SHAFT! (1957)

Wed Mar 8 19:13:37 UTC 2006

_http://www.lyricsondemand.com/soundtracks/s/shaftlyrics/themefromshaftlyrics.
html_ 
(http://www.lyricsondemand.com/soundtracks/s/shaftlyrics/themefromshaftlyrics.html) 
They say this cat Shaft is a bad mother
SHUT YOUR MOUTH! 
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The great Gordon Parks (director of SHAFT and popular photographer and so  
much more) has died at age 93.
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What do OED and HDAS have for "shaft"?
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Well do I remember playing tuba in the high school band, and the tune from  
SHAFT! that went like this...
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_http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0603080177mar08,1,7229610.
story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed_ 
(http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-0603080177mar08,1,7229610.story?coll=chi-newsnationworld-hed) 

Gordon Parks
1912--2006

Social critic was armed  with lens

By Michael Wilmington, Tribune movie  critic. Tribune staff reporter Mark 
Jacob and Tribune news services contributed  to this report
Published March 8, 2006

"I chose my camera as a weapon against all the  things I dislike about 
America--poverty, racism, discrimination."

So said  Gordon Parks in his searingly powerful 1966 autobiography "A Choice 
of Weapons,"  a bold statement that aptly revealed two sides of this complex, 
brilliant and  ultimately heroic artist: the outward anger against injustice 
and the love that  lay beneath it. Both helped fuel his rise from Kansas rural 
poverty to world  fame.

Parks, who died Tuesday in his New York City home at the age of 93,  was a 
true Renaissance man who had an astonishing array of gifts and talents. He  
excelled in many areas and lived an improbably full, inspiring and productive  
life.

He was a subtle and luminous photographer and poet and was director  of the 
action-packed 1971 hit movie "Shaft."

Above all, he was a  photographer, one of the legends of his profession. He 
was the first  African-American staff photographer for Life magazine, and later 
became the  first black to direct a major Hollywood movie.

Parks' perfect eye and  sensitivity to light and dark revealed themselves in 
many other fields as well.  He was a novelist, poet, journalist, composer of 
both film scores and classical  music (including the 1989 ballet "Martin," 
about Martin Luther King Jr.) and  even, for a while, a semi-pro basketball player.

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(OED)
10. In various slang uses.    a. The penis. Also shaft of delight.  
[1719  _T.  D'URFEY_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-d2.html#t-durfey)  Wit & Mirth IV. 72 It is a  Shaft of Cupid's cut, 'Twill serve to Rove, to 
Prick, to Butt.] 1772  _G. A. STEVENS_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-s4.html#g-a-stevens)  Songs, Comic, & Satyrical 11 For Cupid's Pantheon, 
the Shaft of Delight Must spring from the  Masculine Base. 1971  _B. W. ALDISS_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-a.html#b-w-aldiss)  Soldier Erect 45 
It was never  enough merely to lower your It was nthey had to come off,..so 
that you could crouch  there naked but for your shirt, frantically rubbing your 
shaft.
b.  A human leg. U.S.  
1935  _A. J. POLLOCK_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-p2.html#a-j-pollock)  Underworld Speaks 103/2  Shaft, a woman's leg. 1939  C. MORLEY  Kitty 
Foyle 95 If anyone showed  a good shaft Pop would wink at me.
c.  U.S. An act or instance of unfair or harsh treatment; slighting,  
rejection, ‘the push’; esp. in to give or get the shaft
.  
1959  Amer. Speech XXXIV. 155 A girl  or boy who makes a play for another's 
date is snaking... If he succeeds,  the loser gets the shaft (sometimes with 
barbs), the purple  shaft, or the maroon harpoon, depending upon the degree of 
injury to  his pride. 1960  _WENTWORTH_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-w2.html#wentworth)   & FLEXNER  Dict. Amer. Slang 461/1  Shaft.., an act or 
an instance of being taken advantage  of, unfairly treated, deceived, tricked, 
cheated, or victimized; a raw deal.  Usu. in ‘to get the (or a) shaft’. 
Fig., the image is the taboo one of  the final insult, having someone insert 
something, as a barbed shaft, up one's  rectum. 1964  Mad Mag. July 14 Looks like  
somebody gave him the shaft! 1977  Amer. Speech 1975 L. 65 She gave  him the 
shaft after he broke their date last weekend.  1979  Mod. Photography Dec. 
86/2, I  would give more of my business to Minolta but for the company's 
uncooperative,  anti~consumer thinking. Doubtless there are many such as myself who 
have gotten  the shaft.
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(OED)

4. To treat unfairly or harshly; to cheat, deceive; to take advantage  of; to 
slight, reject. slang (orig. and chiefly N. Amer.).  
1959  Amer. Speech XXXIV. 155 A raw  deal from any other source may also be 
referred to in this way; for example, one  may be shafted or jabbed by the 
opposite sex, a professor, a  policeman, parents, or anyone else for any real or 
imagined injury. 1966  _‘E.  LATHEN’_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-l.html#e-lathen)   Murder makes Wheels go Round xiii. 108 He was a menace to 
Wahl... He'd railroaded Orin Dunn into jail...  He was shafting Buck 
Holsinger! 1970  Deb. Senate Canada 1 June 7551/2 As I have told my constituents in 
Hamilton, Ontario, which seems  to have been continually shafted by this 
government. 1971  _B.  MALAMUD_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-m.html#b-malamud)  Tenants 19 Rent control..is an  immoral situation. The innocent landlord 
gets shafted.  1976  _M.  MACHLIN_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-m.html#m-machlin)  Pipeline xxxv. 397, I think how  they're shafting us with 
this whole deal.
5. =  _FUCK_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/cgi/crossref?query_type=word&queryword=shaft&first=1&max_to_show=10&sort_type=alpha&search_id=vVLd-mrV5gp-10861&resu
lt_place=5&xrefword=fuck&ps=v.)  v. 1  trans. coarse slang.  
1970  G. LORD  Marshmallow Pie xxi. 185 There  was this young girl among 
them, not even sixteen yet..like as not being shafted  by every dirty long-haired 
crud in town. 1971  _B. W. ALDISS_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-a.html#b-w-aldiss)  Soldier Erect 82 How sinful he  looked, squatting there by 
the water while his wife was being shafted by some  dirty big Mendip only a few 
feet away! 1971  _J. WAINWRIGHT_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-w.html#j-wainwright)  Last Buccaneer II. 228 He was Jimmy  He was that's 
all...and the rest of the world could go  shaft itself.
Hence shafting  vbl. n.  
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1971  _B. W. ALDISS_ 
(http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-a.html#b-w-aldiss)  Soldier Erect 124 Hello there,  gran! What do you do? Gobble? Where are 
the birds? We want three as are fit  enough to stand a gude shafting. 1972  _J. 
WAINWRIGHT_ (http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-w.html#j-wainwright)  
Requiem for Loser iii. 50 What a  monumental shafting he'd deliver to some lucky 
bint. 1973  Farm & Country 20 Nov. 23/3  Hugh Blaine charged that farmers ‘
suffered a shafting at the  hands of feed dealers last year’. 1975  _R. H. 
RIMMER_ (http://dictionary.oed.com/help/bib/oed2-r.html#r-h-rimmer)  Premar 
Experiments i. 94 After  double-dealing with his own people and selling them to the 
slavers, some slaver  gave the king and his family a shafting and enslaved them 
too.
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(PROQUEST)
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_FISH  'N' GAME; Most License Boosts Effective Next Year _ 
(http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=4&did=437222762&SrchMode=1&sid=11&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=P
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JACK CURNOW. Los Angeles Times  (1886-Current File). Los Angeles, Calif.: Jul 
14, 1957. p. C4 (1 page) 
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_The Shaft_  
We got the shaft pretty good at a party the other night at which some  
skippers were among those present. 
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_PREP  PATTER; City Elevens Clash in Milk Bowl Tilts _ 
(http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?index=5&did=445041732&SrchMode=1&sid=11&Fmt=10&VInst=PROD&VType=PQD&R
QT=309&VName=HNP&TS=1141844387&clientId=65882) 
JACK  HEFLEY. Los Angeles Times (1886-Current File).  Los Angeles, Calif.: 
Oct 16, 1958. p. C4 (1 page)  
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California got the shaft when the all-star track team for 1958 was  selected 
by Scholastic Coach magazine that's distributed to all high schools in  the 
nation. 
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(NEWSPAPERARCHIVE) 
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_The Post Standard_ 
(http://www.newspaperarchive.com/Viewer.aspx?img=3YGl/Jks4m6KID/6NLMW2nyJHCLEejBuFnl6nMCXW6I/NGCAyj03oUIF+CsZYmrz)  _Sunday,  March 02, 
1958_ 
(http://www.newspaperarchive.com/Search.aspx?Search="get+shafted"+AND+date:1958-03-02)  _Syracuse,_ 
(http://www.newspaperarchive.com/Search.aspx?Search="get+shafted"+AND+cityid:28660+AND+stateid:67+AND+range:1935-1959)   _New  
York_ 
(http://www.newspaperarchive.com/Search.aspx?Search="get+shafted"+AND+stateid:67+AND+range:1935-1959)   ...And is the  word that has replaced Next 
time your young hopeful tells I GET  SHAFTED on that ...  ..

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