10 Seinfeldisms That Became Part Of Our Everyday Life

By Anes Tojaga / February 9, 2022

Seinfeld, a sitcom co-created by Larry David and Jerry Seinfeld, was a decade-defining piece of media, but its influence continued far beyond the nineties.

The Show About Nothing, as it was often called, had a style so recognizable and relatable that it immediately resonated with massive audiences regardless of their background, and that's why it continues to appeal to today's generation even though most of them weren't even been born during the show's original run.

This relatability and universality was the result of brilliant writing by David, Seinfeld, and their talented team of screenwriters, who had a great knack making the most mundane, everyday things incredibly funny and interesting. In the process, they were often coming up with catchy, if often absurd, one-liners and catch-phrases.

Those phrases, that instantly make you think of the show and its characters, are what came to be popularly known as "Seinfeldisms."

In fact, some of them became so ingrained within the pop culture discourse that we still regularly use them today. So, having said that, let's look at the ten 'seinfeldisms' that are still as relevant as they were two or three decades ago.

10. Re-Gifter

Elaine gave Dr Whatley a label maker as a Christmas present, only to see it crop up in Jerry’s apartment later on. This prompts them to label Whatley a "re-gifter."

This episode spawned the wide use of re-gifting and de-gifting (after Jerry tries to de-gift, i.e. take back, the Super Bowl tickets he had given to Whatley). In fact, the Oxford dictionary cites this episode's script as the first recorded mention of the terms. Apart from that, it seemed to change people's general attitude towards giving and receiving used presents.

Interestingly, the script was originally written by Alec Berg and Jeff Schaffer, and both Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David liked it so much that they didn't want to make any changes of their own.