when "intercourse" got funny

[Baker, John]

        I think we have to start with the non-innocent meaning of
"intercourse."  "Sexual intercourse" (or "carnal intercourse," etc.) has
referred to coitus for a long time, but it became the dominant polite
reference in the later years of the 19th century, and it seems to have
been during this period that coitus became the default meaning of
"intercourse" without an adjective.  After about 1900, it becomes rare
to find unmodified "intercourse" referring to anything other than sex,
though the modified form ("social intercourse," etc.) can have an
innocent meaning even today, in the right circles.

        Once "intercourse" meant "fucking," the humor could not have
been long to follow.


John Baker



-----Original Message-----
From: American Dialect Society [mailto:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU] On Behalf
Of Jonathan Lighter
Sent: Wednesday, September 27, 2006 8:31 AM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject: when "intercourse" got funny

Some months ago it was observed that there was a time when the word
"intercourse" could be used with a perfectly innocent meaning. Now, of
course, its denotation has narrowed so drastically that it is impossible
to use the word in nonsexual contexts without eliciting
counterproductive, muffled guffaws.

  Just when the innocent era came to an end is not clear, but the
benchmark in my own memory is 1964 when mention of the Non-Intercourse
Act of 1809 caused such wordless mirth in my co-ed high-school American
History class that Mr. Callahan had to tell us to get serious, that's
what they called it.

  And yet, also in 1964, the novelist and critic George P. Elliott was
publishing the following sentence in which he attempted to characterize
the novel as a genre :

  "The content of the [ideal] novel as here defined is intercourse among
a few credible characters and between them and the reader, who knows
them by their public actions, their intimate words, and their
unrecognized impulses."

  Elliott was born around 1920. Could the shift have occurred so late in
his life that he didn't realize the umhilarity in what he was writing ?
Or was his mind clouded by his doctorate in literature ?

  When did "intercourse" get funny ?

  JL

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