{"id":81415,"date":"2015-01-09T13:59:33","date_gmt":"2015-01-09T18:59:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=81415"},"modified":"2016-03-23T11:38:57","modified_gmt":"2016-03-23T15:38:57","slug":"are-you-okay","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/","title":{"rendered":"Are You Okay?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_81422\" style=\"width: 610px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-81422\" class=\"wp-image-81422\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\" alt=\"okay\" width=\"600\" height=\"672\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png 1000w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay-268x300.png 268w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay-768x860.png 768w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay-914x1024.png 914w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-81422\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Illustration: Mohamed Ibrahim<\/p><\/div>\n<p>We have all heard the theories: <em>OK<\/em> is of Choctaw derivation, or possibly West African. Some linguists attribute it to the\u00a0\u201ccomical misspellings\u201d craze of the 1830s, while others cite Martin Van Buren\u2019s Old Kinderhook campaign, or attempts to lampoon Andrew Jackson as an illiterate who couldn\u2019t manage \u201call correct.\u201d \u00a0<\/p>\n<p>What is pretty generally agreed is that the first published usage dates from 1839, in the\u00a0<em>Boston Morning Post.\u00a0<\/em>Describing an outing by the Anti-Bell-Ringing Society, the paper reports: <!--more--><\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>The above is from the\u00a0<em>Providence Journal<\/em>, the editor of which is a little too quick on the trigger, on this occasion. We said not a word about our deputation passing \u201cthrough the city\u201d of Providence.\u2014We said our brethren were going to New York in the Richmond, and they did go, as per Post of\u00a0Thursday. The \u201cChairman of the Committee on Charity Lecture Bells,\u201d is one of the deputation, and perhaps if he should return to Boston, via Providence, he of the Journal, and his\u00a0<em>train<\/em>-band, would have his \u201ccontribution box,\u201d et ceteras,\u00a0<em>o.k.<\/em>\u2014all correct\u2014and cause the corks to fly, like\u00a0<em>sparks<\/em>, upward.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>This society was one of many waggish stunts pulled by Bostonians of the age, a deep series of in-jokes based on other in-jokes. As should be evident from this passage, not many vestiges of this sort of early-nineteenth-century American wit have survived the ages.\u00a0<em>O.K.<\/em>, however,\u00a0has not merely abided but prospered. True, more often than not it denotes mere adequacy. All correct? Correctness is rarely what people care about nowadays; we want to be dazzled, impressed.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>But when you comfort a crying child, that\u2019s what you say: It\u2019s okay. Because whatever is in the child\u2019s mind at that moment is, to him or her, the worst thing in the world. And when we get down to questions of life or death, <em>okay<\/em> remains the word we most want to hear.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>We have all heard the theories: OK is of Choctaw derivation, or possibly West African. Some linguists attribute it to the\u00a0\u201ccomical misspellings\u201d craze of the 1830s, while others cite Martin Van Buren\u2019s Old Kinderhook campaign, or attempts to lampoon Andrew Jackson as an illiterate who couldn\u2019t manage \u201call correct.\u201d \u00a0 What is pretty generally agreed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":178,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13115],"tags":[4215,1456,3148,10882,16548,2861,687,16547,270,2393],"class_list":["post-81415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-our-daily-correspondent","tag-andrew-jackson","tag-boston","tag-cnn","tag-etymology","tag-euphemisms","tag-history","tag-language","tag-okay","tag-paris","tag-words"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Etymology of \u201cOkay\u201d<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"In 1839, the initials \u201cO.K.\u201d were first published in The Boston Morning Post.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Are You Okay? by Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"January 9, 2015 \u2013 We have all heard the theories: OK is of Choctaw derivation, or possibly West African. Some linguists attribute it to the\u00a0\u201ccomical misspellings\u201d craze of\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-01-09T18:59:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2016-03-23T15:38:57+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1000\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"1120\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sadie Stein\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sadie Stein\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sadie Stein\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/a1aef49f81bfc540a37e03590f3bb4d9\"},\"headline\":\"Are You Okay?\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-01-09T18:59:33+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-03-23T15:38:57+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\"},\"wordCount\":337,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\",\"keywords\":[\"Andrew Jackson\",\"Boston\",\"CNN\",\"etymology\",\"euphemisms\",\"history\",\"language\",\"okay\",\"Paris\",\"words\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Our Daily Correspondent\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\",\"name\":\"The Etymology of \u201cOkay\u201d\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-01-09T18:59:33+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2016-03-23T15:38:57+00:00\",\"description\":\"In 1839, the initials \u201cO.K.\u201d were first published in The Boston Morning Post.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/okay.png\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2015\/01\/09\/are-you-okay\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Are You Okay?\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"description\":\"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. 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