Q: soixante neuf (UNCLASSIFIED)

[Benjamin Zimmer]

On Thu, Oct 29, 2009 at 6:11 PM, Mark Mandel <Mark.A.Mandel at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On the meaning, I would define it not as "simultaneous cunnilingus and
> fellatio", but as "simultaneous mutual oral sex". I remember hearing it with
> reference to male-male pairings as well. Google /"gay 69"/ claims "about
> 58,200" hits; and /"lesbian 69"/ "about 128,000".

Jesse's recent Slate piece on "Why it's so hard to put sex in the
dictionary" addresses this very point. He cites an older edition of
Random House College Dictionary defining "sixty-nine" as "simultaneous
fellatio and cunnilingus by two partners" and notes that it "omits the
possibility of a homosexual sixty-nine."

http://www.slate.com/id/2227971/

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