Why Bananas Means Bonkers

Hello, you have A Way with Words.

Hi there, this is Eddie calling from Queens, New York.

Welcome to the show, we’re glad to have you.

What’s up?

Thank you.

Well, the other night I was watching some reruns of Buffy Vampire Slayer,

And they said a phrase, and I started to think,

Why are bananas the fruit that we associate with things that are crazy?

Like, what is particularly crazy about bananas?

So, on Buffy, somebody went bananas.

Yeah, or there’s some line. I don’t really remember, but it just got me thinking.

And I figured rather than Google it, I would call the experts.

Bananas are funny, right? I mean, it’s a funny word to begin with.

I mean, I’m thinking about the song, Yes, We Have No Bananas.

You know, would that song have been as funny if the refrain involved apples or pears?

I don’t think so.

I don’t know. I guess I just kind of wondered, like, is it common in other languages?

Is it just in English that we say so-and-so went bananas or this is all bananas?

Oh, that’s a really good question.

I don’t know about in other languages, but, like, there’s the term banana problem.

Do you know this term, banana problem?

No, I don’t think so.

I think it comes from the language of tech and computers.

But, like, when you’re uncertain about whether a project is actually finished and you’re uncertain about where to stop,

Like you’re designing a website and you keep adding more and more stuff and you probably should have stopped a while ago.

That’s called a banana problem.

And it comes from the joke about the kid who says, I know how to spell banana.

I just don’t know when to stop.

You know, all those letters.

A-N-A-N-A-N-A-N-A.

Yeah.

And then, of course, there’s the fact that we associate bananas with monkeys and their antics or slipping on a banana peel.

And I can tell you that by the early 1900s, people were using the term banana oil to mean nonsense for some reason.

And if you talked about somebody being bananas back then, sometimes, at least in underworld slang, it meant somebody was a degenerate.

But by the 1950s, on college campuses, bananas and go bananas, meaning being wacky or out of touch with reality, was being included in collections of campus slang.

There’s one from the late 1960s that defines the adjective bananas as excited and upset or wild.

And then the other thing is, I don’t know if you’re old enough to remember back in the 60s,

But there were rumors that you could dry and smoke banana peels,

And it would sort of give you a hallucinogenic effect.

And so there are a lot of different factors swirling around,

But I think basically it’s just that the word is a funny word.

What do you think?

Wow. I had never heard of people actually trying to smoke banana peels.

I feel like, I don’t know, I’m 40.

I’m so freaked out when the kids are trying to lick frogs or whatever.

Yeah, well, don’t try this at home.

Yeah, supposedly it doesn’t work.

I thought, Martha, that there was something to the story about monkeys and apes getting excited over bananas as their favorite fruit to eat.

Because this is why we also say that people go ape over something.

Yeah, right.

Yeah, monkeys in their antics.

Yeah, but it is a funny word.

Yeah, there were all these jokes when bananas became more common and you could get them at the grocery store that started appearing in the periodicals about the people who ate bananas for the first time.

And somebody would say, well, how’d you like it?

I’d say, well, I liked it pretty good, but the hull was kind of hard to eat.

Yeah, all these dumb jokes.

But that’s the thing that the banana just inspired, just like jokes, because it looks funny and it was just so unusual compared to your normal hand fruit.

Interesting.

That is good to know.

You said that you noticed it when you were watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

Do you use it in your everyday life?

All the time.

Go Bananas?

All the time.

Well, tell us about your life.

Usually when I use it, I usually just say B-A-N-A-N-A-S to stress how crazy something is at work.

But it’s my sort of euphemism for this is like a total cluster at work.

Yeah.

I’ve heard people go, this is Bananas.

Yep, yep, yep.

That’s probably how you say it without an items, yeah.

But it is kind of hard to stop, isn’t it, when you’re saying B-A-N-A-N-A?

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

Like a ball bouncing.

Well, I’m old enough to remember the Gwen Stefani hit,

So I definitely remember spelling bananas quite a lot.

What?

Wait, wait.

Gwen Stefani?

What’s it?

Wait, educators.

Yeah.

What?

In that song, Hollaback Girl, she says,

This is bananas, B-A-N-A-N-A-S.

Oh, yeah.

I don’t know why.

I think that probably was like a pretty big pop-it.

I was a flight attendant.

Yeah, it was.

It was a huge song.

Oh, my gosh.

And here I am quoting, yes, we have no bananas.

I think that’s from the 20s.

Okay, that’s why we call into the show.

I want to learn all of the history.

I’ve been a big fan for a long time, Martha and Graham.

I see your live shows, your Zoom shows.

A super fan.

Thank you so much for calling us.

We really appreciate it, dude.

Have a great day, Martha and Graham.

Thanks, Eddie.

We appreciate your comments.

Take care now.

Thanks.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

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