scoff/scarf

[Wilson Gray]

As "food," both "scoff" and "scoffs" work for me. In my case, "scoffs"
may have been influenced the far more common (in Saint Louis), "(get
some) pecks," wherein "pecks" equals "food, something to eat." "Peck"
doesn't occur in the singular as a slang term, in StL.

-Wilson

On 8/30/07, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at yahoo.com> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
> Subject:      Re: scoff/scarf
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> A coupla thou undercooked Googlits for "snarf (and/ 'n/ &) barf," not so many for "slurp (and/ 'n /& ) burp."  The former looks to be popular in bulimic contexts.
>
>   Meanwhile, "scoff" essentially means "to eat," regardless of transitivity or voracity level (OED: 1798), though guzzling may certainly be implied.  The secret HDAS files confirm its former popularity among sailors. It is also a noun meaning "food," with a corresponding nominal "scarf" appearing in the 1930s.
>
>   An apparently silent "r" intrudes orthographically so early as 1864 in that year's edition of John C. Hotten's (Anglo English) _Slang Dictionary_, which offers "scorf."
>
>   You could also "scoff" tobacco 160 years ago; cf. later U.S. "eatin' tobacco," i.e., the chewing kind.
>
>   The earliest full-feldged U.S. "scarf," v., I've seen is from _AS_ in 1938, though there's a U.S. "scorf" from a dozen years earlier.
>
>   Cf. the similar "snarf," from the 1950s.  By the early 1970s  it also meant "to sniff."
>
>   JL
>
>
> Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU> wrote:
>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Laurence Horn
> Subject: Re: scoff/scarf
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 11:05 AM -0400 8/30/07, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>
> >On 8/30/07, Laurence Urdang wrote:
> >>
> >> Since the first quote in the OED for scoff is the same year when
> >>he was born, it is
> >> rather unlikely (but, for some, not impossible) that it was formed
> >>on the name of
> >> Auguste Escoffier.
> >> I first encountered it in the UK, in the 1970s. Later, when I
> >>encountered scarf
> >> among native speakers in the New York area, it occurred to me that it was a
> >> resurrection (hypercorrection, if you prefer) of the r-less form
> >>scoff by those speakers
> >> who want listeners to know that they are aware there is an "r" in
> >>the spelling of a word,
> >> which, of course, there wasn't---at least if one compares the
> >>history of scoff and scarf
> >> in the OED.
> >> I wanted to check it in the Century, but I couldn't get it on
> >>line and was too lazy to pick
> >> up the volume in the next room.
> >> Also, the meaning has always seemed to me closer to 'gorge
> >>oneself; eat voraciously'
> >> than to 'eat heartily.'
> >
> >I was able to access the Century online without a problem:
> >http://www.global-language.com/CENTURY/
> >
> >Under "scoff, v." one sense is "To eat hastily; devour [Naut. slang]".
> >The Supplement also shows a sense of the noun, "Food; 'grub.' [Slang]"
> >(quoting Kipling). Nothing relevant for "scarf".
> >
> >I first encountered the gluttonous sense of "scarf" in my childhood,
> >reading a collection of Peanuts comic strips. In one strip, Snoopy
> >observes that "one of the great joys in life is scarfing down junk
> >food." I can't find a dating for that strip (though the saying turns
> >up on Peanuts merchandise now) -- I'd guess it was early to mid-'70s.
> >
> >--Ben Zimmer
> >
>
> I recall once, when I had too much time on my hands and had passed
> too many similarly named establishments, coming up with the "Scarf
> 'N' Barf" as a name for an undistinguished fast food franchise. Just
> down the road from the "Slurp 'N' Burp".
>
> LH
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>
>
>
>
> ---------------------------------
> Take the Internet to Go: Yahoo!Go puts the Internet in your pocket: mail, news, photos & more.
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


--
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-----
                                              -Sam'l Clemens

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org