Crash Went From Noise to Finance to Sleeping on Sofas
A crash is a violent collision or its noise. The word has spread into finance, computing and casual speech, all from one sound.
A crash is a violent collision, or the loud noise one makes. The word started as pure sound imitation and then colonised whole fields: markets crash, computers crash, uninvited guests crash a party, and an exhausted person crashes on a sofa. Each is a sudden, uncontrolled stop or arrival, which is the sound turned into a shape of event. A *crash course* is intensive by the same logic: everything at once.
- A collision. *A car crash.*
- A loud noise. *A crash of thunder.*
- A market collapse. *The crash of 1929.*
- A computer failure. *The app crashed.*
- To sleep (informal). *I crashed on his sofa.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | crash | A bad crash. |
| Plural | crashes | Three crashes. |
| Verb | crash | It crashed. |
| Past | crashed | The system crashed. |
| Compound | crash course | A crash course. |
- There was a crash of thunder.Sound.
- The market crashed overnight.Finance.
- He crashed the party uninvited.Informal.
Crash in different fields
- Transport — a collision
- Finance — a sudden collapse in prices
- Computing — an unexpected program failure
- Social — arriving uninvited
- Sleep — falling asleep suddenly, often somewhere temporary
Middle English *crasschen*, of imitative origin, perhaps blending *craze* and *dash*. The financial sense dates from the 1800s.
What is a crash course?
An intensive short course covering essentials quickly. The name suggests everything arriving at once.
Why do computers crash?
The word describes the effect, not the cause: an unexpected, uncontrolled stop, borrowed from the sense of sudden collapse.