"Ghetto" now (also) means "jury-rigged"?

[Joel S. Berson]

I meant to ask a question, not say I had heard/read the sense
"stolen".  Instead of "stolen", If I'd thought of it I'd have used
the word "bootleg", as in "APPENDED FROM ADDITIONS 1993  bootleg,
n.  Add: [1.] b. A gramophone record or tape prepared without
authorization".  The hand-scanner is built without authorization from
the owners of the patent rights.

Grant Barrett wrote "Wilson and Alice's glosses are similar to mine:
jerry-rigged, improvised, half-assed, knock-off, bootleg, cheap,
tacky."  Are these glosses on the usage re the hand-scanner (although
I don't see all these as synonymous or as equally applicable to this
example)?  Or are they glosses on "ghetto" that you've picked up in
other contexts?

Joel

At 1/9/2006 04:50 PM, Grant Barrett wrote:
>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>-----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Grant Barrett <gbarrett at WORLDNEWYORK.ORG>
>Subject:      Re: "Ghetto" now (also) means "jury-rigged"?
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>On Jan 9, 2006, at 16:21, Alice Faber wrote:
> > Wow...I *never* understood *any* implication of illegality in "ghetto"
> > (as in "ghetto-blaster"), *never*.
>
>The "stolen" implication is completely absent from my experience,
>too. Wilson and Alice's glosses are similar to mine: jerry-rigged,
>improvised, half-assed, knock-off, bootleg, cheap, tacky.
>
>
>Grant Barrett
>gbarrett at worldnewyork.org
>http://www.doubletongued.org/