Yet More Bad Girl Talk

[Jonathan Lighter]

A little more reflection suggests that the BG's "snatch" may mean something
a little more abstract, like "deal roughly with."

More examples of this usage are needed.  It may be idiosyncratic, but I
doubt it.

JL

On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 5:18 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: Yet More Bad Girl Talk
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> My guess is that "snatch" means something like "seize and assault." I'm not
> familiar with this usage, but cf. 19th C. _to snatch baldheaded_ 'to
> vanquish, ruin, defeat thoroughly, etc.'
> UrbanDictionary isn't any help here.
>
> OED's 6a is vaguely related in sense, but the above seems to me
> significantly different. It implies (if I read it rightly) more
> physicality=
> .
> (To "snatch someone's life" is not really the same as to "snatch someone"
> a=
> s
> I provisionally understand it.)
>
> The putative "bitches" in the utterance seem to be female, though in theory
> they could be of either sex. I doubt any connection with pudendal "snatch."
>
> I don't mean to suggest that all the lexical items exemplified in my post
> are new, though one or two appear to be. I only mean they are relatively
> unusual and insufficiently documented.
>
> "Bitch" as a general term of contempt applied to men is old but apparently
> never common. That may be changing; see HDAS I. This ex. may be the first
> I've encountered that was applied by a woman to a man, esp. with no
> imputation of homosexuality.
>
> JL
>
>
>
> On Sat, Aug 14, 2010 at 8:11 AM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
>
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> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> > Subject:      Re: Yet More Bad Girl Talk
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------=
> ------
> >
> > A few questions:
> >
> > At 8/13/2010 11:58 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> > >The Oxygen cable network ("for women") is back with another bunch o' bad
> > >girls in _The Bad Girls Club_.  Some linguistically noteworthy sayings
> > from
> > >the unruly female 21-26-year-old cohort:
> > >
> > >...
> > >"If Iike you, I'll snatch the bitch for you. If I don't like you, you
> ge=
> t
> > >snatched by the bitch."  [Meaning unclear but ominous.]
> >
> > Could this possibly be descended from the OED2's
> > snatch (v). ":6. a. To remove suddenly from this
> > world or life. Used in passive and freq. with
> > away and from."?  (Here used in the active and without "away" or "from".)
> >      1597 HOOKER Eccl. Pol. V. xlvi. =A71 Rather
> > to bee taken then snatched away from the face of
> > the earth. 1601 SHAKES. All's Well V. iii. 154, I
> > am a-feard the life of Hellen (Ladie) Was fowly
> > snatcht. ... 1888 BURGON Lives 12 Good Men I.
> > Pref. p. xiv, He was snatched away while
> > affording..fresh promise of a truly brilliant Professorial career.
> >
> > Or, assuming the "bitch" here is female (as it is
> > not in the "motherf*****g bitch" quotation),
> > perhaps arising somehow from snatch (n), "14.
> > dial. and slang. The female pudenda."?  What were
> > the genders of the speaker, "you", and "the bitch"?
> >
> >
> > >...
> > >
> > >"[She's a] slutbag."  [I.e., despicable.]
> >
> > Jon, did you intend to suggest that these
> > expressions were recent?  Thinking that I'd heard
> > or seen "slutbag" some time ago (unless it's so
> > attractive that I invented a memory of it!), I
> > checked Google Books, and see a 1988 snippet from
> > _Little Red Rooster_, by Greg Matthews:  ". . .
> > lying bitch of a two-faced slut bag shit-faced ..."
> >
> > Joel
> >
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