What is "smut"

Dust \Dust\ (d[u^]st), n. [AS. dust; cf. LG. dust, D. duist meal dust, OD. doest, donst, and G. dunst vapor, OHG. tunist, dunist, a blowing, wind, Icel. dust dust, Dan. dyst mill dust; perh. akin to L. fumus smoke, E. fume. [root]7

1. ] 1. Fine, dry particles of earth or other matter, so comminuted that they may be raised and wafted by the wind; that which is crumbled to minute portions; fine powder; as, clouds of dust; bone dust.

   Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return.
   --Gen. iii. 19.

   Stop! -- for thy tread is on an empire's dust.
   --Byron.

2. A single particle of earth or other matter. [R.] ``To touch a dust of England's ground.''
   --Shak.

3. The earth, as the resting place of the dead.

   For now shall sleep in the dust.
   --Job vii. 21.

4. The earthy remains of bodies once alive; the remains of the human body.

   And you may carve a shrine about my dust.
   --Tennyson.

5. Figuratively, a worthless thing.

   And by the merit of vile gold, dross, dust.
   --Shak.

6. Figuratively, a low or mean condition.

   [God] raiseth up the poor out of the dust.
   --1 Sam. ii. 8.

7. Gold dust; hence: (Slang) Coined money; cash.

   Down with the dust, deposit the cash; pay down the money. [Slang] ``My lord, quoth the king, presently deposit your hundred pounds in gold, or else no going hence all the days of your life. . . . The Abbot down with his dust, and glad he escaped so, returned to Reading.''
   --Fuller.

   Dust brand (Bot.), a fungous plant ( Ustilago Carbo); -- called also smut.

   Gold dust, fine particles of gold, such as are obtained in placer mining; -- often used as money, being transferred by weight.

   In dust and ashes. See under Ashes.

   To bite the dust. See under Bite, v. t.

   To raise dust, or

   To kick up dust, to make a commotion. [Colloq.]

   To throw dust in one's eyes, to mislead; to deceive.

1660s, "black mark, stain," from verb smutten "debase, defile" (late 14c.), later "stain or mark with soot, etc." (1580s), cognate with Middle High German smotzen "make dirty," from West Germanic *smutt- (cognates: Middle High German smuz "grease, dirt;" German Schmutz "dirt," schmutzen "to make dirty"). The meaning "indecent or obscene language" is first attested 1660s.

n. 1 (context uncountable English) soot. 2 (context uncountable English) Sexually vulgar material; something that is sexual in a dirty way; pornographic material. 3 (context uncountable English) Obscene language; ribaldry; obscenity. 4 (context derogatory English) A promiscuous woman. 5 Any of a range of fungi, mostly Ustilaginomycetes, that cause plant disease in grasses, including cereal crops; the disease so caused. 6 (context mining English) Bad, soft coal containing earthy matter, found in the immediate locality of faults. vb. 1 To stain (or be stained) with soot etc. 2 (context intransitive English) To gather smut; to be converted into smut; to become smutted. 3 To taint (grain, etc.) with the smut fungus. 4 To clear of the smut fungus.

1. n. a black colloidal substance consisting wholly or principally of amorphous carbon and used to make pigments and ink [syn: carbon black, lampblack, soot]

2. destructive diseases of plants (especially cereal grasses) caused by fungi that produce black powdery masses of spores

3. any fungus of the order Ustilaginales [syn: smut fungus]

4. creative activity (writing or pictures or films etc.) of no literary or artistic value other than to stimulate sexual desire [syn: pornography, porno, porn, erotica]

5. [also: smutting, smutted]

1. v. make obscene; "This line in the play smuts the entire act"

2. stain with a dirty substance, such as soot

3. become affected with smut; "the corn smutted and could not be eaten"

4. affect with smut or mildew, as of a crop such as corn

5. [also: smutting, smutted]

Smut may refer to:

• Smut (fungus), a group of plant parasitic fungi
• Smut (comics), an adult British comic title dating back to the 1980s
• A colloquial term for obscenity in general or pornography in particular
• Jimmy Means, a former NASCAR driver nicknamed "Smut"
• "Smut", a song by Tom Lehrer from his 1965 album That Was the Year That Was, referencing the colloquial meaning of the term

The smuts are multicellular fungi characterized by their large numbers of teliospores. The smuts get their name from a Germanic word for dirt because of their dark, thick-walled, and dust-like teliospores. They are mostly Ustilaginomycetes (of the class Teliomycetae, subphylum Basidiomycota) and can cause plant disease. The smuts are grouped with the other basidiomycetes because of their commonalities concerning sexual reproduction.

Smuts are cereal and crop pathogens that most notably affect members of the grass family ( Poaceae). Economically important hosts include maize, barley, wheat, oats, sugarcane, and forage grasses. They eventually hijack the plants' reproductive systems, forming galls which darken and burst, releasing fungal teliospores which infect other plants nearby. Before infection can occur, the smuts need to undergo a successful mating to form dikaryotic hyphae (two haploid cells fuse to form a dikaryon).

Smut was a British adult comics magazine that was launched on May 1, 1989. "Smut" is a British term for any form of media that is considered profane or offensive, particularly with regards to sexual content. Smut comic was named as such for good reason.

The comic was similar to Viz, although was considered to be a downmarket copycat of Viz, being less subtle and lacking in Viz's surreal satire, and printed on lower quality paper.

Its strips were usually heavily violent, full of profanity and with themes many may regard as being politically incorrect. Its flagship character was "Everard Edbutt", a heavily built skinhead who, despite his cheerfully moronic nature, tended to get very violent when anyone bothered him. His surreal strength invariably meant he horribly mutilated people without much effort, such as by punching someone in the face with such strength that his fist burst through the back of their head.

Other characters, who invariably had self-explanatory names, included:

• Tactless Terence – a man who is incapable of good manners or being tactful.
• Sarky Marky – an incredibly sarcastic man.
• Psycho Sid – a grinning psychopath who ends every strip by viciously murdering someone for no reason.
• Fat Idle Bastard – a total slob who is as unproductive as he is greedy, deceitful and sexist.
• The Skeggys – similar to the Viz's Biffa Bacon, a family of immoral, overweight benefit claimants.
• Twatman and Nobbin – an obvious parody of Batman (Twatman is an older sexist pig while Nobbin is a young and inexperienced nerd).
• Klaus The Louse – Pubic Enemy Number One -- the travels of a pubic louse.
• Lionel Lettuces and his Sexual Fetishes

The cartoonist Dave Colton contributed many 'one off' strips to the comic in the early 1990s.

In July 2007, Smut relaunched as Twisted! incorporating Smut. Despite the name change, the comic's content remained broadly similar, and included reprinting earlier material. The title stopped publishing shortly afterwards.