Questions from students: What does "Shibboleth" means?

During one of my latest training sessions, one of the students stumped me by asking "Where does the name "Shibboleth” comes from?". Well, here is the answer...

According to Wikipedia, the word Shibboleth comes from the Hebrew word shibbólet, which literally means the part of a plant containing grains, such as an ear of corn or a stalk of grain or, in different contexts, "stream, torrent".

Today, the word shibboleth applies to a word or a custom whose variations in pronunciation or style can be used to differentiate members of ingroups from those of outgroups. Within the mindset of the ingroup, a connotation or value judgment of correct / incorrect or superior / inferior can be ascribed to the two variants.

In the context of IT, Shibboleth is a 'single-sign in', or logging-in system for computer networks and the Internet. It allows people to sign in, using just one 'identity', to various systems run by different organisations or institutions (often universities or public organisations).

This is why, using only your Shibboleth password, you can access to the 13.000 online journals the library subscribe to, all our bibliographic databases, your reading lists and Moodle!