"saditty" (snobbish) from "Saturday"?

[Wilson Gray]

Y'all are just playing, "Let's mess with the mind of the colored
guy!," right? This thread can't really be serious, can it? Because, to
quote one of Richard Pryor's most useful aphorisms, it's  "unreal. And
I ain't going for it."

When it's a WAG, call it a WAG.

To answer G's question, though, of course, I haven't been everywhere
in the United States, I shall nevertheless make the strongest possible
assertion: no.

For one thing, slang, like exclamation, doesn't follow standard rules
nor do they often have a standard spelling that people only half-learn
in school and which would affect the pronunciation of the word. The
pronunciation of "Saturday" ranges from [saeTr de(i)] to ['sae?I dI],
at least. But the other word, however anyone chooses to spell it,
ranges from [s at dIdI(y)] to [s'dIdI].

I can't imagine the least connection between Saturday and
snobbishness. Thursday is jokingly referred to as "MDO" or "Maids' Day
Off" and, on Sunday, "Blue-veins" (in my experience, more common than
"high-yellow," but both terms are very rare in ordinary speech) go to
the Episcopal church and darker shades are distributed among the
remaining denominations. But Sunday merely separates the "good,
Chrishtan folk" from the sinners. But there's nothing particularly
snobbish about this.

Little Richard:

It's Saturday night
And I just got paid
Fool about my money
Don't try to save
...
Gonna rip it up!

Fats Domino:

Sunday morning
My head is bad
But it's worth it
For the time that I had
[On Saturday night]

Has anyone besides your humble correspondent spent as much as a second
with a black street-whore? They are anything but sadistic. They have
what was called, back in the day, "cold" i.e. hyper-cool,
personalities intended to make a man feel relaxed, comfortable, and
willing to spend all the money that she can get out of him. It ain't
nothin' saditty, let alone sadistic, about no who'.

But, of course, a street whore has exactly zero social standing.
Calling the ex a who' is the essence of the insult. "Saditty" merely
adds a claim something like the following: that, even though this
woman has no social standing whatsoever, she has had the gall to try
to act above her non-existent social station by disrespecting Eddie's
manhood and he ain't goin' for it.

Besides, Eddie's talk is merely the kind of meaningless, hurt-feelings
babble that you expect from someone who's been burned in an affair of
the heart.

-Wilson

On Mon, Jul 28, 2008 at 10:36 AM, Cohen, Gerald Leonard <gcohen at mst.edu> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Cohen, Gerald Leonard" <gcohen at MST.EDU>
> Subject:      "saditty" (snobbish) from "Saturday"?
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Barry Popik once sent me a photocopy of a page from the NY Amsterdam News (Nov. 23, 1935, p. 13); it was in connection with "The Big Apple", but I also noticed "Satiddy", which I assume is "Saturday." The left column was cut off slightly, and so the context is: "1-0-1 Club packing to Notre Dame-[left column] to S.R.O. Satiddy nite gone."
>
> This "Satiddy" is so close (at least in spelling) to "saditty" that I'm tempted to revisit "saditty" with "Saturday" in mind.  The original context would have something to do with getting all dressed up for going out on Saturday night.
> Maybe a woman who was always dressed to the nines might have been described by her less-well-dressed up acquaintances as looking "like a Satiddy (saditty) ho."  Or something along this line.
>
> As for the pronunciation, suh-DITT-eh, perhaps this is merely an altered form.  Southern speech often stresses the first syllable (e.g., PO-lice, IN-surance), whereas Northern speech stresses the second one (po-LEESE, in-SUR-ance).  So maybe an original "SAT-iddy" (> SAD-itty) was transformed on Northern soil to sa-DITT-ee.
>
>    My main question now: Is there any evidence of "saditty" (snobbish) being pronounced with initial stress anywhere in the U.S.?
>
> Gerald Cohen
> P.S. Btw, my e-mail address is now gcohen at mst.edu (due to the change of my institution's name to Missouri University of Science and Technology).  My former e-mail address (gcohen at umr.edu), still an option for a few days, will be entirely phased out on July 31.
>
> * * * * * * *
>
> Date:         Wed, 20 Jul 2005 14:14:23 -0500
> Reply-To:     American Dialect Society
> Sender:       American Dialect Society Mailing List
> From:         "Mullins, Bill"
> Subject:      Re: siditty, saditty (1963), siddity (1965)
>
>
>
>
> suh-DIT-eh
>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: American Dialect Society
>> [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Laurence Horn
>> Sent: Wednesday, July 20, 2005 2:13 PM
>> To: [log in to unmask]
>> Subject: Re: siditty, saditty (1963), siddity (1965)
>>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <[log in to unmask]>
>> Poster:       Laurence Horn <[log in to unmask]>
>> Subject:      Re: siditty, saditty (1963), siddity (1965)
>> --------------------------------------------------------------
>> -----------------
>>
>> >No, it sounded clearly like "saditty", and the
>> closed-captioning agreed.
>> >
>>
>> With what stress?  If it's antepenult, I certainly can't
>> detect any huge difference in how "SADitty" and "SADurday"
>> would sound, especially with a non-rhotic pronunciation of
>> the latter.  But if it's stressed in another way, there's no
>> possibility of confusion, even without the support of the
>> closed-captioning.
>>
>> Larry
>>
>> >  > -----Original Message-----
>> >>  From: American Dialect Society
>> >>  [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of James Smith
>> >>  Sent: Wednesday, July 20, 2005 2:04 PM
>> >>  To: [log in to unmask]
>> >>  Subject: Re: siditty, saditty (1963), siddity (1965)
>> >>
>> >>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> >>  -----------------------
>> >>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <[log in to unmask]>
>> >>  Poster:       James Smith <[log in to unmask]>
>> >>  Subject:      Re: siditty, saditty (1963), siddity (1965)
>> >>  --------------------------------------------------------------
>> >>  -----------------
>> >>
>> >>  Could this be simply 'Saturday Whore'?
>> >>
>> >>  --- "Mullins, Bill"  wrote:
>> >>
>> >>  > I mentioned last week that I saw the movie "Barbershop 2", in
>> >> which  > Eddie calls his ex-girlfriend a "saditty ho".  My wife's
>> >> reaction was  > that "saditty" meant "sadistic", which would have
>> >> been appropriate  > under the circumstances.
>> >>  >
>> >>
>> >>
>> >>  James D. SMITH                 |If history teaches anything
>> >>  South SLC, UT                  |it is that we will be sued
>> >>  [log in to unmask]     |whether we act quickly
>> and decisively
>> >>                                 |or slowly and cautiously.
>> >>
>
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