Whiz

[ronbutters at AOL.COM]

A fourth possibility: they may have known that "whiz" was a euphemism for 'urinate',? but the contexts were so different that they were just not concerned. "Whizzer" as a nickname has a long and honorable history. A recent Supreme Court Justice had that nickname and it was often used in the newspapers long after "take a whiz" had come into common parlance. Like people who speak of a "sucker punch" but would not think of saying "You suck" because of the possiblity of interpreting the latter as redolent of fellatio.

Along the same lines: do people still name their children "Gay"?

I did first became aware of the idiom "take a whiz" about 1970. My students tell me that it is somewhat old-fashioned today.


Robert Wachal asked:
> Was the phrase "take a whiz" in use in the early 1920's?

Not a direct answer, but possibly relevant: in 1941, Timely Comics
introduced a superhero known as the Whizzer - basically a knockoff of
the Flash (the original - Jay Garrick). His uniform was mostly yellow.

Either:
a) "whiz" = "urinate" was not in use in 1941; or
b) the editors of Timely Comics were not aware of this meaning; or
c) the editors were aware of the meaning, and chose his uniform with
malice aforethought.

I leave it to you to assign probabilities.

Jim Parish




-----Original Message-----
From: Jim Parish <jparish at SIUE.EDU>
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Sent: Tue, 25 Sep 2007 8:48 am
Subject: Re: [ADS-L] Whiz



Robert Wachal asked:
> Was the phrase "take a whiz" in use in the early 1920's?

Not a direct answer, but possibly relevant: in 1941, Timely Comics
introduced a superhero known as the Whizzer - basically a knockoff of
the Flash (the original - Jay Garrick). His uniform was mostly yellow.

Either:
a) "whiz" = "urinate" was not in use in 1941; or
b) the editors of Timely Comics were not aware of this meaning; or
c) the editors were aware of the meaning, and chose his uniform with
malice aforethought.

I leave it to you to assign probabilities.

Jim Parish

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org


________________________________________________________________________
Email and AIM finally together. You've gotta check out free AOL Mail! - http://mail.aol.com

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org