Splib

[Wilson Gray]

On Oct 4, 2004, at 1:56 AM, Douglas G. Wilson wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> Subject:      Re: Splib
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> --------
>
>>>> I hope Jonathon Green can say something about it. His (Cassell's)
>>>> slang
>>>> dictionary shows an etymology which I don't understand.
>> Is it _that_ incomprehensible?  I suggested a possible link to the
>> phr.
>> slip-de-wib, and the jazz use splibby, which I defined, doubtless
>> from a
>> more authoritative source, which evades me now, possessing 'soul'.
>> Ah, I
>> have the source: Clarence Major's Juba to Jive which is not, and i'd
>> be
>> intersted to know if Wilson Gray has seen it, the ideal authority. He
>> in
>> turn cites Wentworth & Flexner.
>
> I can't understand what "slip-de-wib" is; in fact, I can't even
> interpret
> the parts (is "de" = "the"? what is "wib"? is it like
> "flibbertigibbet"?).
> I can't find this expression anywhere.

Exactly so.

>  I can't find "splibby" either,
> except in "Juba to Jive" (and the Cassell's dictionary!).

I'm not familiar with Cassell's, but you might anything in JtoJ.

>
> I can't find "splib" in any of the older books, not in the Wentworth
> and
> Flexner editions which I've checked, not even in Major's 1970
> dictionary.
>
> The books which do show "splib" define it as (1) any black person
> (e.g.,
> "Juba", Smitherman's "Black Talk")

They probably meant to define the term as "any black _male_." Nobody
ever referred to a chick as a "splib." Well, back in the day, nobody
did. More than enough time has passed to allow for changes in usage.
Simple change over time could also account for the usages noted below.

> , OR (2) a black child (Claerbaut's
> "Black Jargon in White America"), OR (3) a black soldier/marine/sailor.

I'm unfamiliar with these _specific_ uses, but that could be a result
of my never having lived in a part of the country where people use the
term with such narrow meanings.

>
> I can recall the word from the late 1960's in both derogatory

I've never, from 1949 to the present, known splib to be a term other
than neutral. What constitutes a derogatory use? I've seen phrases like
"splib street crime," but that doesn't make "splib" derogatory any more
than "African-American street crime" makes "African-American"
derogatory.

>  and non-derogatory uses (it was never very common in my civilian
> experience,
> though). I don't think I've heard it once in the last 15 years

I'm not surprised. The term is quite antiquated. Its heyday was the
'Fifties. Using "splib" is like using "short" to mean "automobile" or
using "up tight" in its positive sense, as in "up tight [and out of
sight]."

-Wilson Gray

> , but then
> maybe I don't get out enough. Usenet search (Google Groups) shows
> mostly
> derogatory uses recently. Do any of the savants have earlier or more
> precise information?
>
>> I can return to this on Saturday; in the interim I'm off to Paris. I
>> trust
>> at least some will be jealous.
>
> I am, but we US-ans, if we're good, get to go there after we die, I'm
> told.
>
>> PS. What on earth is wrong with 'Would that it were'?
>
> Nothing, IMHO. Sounds a little old-fashioned maybe, kind of
> subjunctive or
> something. Some otherwise reasonable persons object to old-fashioned
> expressions; I don't know why. E.g., Larry Trask was strongly averse to
> "albeit".
>
> -- Doug Wilson
>