I. (Annoyed Grunt)"
  … a parody of G.I. Joe.

In early airings, the closed captioning (CC) of the show displayed "(Annoyed Grunt)" in place of where "D'oh!" is heard. I, Doh-Bot is the ninth episode of The Simpsons fifteenth season, which originally aired January 11, 2004. ... I, Robot is a collection of nine English language science fiction short stories by Isaac Asimov, first published by Gnome Press in 1950 in an edition of 5,000 copies. ... Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(Annoyed Grunt)cious, also known as Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(doh)cious[2] is the thirteenth episode of The Simpsons eighth season and originally aired February 7, 1997. ... Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (pronounced ) is an English word in the song with the same title in the musical film Mary Poppins. ... For the 2004 stage musical, see Mary Poppins (musical). ... E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt) is the fifth episode of the eleventh season of The Simpsons. ... Old McDonald Had a Farm is a childrens song about a farmer named McDonald and the various animals he keeps on his farm. ... G.I. (Annoyed Grunt), i. ... 1960s Action Soldier Adventure Team circa 1973 G.I. Joe is a line of military-themed commandos produced by the toy company Hasbro. ... A commonly-used symbol indicating that a program or movie is closed-captioned. ...

Five episodes so far have "D'oh" in their titles (all in later seasons):

• "D'oh!-in' in the Wind" (Season 10),
• "Days of Wine and D'oh!'ses" (Season 11),
• "C.E. D'oh!" (Season 14),
• "We're on the Road to D'oh!where" (Season 17), and
• "He Loves to Fly and He D'oh!s" (Season 19).

Doh-in In the Wind is the sixth episode from the tenth season of The Simpsons. ... The Simpsons tenth season originally aired between August 1998 and May 1999, beginning on Sunday, August 23, 1998. ... Days of Wine and Dohses is the eighteenth episode of the eleventh season of The Simpsons. ... The Simpsons 11th season (September 1999 - May 2000) began on Sunday, September 26, 1999 with Beyond Blunderdome. ... C.E. Doh is the fifteenth episode of The Simpsons fourteenth season. ... The Simpsons 14th season (November 2002 - May 2003) began on Sunday, November 3, 2002 with Treehouse of Horror XIII. The season contains five hold-over episodes from the season 13 (DABF) production line. ... Were on the Road to Dohwhere is the eleventh episode of the seventeenth season of The Simpsons. ... The Simpsons celebrate Labor Day in this promotional artwork for the series 17th season. ... He Loves to Fly and He Dohs is the season premiere of The Simpsons’ nineteenth season and first aired on September 23, 2007. ... The Simpsons 19th season (2007 - 2008) began airing on Fox on September 23, 2007. ...

Usage

The term d'oh! has been adopted by many Simpsons fans, and even by people that are not specifically fans. The term has become commonplace in modern speech and demonstrates the extent of the show's influence. "D'oh" has been added to the English language Wiktionary, the Webster's Millennium Dictionary of English, the Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners and the Oxford English Dictionary. It is defined as: "expressing frustration at the realization that things have turned out badly or not as planned, or that one has just said or done something foolish. Also (usu. mildly derogatory), implying that another person has said or done something foolish (cf. DUH int.)." The OED etymologizes the word as "popularized by" The Simpsons, but lists usages as early as 1945. It is also now becoming a popular minced oath for many various curse words, especially damn. Wiktionary (a portmanteau of wiki and dictionary) is a multilingual, Web-based project to create a free content dictionary, available in over 151 languages. ... 1888 advertisement for Websters Dictionary Websters Dictionary is the common title given to English language dictionaries in the United States, derived from American lexicographer Noah Webster. ... The Oxford English Dictionary print set The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is a dictionary published by the Oxford University Press (OUP), and is the most successful dictionary of the English language, (not to be confused with the one-volume Oxford Dictionary of English, formerly New Oxford Dictionary of English, of... A minced oath, also known as a pseudo-profanity, is an expression based on a profanity which has been altered to reduce or remove the disagreeable or objectionable characteristics of the original expression; for example, gosh used instead of God, darn instead of damn,heck instead of hell and freaking... In cartoons, profanity is often depicted by substituting symbols for words, as a form of non-specific censorship. ... dAmn (deviantART messaging network) is the name of the real-time chat system implemented on deviantART version 4. ...

The term has also been used in popular culture beyond The Simpsons, sometimes as a reference to the program. For example, in a 2008 episode of Doctor Who, an Ood with a mark VI translator mechanisim set on a "comedy classic" option says "D'oh!"^[6] Planet of the Ood is the third episode of the fourth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who. ... This article is about the television series. ... This is a list of monsters and aliens from the long-running BBC science fiction television series Doctor Who. ...

In the German-dubbed version, "d'oh!" is translated as "Nein!" (No!); in the Spanish-dubbed version, it is ¡Ou!. The pronunciation, with the proper Homer-like intonation (the word dough or doe, pronounced as a quick-sounding yelp), has also entered the popular culture of many Spanish-speaking countries. The closed captions for the program in the U.S. spell it as "D-ohh!". Closed captioning allows deaf, hard of hearing / hearing_impaired, and other people to read, through captions, a transcript of the audio portion of a video that they cannot hear. ...

See also

Look up d'oh in
Wiktionary, the free dictionary.

• ¡Ay, caramba!
• Culturally significant phrases from The Simpsons
• Uh-oh (expression)

Wiktionary (a portmanteau of wiki and dictionary) is a multilingual, Web-based project to create a free content dictionary, available in over 151 languages. ... Look up ¡Ay, caramba! in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Simpsons redirects here. ... Uh-oh! is a ubiquitous interjection or expression of dismay in the English language, generally uttered in anticipation, rather than after something bad has happened. ...

References

This article is about the year. ... is the 165th day of the year (166th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Also see: 2002 (number). ... is the 337th day of the year (338th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 228th day of the year (229th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 237th day of the year (238th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(Annoyed Grunt)cious, also known as Simpsoncalifragilisticexpiala(doh)cious[2] is the thirteenth episode of The Simpsons eighth season and originally aired February 7, 1997. ... E-I-E-I-(Annoyed Grunt) is the fifth episode of the eleventh season of The Simpsons. ... I, Doh-Bot is the ninth episode of The Simpsons fifteenth season, which originally aired January 11, 2004. ... G.I. (Annoyed Grunt), i. ... Doh-in In the Wind is the sixth episode from the tenth season of The Simpsons. ... Days of Wine and Dohses is the eighteenth episode of the eleventh season of The Simpsons. ... C.E. Doh is the fifteenth episode of The Simpsons fourteenth season. ... Were on the Road to Dohwhere is the eleventh episode of the seventeenth season of The Simpsons. ... He Loves to Fly and He Dohs is the season premiere of The Simpsons’ nineteenth season and first aired on September 23, 2007. ... Charles Mackintoshs Glasgow Herald building, now The Lighthouse The Herald is a national broadsheet newspaper published Monday to Saturday in Glasgow, Scotland, with an audited circulation of 71,000, making it the best-selling national Scottish broadsheet newspaper. ... For other uses, see Glasgow (disambiguation). ... is the 202nd day of the year (203rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... Year 2007 (MMVII) was a common year starting on Monday of the Gregorian calendar in the 21st century. ... is the 203rd day of the year (204th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1994 (MCMXCIV) The year 1994 was designated as the International Year of the Family and the International Year of the Sport and the Olympic Ideal by the United Nations. ... is the 42nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. ... 2008 (MMVIII) is the current year, a leap year that started on Tuesday of the Anno Domini (or common era), in accordance with the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 110th day of the year (111th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...

External links

• The definitive "D'oh" list
• Homer Simpson says "D'oh!" 32 times (WAV sound file)
• D'oh! joins the Oxford English Dictionary - BBC News