Joint (cannabis)

"Spliff" redirects here. For other uses, see Spliff (disambiguation).

A joint prior to rolling with a paper "roach" at left

A joint with roach.

Joint is a slang term for a cigarette rolled using cannabis. Rolling papers are the most common rolling medium among industrialized countries; however, brown paper, cigarettes with the tobacco removed, beedis with the tobacco removed, tracing paper, ATM receipts, mango tree leaves and newspaper are commonly used in some developing countries. Modern papers are now made from a wide variety of materials including rice, hemp, and flax.

A joint can range in size, typically containing between 0.25 to 1 grams net weight of cannabis (depending on whether tobacco is used in the rolling process).

Description

Joints consist of dried cannabis rolled inside a cylinder by hand or by a rolling machine. When smoked to the very bottom of the joint, it is often difficult to hold and is called a roach. The roach will often have an appreciable amount of THC from the accumulated resin. The roach can be held with finger nails, roach clips, roach pins, tweezers, or can be smoked using a pipe.

Variations

Commercially prepared American medical cannabis joint.

Though all joints by convention contain cannabis, regional differences occur. In Europe, (recently North America) and certain Commonwealth nations, joints, "B1's", or "spliffs", typically include a bit of cardboard, rolled cigarette packet paper or rolled business card in one end to serve as a mouthpiece. This is known as a filter or "roach." Other common terms used for the paper "filter" are "crutch" or "tip". In North America, "roach" usually means the smoked-down butt of a joint, which can be finished off in a pipe, rolled into the lighting-end of a new joint, or saved for a cumulative all-roach joint. Though in the past decade filters have become popular in North America as well. Another common term for a joint is a "spliff". The term "Spliff", however, sometimes refers to a joint prepared with cannabis and tobacco, as is commonly done in European countries, where joints containing only cannabis are rarely smoked. In the West Indies (especially Jamaica), a spliff is simply a marijuana cigarette containing no tobacco whatsoever.

Name

Herb grinder for cannabis used to prepare herb for rolling into a joint.

Etymology

The word joint ultimately originated from French, where it is an adjective meaning "joined" (past participle of the verb joindre), derived in turn from Latin iunctus, past participle of iugare ("join"/"bind"/"yoke").

By 1821, "joint" had become an Anglo-Irish term for an annexe, or a side-room "joined" to a main room. By 1877, this had developed into U.S. slang for a (usually unsavory) "place, building, establishment," especially referring to an opium den. By 1935, "joint" was being used to refer to the hypodermic needles used to inject heroin and other drugs at such establishments; this may have been influenced by the secondary meaning of "joint" in the sense of something done "in common" or shared. Its first usage in the sense of "marijuana cigarette" is dated to 1938.

Other terms

There are many slang terms mostly synonymous with the word joint, e.g. "fatty", can be used to describe a joint that contains an unusually large quantity of marijuana.

The term spliff is a West Indian word of Jamaican English origin, but has spread to several western countries, particularly Canada, the United States, and many countries in Europe. Its precise etymology is unknown, but it is attested as early as 1936. While Jamaican spliffs are generally conical in shape, those elsewhere tend to be cylindrical and of varying lengths. A joint is also called a "doobie", mostly when rolled with king sized rolling papers.

See also

• Cannabis smoking