Heard on "Today on NBC"

[Wilson Gray]

As I noted, I had in mind the local, Saint Louis BE sense. I'm totally
unfamiliar with the AAVE sense, though I agree that that sense isn't
particularly slangy. That a term used in Saint Louis might have a
meaning different from or even unknown to that of AAVE is possibly the
consequence of the fact that, at least into the 'Sixties, black Saint
Louis consisted of two islands surrounded by white Saint Louis, with
Saint Louis itself being an independent city in turn surrounded by the
politically-separate, 99.44% white Saint Louis County. And, in those
days, now 99.44% black East Saint Louis, IL, known as "East Side"
("into the flivver and across the river") in black Saint Louis, was
white enough to have an illegally-segregated school system, e.g.
Lincoln High School for ordinary blacks and East Saint Louis High
School for whites and for black scholars and athletes.

-Wilson

On Nov 29, 2007 10:29 AM, 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: Heard on "Today on NBC"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> IIRC, to _lay dead_ has long had an AAVE sense of "to lie low." I associate it with the '60s or early '70s. If it isn't in HDAS, it's because I didn't think it was slangy enough.
>
>   Or else because I don't RC.
>
>   JL
>
> Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Wilson Gray
> Subject: Heard on "Today on NBC"
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Matt is questioning Magic Johnson on the amount of medicine that the
> latter takes daily to control his HIV. Magic answers that he now takes
> only two medicines a day "because the virus is _layin' dead_ in [his]
> body."
>
> Clearly, Magic means that the virus is _lying dormant_ in his body.
> However, this caught my attention because, in the 'Forties and
> 'Fifties in Saint Louis, we used "lay dead" to mean, "laze around the
> house doing nothing in particular."
>
> It may be a bit macabre, but I gotta tell y'all, the mental picture of
> HIV just lazin' around in Magic's bod doin' nothin' in p'ticluh cracks
> me up.
>
> -Wilson
> --
> 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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--
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