"Sock It to Me"

[Wilson Gray]

On Jun 10, 2005, at 11:59 PM, Sam Clements wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Sam Clements <SClements at NEO.RR.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "Sock It to Me"
> -----------------------------------------------------------------------
> --------
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Wilson Gray" <wilson.gray at RCN.COM>
> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Sent: Friday, June 10, 2005 10:31 PM
> Subject: Re: "Sock It to Me"
>
>
>> On Jun 5, 2005, at 3:03 AM, Sam Clements wrote:
>
>>> Poster:       Sam Clements <SClements at NEO.RR.COM>
>>> Subject:      Re: "Sock It to Me"
>>> ---------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> ----- Original Message -----
>>> From: "Wilson Gray" <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>> To: <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>> Sent: Sunday, June 05, 2005 1:03 AM
>>> Subject: Re: "Sock It to Me"
>>>
>>>
>>>> Of course. It will be my honor.
>>>>
>>>> In 1968. there was a television show on one of the Big Three devoted
>>>> to the careers of two uknown female song stylists, one white and one
>>>> black. Unfortunately, the unknown white singer's career came from
>>>> nowhere and went nowhere. I'd never heard of her at the time and
>>>> have
>>>> not heard of her since. Hence, her name escapes me.
>>>
>>> Her name was Gloria Loring.  The show, titled "The Singers," was
>>> aired
>>> on
>>> ABC on May 11, 1968.   But your characterization of the show as
>>> "devoted to
>>> the careers of two unknown female song stylists" is incorrect.
>>
>> It's not *my* characterization. it's the way that the show was
>> advertised and presented. Maybe you had to have been there and seen
>> the
>> TV program and seen the TV ads preceding it. That program was
>> memorable
>> for only one thing: equating Aretha with a nobody, despite the fact
>> that Aretha had long been somebody. What could have motivated that, do
>> you think? The fact that ABC's boss was Aretha's number-one fan,
>> perhaps? And why would Aretha have acceded to such an insulting
>> juxtaposition? We could have been wrong, but, at the time, most black
>> people figured it was that she needed the exposure to white America.
>>
>> -Wilson Gray
>
> You're right--I don't remember watching the show, even though I was 24
> at
> the time.

>   I certainly knew who Aretha was,  but I guess it's always
> possible that no one at ABC did.  They just picked her name out of a
> hat.
> If you ask me to decide on how the show portrayed Ms. Franklin based
> on your
> 37-year-old memory and my reading of a few dozen newspaper reviews and
> stories from the time, then I go with the print cites.
>
>>> Every major
>>> newspaper I can read on Proquest make it clear that Aretha was big
>>> time
>>
>> That is precisely my point. Oh, I'm sorry. You mean that old newspaper
>> stories have persuaded you that she was considered big time by *white*
>> people.
>
> I don't get the point that you're making.  She was considered big time
> by
> all of America.
>
>>> ("Respect" had won her a Grammy
>>
>> And, of course, given that the Grammy-winners are selected by means of
>> a vote by the general public, it naturally  follows, as the night the
>> day, that Aretha was clearly the darling of the general white-American
>> public.
>>
>
> All I meant was that she was well-known.  She wasn't some unknown.
>
>>>  earlier that year) and Loring was a
>>> newbie.
>>
>> The word that you're searching for is "nobody."
>>
> Actually, I wasn't searching.  I used the word I meant.  Aretha had
> arrived,
> Loring was a newbie on the scene.  That juxtaposition was part of the
> show.
> Oh!  I forgot--you saw the show and Aretha was presented as a nobody.
> My
> bad.
>
>
>
>>>> Clearly, neither the white power structure nor the average person on
>>>> the white street had any idea who Aretha Franklin was or even gave a
>>>> Roosevelt damn. Aretha Franklin had not crossed over the color line
>>>> by
>>>> 1967. Q.E.D.
>>>
>
> Perhaps it was clear to you.  I think that the term you were searching
> for
> was not Q.E.D. but rather IMO.
>
> Sam Clements
>

You''re right, of course. The use of Q.E.D. was not serious.

-Wilson Gray