Pokadope: nonce or regional slang?

[Cohen, Gerald Leonard]

   Since Jonathan Lighter never heard of the term, it's likely of extremely limited use. My guess is that we deal here with the humorous word-play of someone who knew some German and Italian..

   My first thought when I saw "pokadope" is that this word looks like Italian "poco dopo" (= a little while afterwards).  Meanwhile, German has the childish word "Po" (rear-end, backside), which incidentally, I'm told will usually produce giggles among German gradeschoolers the first time they come across the Itialian river Po in a geography lesson.

    So someone familiar with German "Po" might have used the Italian "poco dopo" as a humorous extension of this "Po"-- a bit like Lyndon Johnson's once referring to the "do-re-me" (money), intended as a humorous extension of "dough" (money). --- Then shortening to give the term a sense of still more familiarity: hence "pokadope."

     This is of course speculation.  But what else do we have to go on?

Gerald Cohen


> ----------
> From:         American Dialect Society on behalf of Jonathan Lighter
> Reply To:     American Dialect Society
> Sent:         Wednesday, January 4, 2006 8:57 AM
> To:   ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject:           Re: Pokadope: nonce or regional slang?
        [from Jonathan Ligher, Jan. 4, 2006]:
> I have never heard of this.
>
>   JL
>
> neil <neil at TYPOG.CO.UK> wrote:
>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: neil
> Subject: Pokadope: nonce or regional slang?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> My copy of (R)HDAS end at 'O', so could Jesse or anyone else with access to
> forthcoming 'P' tell me if 'pokadope' (presumably a reference to a female as
> sex object) is nonce or whether you have other citations. The novel is set
> in east Texas in the 1930s:
>
> "What do you think of that ass?"
>
> Rooster felt himself turning red. All he could say was, "It's nice."
>
> "McBride laughed. "Nice. That's some first-rate pokadope."
>
> --Joe R. Lansdale, 'Sunset and Sawdust', Alfred A. Knopf
> [Weidenfeld & Nicholson, London, 2004, 206­207]
>
>
> Neil Crawford
> neil at typog.co.uk
>
>
>
>
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