What’s an alternate name for flat plastic lace (“gimp”, rexlace, etc)?
July 1, 2022 9:19 AM   Subscribe

I’m playing uncle / camp counsellor for a bunch of kids this week and decided to bring a box of good craft supplies. When I was a kid in Ontario, “gimp” was what we called flat plastic lace (for lanyards, bracelets, etc). I don’t want to perpetuate this term, but all these kids will be going to camp later in the summer in Ontario and I’d like to use a word or a term that will be understood to mean the same thing. Are you from Canada or Ontario? What did / do you call this stuff?

Thanks for helping me eliminate an ableist term that has bugged me for years!
posted by sixswitch to Sports, Hobbies, & Recreation (16 answers total)
 


I always heard camps call it "boondoggle," but "lanyard" is more descriptive.
posted by rikschell at 9:34 AM on July 1, 2022


Best answer: I’m Ontarioan! We stopped calling it “gimp” at my camp about a decade ago when it clicked that that’s ableist. We said “boondoggle” or “plastic lacing” instead. You could make up a new name, like “Pling” for “plastic string”.
posted by nouvelle-personne at 9:37 AM on July 1, 2022 [5 favorites]


Best answer: Also Ontario, same experience as nouvelle-personne. Boondoggle is what I knew it as by the early 90s.
posted by avocet at 9:52 AM on July 1, 2022 [3 favorites]


HotToddy, while etymology can be interesting in the abstract, it doesn't keep people from being hurt and offended. Using non-offensive terminology is always good, even when the offense comes about tangentially or unintentionally.
posted by rikschell at 10:09 AM on July 1, 2022 [11 favorites]


We called it "lanyard lacing" but I prefer what nouvelle-personne suggests: pling!
posted by blnkfrnk at 10:12 AM on July 1, 2022 [1 favorite]


Ontario here. Interesting. I've only every heard it referred to as "lanyard cord" or something similar to that. That always made sense because it's cord. For lanyards and such.
posted by mandolin conspiracy at 10:13 AM on July 1, 2022 [1 favorite]


Response by poster: Thanks for the cool etymology HotToddy! I’m a nerd that way and I love terms of art. But words conflate and I agree with rikschell. Boondoggle sounds like exactly the word I was looking for.
posted by sixswitch at 10:29 AM on July 1, 2022 [1 favorite]


Best answer: I was curious what the wholesale craft site I order from calls it (because they're very finicky about search terms), and the industry term seems to be "plastic lacing" which is descriptive but sounds a lot less fun than "boondoggle." For what it's worth, the term "boondoggle" seems to have been used for woven braids for at least as long as it's meant wasteful make-work projects.
posted by rikschell at 10:53 AM on July 1, 2022


Best answer: I grew up in the 1980s and always heard it called boondoggle, for whatever that's worth.
posted by twelve cent archie at 10:57 AM on July 1, 2022




Response by poster: Looks like a comment got deleted which is fine but I’d like to leave this interesting etymology link here anyways: “gimp” as a sewing term of art.
posted by sixswitch at 11:04 AM on July 1, 2022 [7 favorites]


Apparently in France it is referred to as scoubidou, which is perfect
posted by chesty_a_arthur at 12:20 PM on July 1, 2022 [6 favorites]


Scoubidou is what I've heard it described as in crafting videos (in English). Drove me up the wall the first time trying to figure out what the speaker was saying that auto-captions kept interpreting as "scooby doo."
posted by brook horse at 3:24 PM on July 1, 2022 [1 favorite]


Just "lanyard" is what I remember hearing as a kid at camp (for the plastic lacing youre describing & the lanyards made from it).
posted by augustimagination at 7:25 PM on July 1, 2022


Longtime camp counselor here. Call it "plastic lasting" or "lanyard."
posted by Miko at 9:38 PM on July 1, 2022


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