The term isn't exactly new, and it's not exclusive to New Haven. But it gained major media attention today after New York Magazine picked up a story about SWUGs by Yale Daily News writer Raisa Bruner.
SWUGs, in short, are senior girls who are jaded, especially when it comes to senior boys.
They have a "'don’t-give-a-f***' or 'DGAF' attitude," writes Bruner, a self-identified SWUG, adding, "Welcome to the world of the ladies who have given up on boys because they don’t so much empower as frustrate, satisfy as agitate."
The definition of SWUG has been debated at Yale since last September, when a series of articles were published in the Yale Daily News.
The feature to start it all was written by senior Chloe Drimal. Titled Profile of a SWUG, Drimal described a girl who is an insider in the college frat and bar scene, the last one at every party ("because hey—who is she going home with?"), and who hooks up with younger men.
Another Yale senior, Michelle Taylor, followed up, writing that the SWUG was a "Dionysian response to the cruel brevity of our bright college years" for all seniors, and not just the women.
But the largely-pejorative term is by definition about senior girls, and SWUB, senior washed-up boys, has not caught on.
Yale is not the only Ivy to make the news recently concerning the romantic lives of its female students. Back in March, Princeton alumna Susan A. Patton controversially advised women at the school to find a husband while they were still attending the prestigious college.