Beyonce and "the dictionary"

[Jonathan Lighter]

I also heard it in '94, about five minutes after the appearance of HDAS 1.  Annoying.

  Regis Philbin was described as "bootylicious" in a TV promo a couple of years ago. Frightening.

  JL

Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: Beyonce and "the dictionary"
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OED On Line takes it back to 1994 in print. It's probably two days
older than water in speech.

-Wilson

On 3/9/06, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Jonathan Lighter
> Subject: Re: Beyonce and "the dictionary"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> "The budding linguist" ! Beyonce' is awesome and all that, OK, but in the total context, that phrase sums up much of what is *wrong* with American education.
>
> Think about it.
>
> JL
>
> Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
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> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Benjamin Zimmer
> Subject: Beyonce and "the dictionary"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> So let's see... "bootylicious" got an OED draft entry in Sep. 2004
> (and it's also in the latest editions of the Oxford Dictionary of
> English and the New Oxford American), but I guess Beyonce's people are
> just hearing about it now. And they're telling her she invented it.
> And tabloid "news" outlets take her at her word. Hey, she's Beyonce,
> clearly an authority on "the dictionary"!
>
> See ,
> which currently finds 26 articles like this one:
>
> -----
> http://entertainment.news.com.au/story/0,10221,18400757-7484,00.html
> Beyonce's boost
> March 09, 2006
> CURVY women around the world will soon have an official term for their
> bouncy butts, thanks to R'n'B diva Beyonce.
> Bootylicious, the term coined by the former Destiny's Child star for
> her own dangerous curves - and made famous by the hit single of the
> same name - will reportedly be added to the dictionary.
> But the Naughty Girl singer is not too impressed by her newfound
> status as a wordsmith.
> "I'm not very proud of that. It's in the dictionary - it's crazy," she
> said to Britain's TV Hits magazine.
> The 24-year-old, who is famous for her hot hip-shaking in film clips
> for songs such as Crazy In Love, says she would have stuck it out and
> put more thought into the term if she had known it would be recorded
> in the lexicon.
> "I wrote the song, but I wish there was another word I could have come
> up with if I was going to have a word in the dictionary," she said to
> the pop mag.
> The budding linguist, who is dating rap king Jay-Z, hasn't yet had a
> chance to see if the dictionary's definition is by the book, but she
> has offered her own spin on the word.
> "I don't know what it says in the dictionary but my definition is
> beautiful, bountiful and bounce-able," she said.
> -----
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>
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