The Sanas, Jazz, Jazz and Teas

[Jonathan Lighter]

Ah, Doug, Doug.  So innocent. As recently as the 1950s - make that the 1960s - in fact, up till the late '70s if I recall correctly, the censorship of certain words was still so strong that no TV show in prime time or later would or could transmit any colloquialism that had a well-known sexual or scatological meaning, unless, as in the exx. you suggest, no simple synopnym ws available.  You may recall the more recent minor uproar in far more permissive times, the early '90s, when the word "sucks" = "stinks" was broadcast for apparently the first time on network TV.  Nothing came of the protests, but they were widely and seriously reported. (Nobody had ever objected to "stinks," so far as I know.)

Here's an example of what could happen from 1969. Following the great success of NBC's "Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In," ABC tried its hand at a comedy show in a similar format - lots of one-liners and black-out comedy.  This show sported the double entendre name of "Turn-On" (get it?). The high point for me was when a busty blonde in an evening dress looked directly into the camera's eye and cooed, "Richard Nixon is the titular head of the Republican Party." That was it. Blackout.

The outburst of condemnation for this unbelievable indecency knocked the show off the air after one episode.  Thank God I caught it. Lest you think it was the inclusion of the President's name in the gag that brought the hammer down, the various "concerned" editorials that I read were equally in the "liberal" press of the day, and none of them indicated that "political satire" was the problem.

Sure, "make" and "do," etc., have sexual meanings and were not banned - but communication would be almost impossible without these words- and I guarandamntee you that if a TV star or journalist of 35 or 40 years ago had uttered either one with the right intonation or facial expression, said individual would be pounding the pavement within forty-eight hours.  In those days even the hint of a sexual or scatological nuance would get a TV employee in trouble with the network. (Janet Jackson could not have malfunctioned back then because the entire halftime show as presented in 2004 would have been banned ahead of time as obscene.)

Much greater license, of course, was permitted in books, but not in movies or magazines.  About 1966 Ralph Ginzburg  was sent to Federal prison for a few years - not for *publishing* his high-class and pricey erotic art magazine "Eros," but for *humorously* mailing the subscription ads from - are you sitting down? - INTERCOURSE and  BLUE BALL Pennsylvania !

When the Merriam-Webster 3 included "bed" as a transitive verb in 1961, this was cited as one more (idiot) reason why this greatest American dictionary should not be purchased or referred to.  The "F" word was not included, reportedly because during a meeting held to decide the issue, nobody there, proponents included, could bring themselves to say the word itself  - in a closed meeting of some of the top lexicographers of their generation!

And all that was in the "wild" '60s. Even now, Hollywood movies are dubbed for network broadcast to remove any bad words. Had anyone on any aboveboard paper in 1912-13 known of the sexual senses of "jazz" and knowingly allowed the word to be printed in any sense at all, he or she would likely have faced a misdemeanor charge or worse.

JL


Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET> wrote:
---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: "Douglas G. Wilson"
Subject: Re: The Sanas, Jazz, Jazz and Teas
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------

>... I agree that no SF Bulletin editor in his right mind would have
>printed "jazz" in 1912 if he had the slightest suspicion that the word was
>indecent.

But "the word is indecent" seems stronger than what would be implied by the
pre-existence (even well-known) of "jazz" meaning "f*ck".

Many verbs routinely mean exactly "f*ck" (among other meanings): even such
basic ones as "do", "have", "know", "make". There is no shying away from
these verbs in general.

Other verbs may even have "f*ck" as a dominant or very likely meaning,
without causing any avoidance of a homonymous noun: e.g., "bed", "prong",
"pork".

Suppose that ca. 1900 "jazz" was used casually like "fizz" and/or like
"zig-zag" and/or like "jasm" -- and also widely used as a verb equivalent
(in denotation) to the F-word. I think in this case "jazz" would have been
printed freely, at least as long as it didn't appear as a transitive verb.

By comparison, when I was young[er] (ca. 1960) it was common knowledge that
(e.g.) "He was banging her" referred to sex and this sentence would not
have appeared in the newspaper (AFAIK), but all sorts of other uses of
"bang" were OK, even "He gets a bang out of her" for example.

OTOH, the F-word itself has generally been treated as indecent in all
applications, and I agree that "jazz" cannot have been such a word. But I
think there are only a few such globally unacceptable words.

-- Doug Wilson


---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
 Yahoo! Search presents - Jib Jab's 'Second Term'