Barry's message: .. My book is published

[Sam Clements]

Oxford Encyclopedia on Food and Drink in America.

I'm just guessing that's it.

Rodney, er...uh, Barry, gets no respect, again.

SC

----- Original Message -----
From: "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at UMR.EDU>
To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, October 17, 2004 5:03 PM
Subject: Re: Barry's message: .. My book is published


>    I'm confused. What book is Barry talking about? How can it be his
published book when it's clearly written by someone else?
>
>   Btw, in the "hot dog" book by Cohen/Popik/Shulman I clarify that 3/4 of
the book's material comes from Barry. There must be no doubt about the
enormous contributions Barry has been making to the study of Americanisms,
> and one of the tasks of ads-l is to see that his contributions (and those
of other scholars too) receive due credit.
>
> Gerald Cohen
>
> > ----------
> > From:         American Dialect Society on behalf of Bapopik at AOL.COM
> > Sent:         Sunday, October 17, 2004 6:47 AM
> > To:   ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> > Subject:           "Hip" from Wolof?; Big Apple Whores (cont.); My book
is published
> >
> >
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
----
> > --------------------
> > MY BOOK IS PUBLISHED
> >
> > My book arrived; the book party is Tuesday. I've been depressed all
week.
> >
> > Last Saturday, I took a walking tour of Little India in Jackson Heights.
I
> > thought I'd do some work on "Bollywood," and all the NYPL materials
were, as
> > usual, off site. Wednesday, after work, I headed to the Science,
Industry, and
> > Business library (open until 8 p.m.) and ordered the books. Thursday and
Friday
> > should have been plenty of time to get them, and I'd read them on
Saturday.
> >
> > Yesterday, I made the trek to the NYPL. My books weren't there. "You
made the
> > request when?" I was asked. There was no trace of my off-site request. I
> > would have to request the books again. That's how it's been.
> >
> > Barry Popik! I'm Barry Popik! This happens to me every single goddamn
time!
> > Is there some problem? Every single thing I do my entire life is like
this!
> > Soylent Green is made of people! People!!!!!!!!!
> >
> > Which brings me again to my new book. I can't say what the book is
because
> > ADS-L archives are Google-searchable.
> >
> > Let's start off with "hot dog." It's written by the expected person.
Written
> > poorly. My name is never cited, but Gerald Cohen's is. Also cited is
David K.
> > Barnhart and Allan A. Metcalf's AMERICA IN SO MANY WORDS, because you'd
want to receive my "hot dog" work second-hand.
> >
> > Let's check "corn dog." (Corn is on the cover of the book.)  "And it is
no
> > coincidence that the corn dog (invented as the 'cozydog' in Springfield,
> > Illinois, in 1947) and cornflakes (by Kellogg's in Battle Creek,
Michigan, in 1902)
> > both originated in the Midwest,..." I'd posted here in February 2003
that "corn
> > flakes" was cited from the 1890s. In November 2002, I'd posted "corn
dog"
> > from 1939. In April 2003, I'd posted "corn dog" from 1929. In November
2003, I'd
> > posted "corn dog" hitting  Los Angeles in 1940.
> >
> > Let's check "gyro." I had made a special trip to Chicago for this. Nope,
not t
> > here.
> >
> > Let's check "Danish pastry." I'd traced this to a Danish baker in New
York
> > City, but no one will ever know.
> >
> > Let's check "slang." The entry is by Tom Dalzell and several AMERICAN
SPEECH
> > articles are cited. No dates are attached to most of the slang.
"86"--perhaps
> > the greatest slang term of this type--is not mentioned. My work on
Michael
> > Casey and the Bowery origin of food slang ("Adam and Eve on a Raft") is
not
> > mentioned. Despite this, Dalzell's "slang" article is still one of the
best written
> > in the book.
> >
> > Let's check "smoothie." I did tremendous work on this, but there's no
entry.
> > Just one line! "Smoothies, thick drinks consisting of fresh fruit
blended with
> > milk, yogurt, or ice cream, became popular in the 1980s." ONE LINE! Not
even
> > a good one line.
> >
> > Let's check "Sicilian pizza," of which I'd recently posted and should
make
> > another post with an earlier cite. It's not here under "pizza."
> >
> > Let's check "ice cream." This entry had better be good--"ice cream" is
> > important. Let's start with "sundae":
> >
> > "The invention of the ice cream sundae is also the stuff of legend. One
> > version has it that preachers thought it was sinful to si[p sodas on
Sundays, which
> > led an enterprising soda jerk to invent the sundae. Another says it was
> > invented when someone ran out of soda water. The sundae was hugely
popular, and
> > other ice cream innovations followed."
> >
> > That's it. No names. No places. No dates.
> >
> > Let's check "iced tea." It's in a section about the 1904 St. Louis
World's
> > Fair: "Visitors are more conventional food than at other fairs but were
first
> > introduced to iced tea, Eskay's healthy baby foods, sliced bread, and,
> > purportedly, hot dogs and hamburgers." But in the section on "tea,"
there's this: "Iced
> > tea was also available in the 1870s in hotels and railroads."  My
important
> > find in the 1857 SATURDAY EVENING POST is never mentioned.
> >
> > Let's check "Long Island Iced Tea." It isn't here!
> >
> > The cocktail sections were written by Dale DeGroff, who quotes the same
usual
> > sources and does no original research.
> >
> > Let's check "coffee." Surely, my book would have some of my work on
> > "cappuccino" in America, tracing the historical sites in San Francisco
and New York
> > (Caffe Regio on MacDougall Street). "Cappuccino" is not even in the
index!
> >
> > So it goes, on term after term of American food and drink.
> >
> > On Friday, I brought the book to work. Everybody was impressed. Yeah,
the
> > binding is fabulous.
> >
> > And I'm thinking, why am I still doing parking tickets for a living? Why
is
> > this even a book and not an electronically searchable format? Why am I
not
> > writing a dictionary and blasting all of this apart?
> >
> > Why do I live another day? To get plagiarized by Chicago? To tell people
> > twice a week that the Big Apple doesn't come from whores? Is that it?
> >
> >