New "lumpkin," "girney"

[ronbutters at AOL.COM]

Isn't Lumpkin an important family name in the American South? My memory is that there is a Lumpkin Ave in Athens, GA.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

-----Original Message-----
From: Dennis Preston <preston at MSU.EDU>

Date:         Sat, 17 Nov 2007 11:32:58
To:ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
Subject:      Re: [ADS-L] New "lumpkin," "girney"


And the Urban Dictionary has a rather different
sense of "lumkin" from any of these.

dInIs



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>header -----------------------
>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
>Subject:      New "lumpkin," "girney"
>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>OED has_lumpkin_ for an oaf in the year 1901
>only.  But today Meredith F. Small has a
>different idea
>[http://www.livescience.com/history/071116-hn-baby-monkeys.html]:
>
>   "Nothing makes a person sound more idiotic than the presence of a new baby.
>
>   "Our voices climb quickly into the
>stratosphere of the human vocal range and our
>words squeak out in a way that annoys everyone
>within earshot.
>
>   "We also start to babble senseless, often embarrassing, phrases.
>   'Oooooh, sweetums, lumpkin, cutie-cutie' "
>
>   Female macaques seems to make a distinctive sound around macaque babies:
>   "Around babies, females also make a call
>called a girney, a whining sound that apparently
>goes well with a grunt.
>
>   "Sounding like wheezing, puffing calliopes,
>females approach the mother or the baby.
>Although they look rather scary in their
>excitement, the noises apparently signal, 'I'm
>no threat. I wonít hurt the baby.' "
>
>   JL
>
>
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--
Dennis R. Preston
University Distinguished Professor
Department of English
Morrill Hall 15-C
Michigan State University
East Lansing, MI 48864 USA

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