Assorted Comments

[Jonathan Lighter]

My supposition is that "slum" is now "inappropriate" because it seems to connote squalor, whereas "ghetto"emphasizes oppression.
  Or did.  I think all U.S. "slums" got [Arnold, n.b.] demolished in the late '60s, to be replaced by "inner cities," but would still work in foreign countries however: "For an unforgettable weekend, visit the slums of Jakarta!"

  JL

Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: Assorted Comments
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Amen, Larry. BTW, thinking about an old friend, what ever happened to
"slum"? [There''s a pun. "Thinking About an Old Friend" is the title
of a Texas blues.]

-Wilson

On 5/21/07, Laurence Horn wrote:
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> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Laurence Horn
> Subject: Re: Assorted Comments
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 3:10 PM -0700 5/21/07, James A. Landau wrote:
> >
> >I remember reading a report Jack London wrote about the 1906 San
> >Francisco earthquake in which
> >he used "ghetto" to mean segregated housing for people of a social
> >class---I don't think
> >he meant blacks, my vague recollection is Irish workmen. Nowadays,
> >except in figurative
> >or historical contexts, "ghetto" exclusively means a type of
> >African-American community.
> >It would be interesting to track down how the change in connatation
> >reflects changes in
> >politics and public perception.
>
> The earlier reference, and perhaps still the salient one then, would
> have been for restricted districts for Jews, such as the eponymous
> ones in Italy.
>
> LH
>
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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

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