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scunted


Busted, caught in the act, particularly a teenager by a parent or teacher: Don't do that, you'll get scunted.

Contributor's comments: Getting busted by the teacher (or other authoritarian-type figure) doing something naughty: "You're so scunted" after you break something (e.g. a window / the teacher's favourite learning display, etc.)

Contributor's comments: Popular for a time amongst schoolkids in the 1980s. Never used by teachers or parents. After you've been busted, the other kids would say 'ssscunterrrd!'.

Contributor's comments: [Townsville informant] Serves you right. Should ill come of someone who is doing something inappropriate, others could respond "scunt", "scunted" or even "scunted badly".

Contributor's comments: Not to be used around grown ups, if the word was mis-heard then you were in deeeeeeep trouble.

Contributor's comments: parants would say "I'll skin you alive if I ever catch you..." doing such and such. So "scunted", which was used extensivly by kids in Narrogin c.1970, could have derived from scund (sp?) which means to skin or having skinned.

Contributor's comments: Scab duty was what we called the emu parade type punishment given for playing up in class or out in the playground. It often consisted of picking up 100 peices of rubbish and getting the teacher who was closely watching you to count in tens of how much you picked up. A lot of the time we used to get one big piece of rubbish and rip it into smaller pieces to make it look like we picked up more. Though if we were found out doing this we were 'scunted'.

Contributor's comments: I went to public high schools in Perth [Hollywood & Churchlands SHS] and I don't recall this word ever being used. However people I know who went to private schools eg Trinity & Scotch used this word at school.

Contributor's comments: The word was commonly heard in Mt. Isa and Townsville high school in the late 70's and early 80's, with the meaning that other correspondents have noted. However, its meaning evolved. In addition to being used to mean "caught in the act", "busted" or "foiled" in classroom and playground contexts, it came also to simply mean "broken" or "wrecked". For example, an exercise book with the cover ripped off or a textbook with torn pages was described for a while, before the word quite suddenly disappeared, as "scunted".