Geeks vs. Nerds

This may not be the right forum, so I'm sorry if that's the case, but I have a bit of a situation. I was wearing my Transformers belt buckle in class the other day, and someone called me a geek. I thanked them for the compliment, but the teacher had a question: what's the difference between a geek and a nerd? She had heard the other guy call me a geek, and thought it was a derogatory term. So she asked the question, and I was a little stunned. Before I could answer, she said that it would be a great essay topic and assigned it to me.(this is a literature and writing class) Now I need help. What, in your opinion, is the difference between a geek and a nerd? I don't want to be mean here, but please understand this can be a hard question. I am looking up this question elsewhere, but I figured here might be a good place as well...... Any help is greatly appreciated!!

Not kidding here! Please help me! :(

Well, geek originated from circus freak shows; geeks were people who ate live things (or supposedly ate live things). Think "freak" shows ("geek" shows).

Make of that what you will.

Crap that's a good question. I will await for someone to give the best answer to this. And also for for Wolverine08's NERRRRRRD video clip from the Simpsons.

I kinda made up a rule when I was little.

A Nerd is a genius, a fanboy is a person who OD's on superheroes/sci-fi/you get the gist, and a Geek is a nice medley between the two.

@_atomikill_: Wouldnt a fanboy just be a fan of something to a ridiculous level

@humanrocket: @hwkfan296:

@kgb725: Hence the 'you get the gist' phrase I left.

Well I bat for BroTeam >

@the_stegman: Beat me to it damn you haha

Kid called you a geek as an insult? He's a lame.

@the_stegman: You just made my day with that video!

@hwkfan296 said:

You might've already seen this, from the same guys.

This is the general gist of things from what I can tell:

The differences between Geeks and Nerds are the same as the differences between Goths and Emos.

Well in my personal opinion a nerd is a person who is very focused on academic pursuits, whereas a geek is someone into a particular thing for example, games, comic books, anime... kind of alternative if you get what I mean.

I prefer pimp.

@project_worm: That helps a lot!

Thanks everyone so far, this is really helping. I've been researching elsewhere and getting similar results.

I'm actually having a lot of fun writing this essay, even though I didn't like how the topic was just spontaneously dumped on me. Thanks again to everyone so far, and if anyone else has more info that could help, I would greatly appreciate it!

That's right.

Also, if anyone is interested, I can post my essay when it's done. Just let me know.

@hwkfan296: You are very welcome