cowabungaとは 意味・読み方・使い方

語源

Unknown, but was popularized (as Kowa-Bunga) by Chief Thunderthud on the American children's show Howdy Doody in the late 1940s or early 1950s, and became associated with American surfing culture. By the early 1980s, it was used as the catch-phrase of Cookie Monster on the American television show Sesame Street, and gained popularity with a broader audience after its use in the American cartoon Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles in the late 1980s and early 1990s. (For further treatment, see here.)

発音

• (General Australian) IPA: /ˌkæɔəˈbaŋɡə/
• (英国発音) IPA: /ˌkaʊəˈbʌŋɡə/
• (General American) enPR: kou'ə-bŭngʹə, IPA: /ˌkaʊəˈbʌŋɡə/

間投詞

cowabunga

1. (slang, originally US, usually humorous) Expressing amazement, enthusiasm, or joy.
   • 1954 Jan, Howdy Doody:

     Kowa-Bunga! Then Me Fix You Good! You Be Sorry.

   • 1963 August 9, Time:

     Shouting the surfer's cry ‘Cowabunga!’ they climb a 12-ft. wall of water and ‘take the drop’ off its shoulder.

   • 1991 December 9, The New Yorker, page 115:

     Both words turn up in the same sentence—as in ‘Cowabunga, it's humongous!’—when the children crowd around some toy.

   Cowabunga, dude!

同意語

• (expressing amazement): See Thesaurus:wow
• (expressing exuberant approval): See Thesaurus:yay

参照

• “cowabunga, int.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 2007.