{{short description|Graffiti in toilet facilities}} [[File:Peoples cafe.jpg|thumb|upright|Restroom graffiti, People's Cafe, San Francisco]] thumb|220px|right|Graffiti at Meilahti Yläaste. Helsinki, Finland, 2006 '''Latrinalia''' is a type of deliberately inscribed or etched marking made on latrines; that is, bathrooms or lavatory walls.<ref>{{Cite news|url = https://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/garden/03punk.html|title = Anarchy Rules: The Dishes Stay Dirty|newspaper = The New York Times|date = 3 January 2008|last1 = Green|first1 = Penelope|access-date = 13 August 2017|archive-date = 20 June 2017|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20170620181244/http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/03/garden/03punk.html|url-status = live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|isbn=0977282759|title=CBGB: Decades of Graffiti|last1=Salyers|first1=Christopher D.|year=2006|publisher=Mark Batty Publisher, LLC }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.yahoo.com/music/blogs/stop-the-presses/rock-scariest-bathroom-immortalized-cbgb-movie-180133133.html|title=Rock's Scariest Bathroom Immortalized in 'CBGB: The Movie'|date=9 August 2013 |access-date=2017-08-13|archive-date=2017-08-13|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170813152438/https://www.yahoo.com/music/blogs/stop-the-presses/rock-scariest-bathroom-immortalized-cbgb-movie-180133133.html|url-status=live}}</ref> It can take the form of art, drawings, or words, including poetry and personal reflections. Other types of latrinalia include political commentary and notes on love as well as derogatory (sharing low opinions) comments and pictures. Humor is also common, such as the phenomenon observed on some college campuses of writing puns about grout in the grouted spaces between tiles.<ref name="u178">{{cite web | last=Stein | first=Isaac | title=The Grout Gatsby: UChicago's notorious bathroom graffiti | website=Chicago Maroon | date=June 2, 2015 | url=https://chicagomaroon.com/20659/news/the-grout-gatsby-uchicagos-notorious-bathroom-graffiti/ | access-date=April 2, 2025}}</ref><ref name="f160">{{cite web | title=Conversations on bathroom walls | website=LocalWiki | date=November 17, 2004 | url=https://localwiki.org/davis/Conversations_on_bathroom_walls | access-date=April 2, 2025}}</ref> When done without the property owner's consent, it constitutes vandalism. Some venues have attempted to curb such vandalism by installing in the lavatory large blackboards and providing free chalk; it is hoped that patrons will avail themselves of the blackboard and chalk rather than applying their latrinalia directly to the walls or toilet stalls.<ref>[https://canadianpuns.com/pun-meaning-types-examples/ Puns meaning]</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.cmmonline.com/article.asp?IndexID=6635560 |title=Cleaning & Maintenance Management Online :: Brought to you by Grand View Media |publisher=Cmmonline.com |date=2007-02-01 |accessdate=2012-01-07 |url-status=dead |archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20060522154106/http://www.cmmonline.com/article.asp?IndexID=6635560 |archivedate=2006-05-22 }}</ref>
==Study and etymology== thumb|220px|Graffiti on the side of a cubicle in a male toilet. Sydney, Australia, 2024 An important work in the study of latrinalia is Allen Walker Read's ''Lexical Evidence from Folk Epigraphy in Western North America: A Glossarial Study of the Low Element in the English Vocabulary.'' The work describes and collates examples of graffiti observed by Read on a road trip throughout the Western United States in 1928. It was privately published in Paris in 1935 since its description of bathroom graffiti was considered too racy for American publishers.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Read |first=Allen Walker |title=Classic American graffiti : lexical evidence from folk epigraphy in western North America : a glossarial study of the low element in the English vocabulary |date=1977 |publisher=Maledicta |isbn=0-916500-06-3 |location=Waukesha, Wis. |pages=28 |chapter=Bibliographical Note |oclc=3523105 }}</ref> It was eventually published in the United States in 1977, under the title ''Classic American Graffiti''.<ref>{{cite book | last=Read | first=Allen Walker | title=Classic American Graffiti | publisher=Maledicta | publication-place=Waukesha, Wis. | date=1977 | isbn=0-916500-06-3 | oclc=3523105}}</ref> The work was described as a classic "model study" of latrinalia that "deserves the attention of any serious student of American language" in a 1979 review, which noted that even then it remained hard to access and "excessively rare."<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Brunvand |first=Jan Harold |date=1979 |title=Classic American Graffiti by Allen Walker Read (review) |url=https://muse.jhu.edu/article/459038 |journal=Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature |volume=33 |issue=4 |pages=217 |issn=1948-2833}}</ref>
The late Alan Dundes, a folklorist at University of California, Berkeley, coined the term ''latrinalia'' in 1966 to refer to graffiti found in restrooms.<ref name="Alan_Dundes">{{cite web | author=Dundes, Alan | author-link=Alan Dundes | title=Here I Sit — A Study of American Latrinalia | publisher=University of California, Berkeley: Kroeber Anthropological Society Papers | date=1966 | url=http://sscl.berkeley.edu/~kas/kas_archives/vol_78/contents/volume_30-39.html | url-status=dead | archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20051120032605/http://sscl.berkeley.edu/~kas/kas_archives/vol_78/contents/volume_30-39.html | archivedate=2005-11-20 }}</ref> Dundes preferred it over the term ''shithouse poetry'', as not all latrinalia is in verse or poetic form.<ref name="Alan_Dundes" />
The word is derived from the compounding of ''latrine'' (or toilet) and the suffix ''-alia'', which signifies a collection of something — in this case bathroom writings.
==See also== *Graffiti *Servít je vůl *Toilet humour *Vandalism
==Bibliography== * {{Cite book|title=The Little Book of Toilet Graffiti|last=Gelfer|first=Joseph|publisher=Summersdale Publishers|year=2002|isbn=978-1840242607}} * {{Cite book|title=Psychology in the Bathroom|last=Haslam|first=Nick|publisher=Palgrave Macmillan|year=2012|location=London|chapter=Toilet Graffiti|pages=114–135|isbn=978-0-230-36755-5|doi=10.1057/9780230367555_7}} * {{Cite book|title=Routledge Handbook of Graffiti and Street Art|last=Trahan|first=Adam|publisher=Routledge|year=2016|isbn=978-1-138-79293-7|editor-last=Ross|editor-first=Jeffrey Ian|pages=92-102|location=London|chapter=Research and theory on latrinalia}} * Norbert Siegl: ''Geschlechtsspezifische Unterschiede hinsichtlich Häufigkeit und thematischer Inhalte bei Toilettengraffiti''. Thiel, Kassel 1992, ISBN 3-923548-78-8 (Zugleich Diplomarbeit an der Universität Wien 1992). * Norbert Siegl: ''Graffiti von Frauen und Männern. Das Basiswerk der Klo-Graffiti-Forschung''. graffiti-edition, Wien 2000, ISBN 3-901927-05-0. * Norbert Siegl: ''Kommunikation am Klo. Graffiti von Frauen und Männern.'' Döcker, Wien 1995, ISBN 3-8511-5178-X. *orbert Siegl: Die Themen der Graffiti-Forschung. Wien 2000
== References == {{Reflist}}
==External links== *[https://web.archive.org/web/20090530114256/http://www.ebathroomgraffiti.com/ Latrinalia (e Bathroom Graffiti)] — Electronic Bathroom Graffiti uploads from around the world. *[http://www.itsallinthehead.com/ Bathroom Graffiti] — Bathroom Graffiti by author and photographer Mark Ferem. {{dead link|date=November 2025}} *[https://web.archive.org/web/20060421034719/http://www.graffitiproject.com/ Bathroom Graffiti Project] — features and rates hundreds of photos of latrinalia from around the world *[http://www.latrinalia.org/ Latrinalia] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070625172755/http://www.latrinalia.org/ |date=2007-06-25 }} — features galleries of bathroom graffiti *Raina Williams, [http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/SommerB/sommerdemo/content/latrinalia.htm Content analysis: Latrinalia] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070824082834/http://psychology.ucdavis.edu/SommerB/sommerdemo/content/latrinalia.htm |date=2007-08-24 }}, ''Department of Psychology, University of California, Davis'' *Mark Ferem, [http://www.50mmlosangeles.com/viewStory.php?storyId=226 Latrinalia: "It's all in The Head"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070620190302/http://www.50mmlosangeles.com/viewStory.php?storyId=226 |date=2007-06-20 }}, ''50mm Los Angeles'' * [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J8Nlebv507Y Origins of Bathroom Graffiti Documentary] * [http://www.thewritingsonthestall.com/ The Writing on the Stall] *Norbert Siegl, [https://www.graffitieuropa.org/klograffiti1.htm Toiletten-Graffiti, Klo-Graffiti. Graffiti von Frauen und Männern] *[https://www.spiegel.de/kultur/krieg-an-der-wand-a-7901d49f-0002-0001-0000-000013679979?context=issue Krieg an der Wand. Ein Wiener Psychologe hat Toilettensprüche untersucht. Ergebnis: Männergekritzel ist aggressiver.], ''Der Spiegel'', 18 October 1992
{{Authority control}} {{Toilets}}
Category:Graffiti and unauthorised signage Category:Writing Category:Toilets Category:1966 neologisms
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