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When a person plays a word, their opponent may believe it’s been misspelled, that it’s too slangy or too obscure, or that it isn’t a real word at all (see KWYJIBO). The dictionary is there to adjudicate challenges. In the days before home computers, whatever print dictionary people had in their homes sufficed. Before starting, players are supposed to agree upon the dictionary to reference when challenging words. The board game doesn’t include a dictionary in the box. That’s the same size as the standard daily crossword puzzles seen in The New York Times or USA Today. Scrabble itself took off in the 1950s, and its relationship to crosswords is apparent not just in the conceit of intersecting words but in the game board itself, a 15×15 grid. You can read about that quaint time in the delightful crossword history Thinking Inside the Box. There were people wringing their hands about crossword puzzles being the downfall of society 100 years ago. If you were ever unsure that history repeats itself, here’s an example. Scrabble arose in the wake of the crossword puzzle craze of the 1920s.

Ultimately, the history of the Scrabble dictionary and its most controversial entries is both twisty and still unfolding. Of course, the real question isn’t about FART at all, but more offensive words. Attempts to make hard rules about what’s allowed reveal myriad edge cases, inconsistencies, and contradictions. Like language itself, Scrabble’s list of playable words is living and evolving, even branching into new subspecies if you extend that metaphor. The long answer, investigating the question of exactly which words are valid, is much more interesting.

Originally from New York, she's as surprised as anyone that she lives in Bloomington, Indiana.Ĭan you play the word FART in Scrabble? The short answer calls on the old adage: your house, your rules. When she's not reading or writing, she's probably knitting or scouring used book stores for vintage gothic romance paperbacks. Isabelle Popp has written all sorts of things, ranging from astrophysics research articles and math tests to crossword puzzles and poetry.