A cap is more of a hat than a cape is a hate.

Let's frontpage a debate that broke out in the comments. I had said, in the previous post:

Trump the billionaire has successfully bonded with millions of working-class Americans. He's convincingly worn a trucker hat and spoken like a tough guy. Trump's wealth is built on branding, and he made his grand political success out of branding: He's a man of the people.

jacksonjay said...

The Professor can be so dumb. The headwear is OBVIOUSLY a cap not a hat.

I responded (links added):

The standard term for that item of clothing is "trucker hat." I agree that the term for the baseball item is "baseball cap," but I believe the thing Trump wears is not a baseball cap but a trucker hat.

On the standard distinction between the words "hat" and "cap" in English, I'll start the debate with the statement: Not all hats are caps, but all caps are hats... except perhaps a skullcap.

I found a discussion of the hat/cap distinction at the blog of Mary Robinette Kowal, who, I see, is a Hugo-award winning author and professional puppeteer. Kowal writes:

A friend just said that he needed to buy a hat while he was here. I started to cite John Helmer Haberdashery downtown, which has a wonderful selection of hats.

He then clarified that he was looking for a Ducks baseball cap hat. [Edited to add: He says that he called it a hat. La! See me be snooty and disdainful.]

I think that a baseball cap is not the same thing as a hat. He thinks that they are.

Now arguably, hat might be used as an umbrella term for headcoverings, but it’s like saying, “I want some fiction,” and then clarifying that you really meant you wanted a movie.

So! Internet debate. Are hats and caps the same thing? Discuss.

She's got 41 responses over there including:

Hats are considered and weighty things that say something about who a person thinks they are. Caps are what a person would wear if they simply wish to indicate an allegiance.

And:

I think baseball caps are caps, but also fall under the broad category of hats. This is partly because all through my growing up years we were told not to wear hats in class, and that meant baseball caps. I’ve found it odd, though, when people tell me they like my hat while I am wearing a headband.  Fascinators are not hats, I feel, though the general public would seem to disagree.

And:

A baseball cap is a type of hat — a callow, debased type of hat — but saying “I want to buy a hat” if what you want is a baseball cap is… well, let’s just say it’s poorly chosen. It’s like saying you’d like dinner when what you really want is dessert, or that you have a dog when it’s actually a large rat chihuahua.

And:

I think that hats are a superclass of caps, in much the same way that fiction is a superclass of fiction books. I suspect that if you said “I want some fiction” to a film professional, their first thought would be of a movie which is not a documentary, and “I want a hat” to a baseball fan, their first thought would be of a cap; whereas saying those things to a writer and a pre-Victorian would instead conjure short stories and bicornes. And saying these things to a computer scientist prompts him to use words like “superclass” when describing headgear.

Lots more over there. Maybe it's all been said. Except that it was back in 2010 and nobody was talking about how a man became President by wearing a hat/cap.

Now, put on your hi-heel sneakers and wear your wig-hat on your head.