Loogie (1985)

Joanne M. Despres jdespres at MERRIAM-WEBSTER.COM
Wed Jul 5 14:20:12 UTC 2006


I've heard "hack a loogie" used as well.  My elementary German
teacher (a young grad student at UMass) would use that phrase
when instructing us how to pronounce the final "ch" sound.  (He
was an excellent teacher, by the way.)

Joanne

On 3 Jul 2006, at 21:42, William Salmon wrote:

> Loogies are definitely hawked where I grew up in South Texas.  I never
> knew anyone to slip one though.
>
> Oyster sounds familiar, but its use would probably require special
> circumstances. Urbandictionary gives a beaut for "dockyard oyster",
> involving British sailors.
>
>
> Quoting Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>:
>
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> > -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: Loogie (1985)
> > -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Thanks for your parenthetical note, Dave! I was saying to myself,
> > "_slip_ a loogie"? Don't you _hawk_ a loogie?
> >
> > BTW, are people here familiar with the use of "oyster" as a synonym
> > for loogie? When I was in the Army, a couple of other recruits were
> > laughing about the poor bastard who had stupidly picked up a gigantic
> > oyster while our unit was on post police (picking up all the trash off
> > the grass of the parade ground by hand). When I asked how anyone could
> > have come across an oyster in the middle of a grassy field, it was
> > explained to me that "oyster" was just another word for "hawker." The
> > latter term was also unfamiliar to me, but it didn'r need explanation
> > because I was familiar with "hawk" as "clear one's throat." You "blow"
> > a hawker, by the way.
> >
> > -Wilson
> >
> > On 7/2/06, Dave Wilton <dave at wilton.net> wrote:
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >> -----------------------
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       Dave Wilton <dave at WILTON.NET>
> >> Subject:      Loogie (1985)
> >> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> In the sense of a wad of phlegm, HDAS has 1988:
> >>
> >> San Francisco Chronicle, 27 April 1985, "A Sci-Fi Horror Surprise," p. 38:
> >> "In the middle of a French kiss, she slips a killer loogie into his face."
> >>
> >> (Technically, this article uses "loogie" to refer to a phlegm-like alien
> >> creature, not a wad of human phlegm, but the writer assumes the readers know
> >> what a loogie is.)
> >>
> >> I'm sure earlier citations are out there. I recall the term from my high
> >> school days several years before this.
> >>
> >> I've also found several much earlier citations of "Loogie" being used as a
> >> nickname. The reference in these cases is unclear.
> >>
> >> --Dave Wilton
> >>   dave at wilton.net
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
> ~Will Salmon
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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