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<div>At 9:57 PM -0500 1/25/01, Jane Parker wrote:</div>
<blockquote type="cite" cite>When I lived in Minneapolis MN in the
mid-'80 the term waitron was commonly used<br>
instead of waiter/waitress in the want ads and by the waitrons
themselves.<br>
People laughed at me (even some linguistic professors) when I went to
gradschool<br>
in IN. I have not seen or heard it used since. Is anyone
else familiar with<br>
this term? I think is was sort of a gender neutral
combo of waitress and<br>
automaton.<br>
<br>
Jane P Parker</blockquote>
<div>I hadn't come across it that early, but here's a message I sent
(in reply to another message, as you'll see) concerning
"waitron" as part of a thread on another list a few years
ago:</div>
<div><br></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">Date: Sun, 29 Sep 1996
10:32:46 -0500</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">Subject: waitron</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000"> </font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">> Waitron, an
American pc</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">>barbarism?? I
thought it was a joke, with that kind of<br>
>robotic-space-computer type sounding suffix making a wry comment
on the<br>
>job. In any case, no one I know would say such a
thing seriously. In</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">>Ohio, I've heard
"server" used and in NY "waiter" for women sounds
possible,</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">>though I can't swear
I've actually heard it here. On the other hand, 'to<br>
>waitress' is about the only sex-related verb, as in: "Oh, I
spent about a<br>
>year waitressing before finding a job as a linguist."
As waitress<br>
>disappears so will that verb.<br>
<br>
Well, the first time I came across "waitron", on a Help
Wanted sign posted on<br>
the Yale cafeteria door several years ago, I mentioned it in my Words
and<br>
Meaning class and one student provided the citation "I'm
tronning for Senior<br>
Dinner". A great verb, I thought--while 'waitressing'
would work in this con-<br>
text, that doesn't help if you're the wrong sex (or gender), and for
me neither<br>
'waitering' nor 'waiting' would, salva sensu. Evidently,
intuitions on this<br>
differ, though. In any case, I always thought 'waitron' was
cute too; for me</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000">it evokes both the robots
others have brought up and subatomic particles (electrons, protons,
neutrons, and waitrons). Unless the plural is
waitra...</font></div>
<div><font face="Geneva" color="#000000"> <br>
--Larry</font><br>
<font face="Geneva" color="#000000"></font></div>
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