History Main / NailsOnABlackboard

* Butch and Cassidy do this to try and get Professor Oak to talk in a ''{{Anime/Pokemon}} Chronicles'' episode.

[[HereComesTheScience Fun fact:]] certain schools of thought posit that the reaction to this sound is an atavistic response to when humanity's pre-evolved ancestors used a similar noise to warn each other of danger that should be fled from at once. This phenomenon was studied in 2006 on [[https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758%2FBF03211488 a scientific paper]], which netted its authors the [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ig_Nobel_Prize Ig Nobel Prize]].

* ''Series/{{Cheers}}'': In first-season finale "[[Recap/CheersS1E22 Showdown, Part 2]]", Diane does this to get Sam to confess his feelings for her.

* On the Creator/TexAvery cartoon ''One Ham's Family'', when the villain is indisposed, the main character decides to [[NoFourthWall "heckle you folks out there"]] while he returns. So he takes out a chalkboard and a piece of chalk and screeches away.

See also SinisterScrapingSound, a dangerous SisterTrope. Believe it or not, Wiki/TheOtherWiki actually has [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chalkboard_scraping its own article]] about it.

* One episode of ''WesternAnimation/ThePowerpuffGirls'' features the Gangreen Gang breaking into Pokey Oaks kindergarten classroom causing mayhem, one of which involves Snake scratching the chalkboard.

* Butch and Cassidy do this to try and get Professor Oak to talk in a ''{{Anime/Pokemon}}Chronicles'' episode.

See also SinisterScrapingSound, a dangerous SisterTrope. Believe it or not, Wiki/TheOtherWiki actually has [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_of_fingernails_scraping_chalkboard its own article]] about it.

* Done in ''WesternAnimation/TheFairlyOddparents'' by Timmy as a prank. Since he is invisible at the time, everyone in the classroom thinks the chalkboard is haunted.

* A sketch in ''Right Now Kapow'' also parodies the Jaws scene, exaggerating the trope so that ''everyone'' scratches a conveniently nearby chalkboard to say anything, eventually doing it just because it's fun to do. After getting nowhere the Mayor moves to the next subject of discussion, replacing all the chalkboards with whiteboards, which is unanimously denied.

* ''Manga/GreatTeacherOnizuka''.

** In a much later episode Arthur's much-dreaded piano teacher substitutes for them ahead of a trip to Crown City and, true to his strict ways assigns the entire singing class homework. The whole lot of them start moaning over this, and they are quickly silenced when he scratches his bare nails clean across the board; they don't interrupt him again after that.

* ''Film/MightyMorphinPowerRangersTheMovie'': Somewhat subverted (as viewers of the film would have been unable to hear it as such). When Ivan Ooze expresses his displeasure at the Tengu Warriors' failure to eliminate the Power Rangers, they counter that they were driven off by a "monster" twirling sticks that made a very painful sound. At this, Ivan asks what the sound was (to confirm his suspicion that the wielder was the warrior woman Dulcea), and the Tengu replied that it was "like nails on a chalkboard".

* Judge Doom in ''Film/WhoFramedRogerRabbit''. Since he wears gloves, he makes the noise with the chalk instead.
* Quint, making his legendary entrance in ''Film/{{Jaws}}''.
* And it was used in ''Film/ThePinkPantherStrikesAgain'' as CoolAndUnusualPunishment. The villain puts on a steel gauntlet from a suit of armor, grins at the tied-up female, walks to the slate blackboard, and -- [[DistantReactionShot CUT! to quite a distance away]], outside, and you STILL hear it. And her screaming.

* The ''soundtrack'' of ''Film/TheDarkKnight'' somehow manages to incorporate this (fittingly, as the Joker's motif). [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fB5tbTpQvsM Have a listen]].
* Freddy used this to torture Carlos in ''Film/FreddysDeadTheFinalNightmare'', as he stole his hearing aid, turned the volume up to 11, gave it back, made it unremovable and dragged his murder-glove all over a giant chalkboard. Then Carlos's head exploded.
* Inverted in ''Film/FinalDestination4'', where the salon scene contains some slightly unnerving shots of the pedicurist scraping a metal tool along the underside of a soon-to-be victim's ''toe''nail. The sound of the scraping is plainly heard, and unpleasant.
* The Grinch in the live-action ''Film/HowTheGrinchStoleChristmas'' reproduces this sound by scraping his nails/fingers along the side of a car.
* In ''Film/ErnestScaredStupid'', a young Ernest does this in a flashback before getting whacked in the head by his teacher.
* ''Film/TheQuickAndTheDead''. When the Lady is challenged to her first duel, her name is chalked up on a board with an audible screech that shows the tension she is feeling at that moment.
* ''Film/OutpostRiseOfTheSpetsnaz''. When the protagonist drags the Nazi nurse by her feet [[LaserGuidedKarma into her own testing chamber]], her nails scrape along the concrete floor.
* In ''Film/{{Slingblade}}'', the trope doesn't need nails or blackboards. The film's opening introduces an inmate of a mental institution who is an attention-hungry sociopath. This is established before he even speaks by his dragging a metal chair across the entire length of the tile-floored common room.
* In ''Film/TheAdventuresOfSharkboyAndLavagirl'', when the two title characters are in Max's classroom, Sharkboy rakes his claws over the blackboard to draw a map to Planet Drool, making the whole class cover their ears.

A sub-trope of NoisyShutUp.

!!Examples

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See also SinisterScrapingSound, a dangerous SisterTrope. Believe it or not, Wiki/{{Wikipedia}} actually has [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_of_fingernails_scraping_chalkboard its own article]] about it.

* ''Manga/OnePiece'' has it too. It's called Usopp Noise.

* In ''TheAdventuresOfSharkboyAndLavagirl'', when the two title characters are in Max's classroom, Sharkboy rakes his claws over the blackboard to draw a map to Planet Drool, making the whole class cover their ears.

* ''VideoGame/{{Afterlife}}'' has "The Chalkboard", a Hellish fate structure where the damned are subjected to the sound of nails scraping on a chalkboard for all eternity.

* In ''Disney/TheLionKing'', Scar scratches his claws on his cave wall in order to annoy Zazu, to the same type of sound.
* ''Disney/WinnieThePooh'': As Owl begins to sing "The Backson Song", he draws the monster on a chalkboard and produces an irritating squeak with the chalk.

* The mechanical brake wear indicator found in most modern cars is a metallic plate mounted on the brake shoe that scratches the disc when the brake pad is only a few millimeters thick, in order to tell the owner via an auditive signal that the brakes are wearing off and must be replaced as soon as possible. Sometime around the mid-TurnOfTheMillennium, in models such as the 2004 Honda Civic, car manufacturers realized that by tuning the plate to mimic the sound of fingernails against a blackboard, the break wear indicator's sound would ''annoy the everliving hell out of the car's owner'' and cause them to hightail it towards the workshop with great haste just to get rid of that nerve-grating sound, thus manipulating the owner into keeping the brake pads always fresh and this way preventing accidents caused by poorly maintained brakes.