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Emo (from emotional) is a slang term used to describe a wide range of fashion styles and attitudes somewhat affiliated with emo music and its related scenes.
History
Origins
Main article: Emo (music)For more than a decade, the term emo was used almost exclusively to describe the genre of music that spawned from the 1980s DC scene and all of the bands inspired by it. However, during the late 1990s, as emo music began to emerge from the underground into popular consciousness, the term began to be used as a reference for more than just the music.
The origin of the word emo itself is unclear. In a 1985 interview by Rites of Spring in Flipside Magazine, members of the band noted that some of their fans in DC were starting to call them "emo", arguably because of the state of emotion that the band displayed during their shows. In later years, the word emo was viewed as a contraction of "emotional hardcore" or "emocore", which was the popular designation of the music genre. (One contingent of the scene insists that emo is a contraction for "emotive hardcore". However, no primary source has been found to confirm use of that term prior to the mid-1990s.)
In recent years, as its use has come to define more than just the music, the word emo has more often been viewed as simply being short for "emotional".
Alternative uses
The term "emo" has also been used in recent years on the Internet as a form of derogatory insult, especially toward those who appear emotionally unstable, or those who talk about issues in their lives to people in public forums or chat rooms. Similar to popular curses, it tends to be used as a general insult even when it is not directly applicable. Phrases such as "don't cry emo kid" are used frequently as a quick brush-off in this context. Some use the term "emo" to describe a feeling of depression, harking back to the association of depression with the Emo subculture.