Wikipedia on Jazz

[George Thompson]

HDAS has Times-Picayune (N.O.), June 20, 1918.

GAT

George A. Thompson
Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
Univ. Pr., 1998, but nothing much lately.

----- Original Message -----
From: "Baker, John" <JMB at STRADLEY.COM>
Date: Tuesday, January 23, 2007 11:54 pm
Subject: Re: Wikipedia on Jazz

> One more point that I think it would be useful to cover, and I
> don't know the answer:  What's the earliest attestation of "jazz"
> in New Orleans?
>
>
> John Baker
>
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: American Dialect Society on behalf of Baker, John
> Sent: Mon 1/22/2007 10:11 AM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Wikipedia on Jazz
>
>
>
>        Thanks for the kind words.  The real credit, of course, should
> go to Gerald Cohen, who prepared the long working paper on which this
> article was based, and to the researchers who found the key
> sources in
> the word's development.  Particularly important are the pioneering
> workof Peter Tamony and the more recent discoveries of George
> Thompson, who
> found the first use of "jazz," of Barry Popik, who found an early
> article spelling "jazz" as "jaz-m," and of Fred Shapiro, who found
the
> earliest attestation of "jazz" in the music sense.  Jon Lighter's
> greatwork in HDAS was very helpful too.  I did not always agree
> with Gerry's
> conclusions, but if I've gone too far out on a limb, the theory of
> Wikipedia is that this will be corrected in the editing process as
the
> article is brought around to a neutral point of view.
>
>        What really struck me as I prepared the piece was the
> overwhelming evidence that "jazz" derives from obsolete slang "jasm."
> Barry's article spelling "jazz" as "jaz-m" really seems to me to
> be the
> smoking gun here.  I wonder if Jon has any "jasm" cites beyond the
> onesthat are included in HDAS.  Also, while the California history
> of "jazz"
> in the sense of pep or exuberant enthusiasm has been pretty well
> fleshedout, there is still more work needed on the earliest
> applications of
> "jazz" to the musical and sexual senses.
>
>
> John Baker
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On
> BehalfOf Jesse Sheidlower
> Sent: Sunday, January 21, 2007 11:00 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Wikipedia on Jazz
>
> On Sun, Jan 21, 2007 at 10:27:32PM -0500, Sam Clements wrote:
> > Definitely not "down" to Wikipedia standards.  :)
> >
> > Incredible job.
>
> Yes, John, superb effort there.
>
> Jesse Sheidlower
> OED
>
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