What, pray tell, might these nonsensical-looking words signify? That was my immediate reaction when this was posted as a comment to a facebook photo. . . I mean, I’m relatively in the know r.e. common slang – (grâce à mon travail au lycée), but gnar gnar is not one I’ve encountered before today.

Well, google was quick to jump to my aid, and a little perusing of urbandictionary.com’s explanations gave me futher insights. . . if that’s what we can call them. Here is my personal favorite that is highly amusing, if clearly incorrect:

Apparently “gnar” alone is short for “gnarly”, that ever-popular surfer-term that signifies the epitome of awesome and/or horrifically daring.

Gnar Gnar is thus not a sound emitted by gnomes during fits of uncontrollable laughter.

Instead it’s some kind of snow-bunny’s term for extreme or awesome conditions for boarding/skiing. Over time, it has morphed into a term that can be generously applied to everything . . . including the necklace I wore today.

via

This new fad of combining shortened words with repetition à la baby-talk is not one of my favorites.

Or, as one of my students said today, it’s getting’ cray-cray.