One for the files? (on origin of "jazz")

[Gerald Cohen]

   One for the files (of mistaken etymologies)? Yes, thanks.  I hereby
renew my offer of $100 to the first person who can provide evidence
that "jazz" (or "jass") was used in a musical or sexual sense prior
to its first attestations of 1913 in a San Francisco baseball context
(= pep, vim, vigor, fighting spirit).

     Btw, I don't think I've ever encountered the derivation of "jazz"
from the jasmine perfume used by prostitutes. Did Hilton Als advance
the etymology himself or is he merely quoting from the book he's
reviewing?


Gerald Cohen



>At 10:20 AM +0000 3/11/03, Jonathon Green wrote:
>Hilton Als in New York Review of Books 3/27/03 p.11/3:
>
>Jazz is her downfall. This music [...] was first called 'Jass' music, in
>homage to the jasmine perfume that prostitutes wore in the red-light
>district [of New Orleans].
>
>Jonathon Green