_Dittybopper_

Sat Jan 23 15:01:15 UTC 2010

The latest OED finds it in a rap song of 1986 by The Fresh Force.  By the
end of October there were at least two "skeezer" rap songs driving parents
nuts:

1986 Nelson George in *Billboard* (Oct. 25) 69: Those of you who don’t know
what a “skeezer” is and wonder what the Fresh Force is singing about on its
Sutra 12-inch “She’s a Skeezer,” don’t ask your son. You might embarrass
him.  Ibid. 72: UTFO…Skeezer Pleezer.

FWIW, there was a 1983 TV movie called _Skeezer_, about a lovable bitch. A
dog.  Get it? The semantic link is close enough in theory, at least until
something better surfaces. (I'm talking etymology, not antedating. The
influence of "sleaze" must not be discounted.)  The movie was based on
Elizabeth Yates's very popular kids' book, _Skeezer: Dog with a Mission_
(1973).

Yates may have gotten the name from the "Skeezers" prominent in Baum's
_Glinda of Oz_ (1920) (there's even a Skeezer Queen).  But they're rather
different from today's bad-girl skeezers.

I also have documentary proof, from _Life_ magazine, that young women have
been calling young men "sluts" since at least the 1980s.  Sounds very weird,
but I hear it a lot on TV.

JL
On Sat, Jan 23, 2010 at 1:17 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: _Dittybopper_
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> The UD-er probably heard somebody my age use the term and pulled a
> meaning for It out of his ass. What's in HDAS is, IME, absolutely
> correct.
>
> FWIW, I first heard _skeezer_ used by Dave Chappelle. I could tell
> from context that the word had some kind of derogatory meaning, but it
> was by no means clear as to wherein the derogation lay: whether in
> physicality or in morality. But then, it's clear from the language of
> the youngest member of my family - a twenty-year-old under the
> impression that, e.g. the word "pimp" didn't exist till she was in
> middle school - that thangs ain't necessarily what they used to be.
> _Skeezer_ may not be the same as "slut" in *my* lexicon, but who knows
> how those who post to the UD have lexicalized "slut"? It was strictly
> a literary term, when *I* was twenty. Probably 99.44% of the boyz in
> the 'hood were totally unaware of the word's existence.
>
> "Skank" was an everyday term, back in the day, but it meant something
> like "poor, lives in the projects; possibly ugly." We boojie studs
> applied the term only to girls of the lower class. "Skag" had almost
> the same meaning, except that a skank *had* to be physically
> unprepossessing in order to be referred to as a skag.
>
> Just heard a character in the original version of The Office refer to
> himself as a "cockney bitch." Wonder what he meant.
>
> Speaking of English English, how common is "I reckon NP" as opposed to
> "I fancy NP"? Back in the '70's, a friend from Ipswich used to use the
> former, translating it directly into AmE as "I like NP," when asked
> the meaning of the phrase.
>
> -Wilson
>
> On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 11:45 PM, Jonathan Lighter
> <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com> wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> > Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: _Dittybopper_
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Wilson, you got me trumped. I believe I had a single cite for the sense
> you
> > describe, possibly referring to the early 1960s. I doubt that the context
> > was the ASA, but can't say for sure.
> >
> > Probably I collected it after Vol. 1 appeared in 1994.
> >
> > Thanks for the informative note.
> >
> > Believe it or not: Urban Dictionary.com has "diddy bopper" as a syn. of
> > "skeezer; slut," etc. and that's it.
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Fri, Jan 22, 2010 at 11:14 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> >> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> >> -----------------------
> >> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> >> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> >> Subject:      _Dittybopper_
> >>
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------=
> > ------
> >>
> >> This word, which is in HDAS with all of the other meanings that I know
> >> of, has another, long-obsolete meaning. In the old Army Security
> >> Agency, eliminated from the Army's "TO&E" in 1965, a "diddy- /
> >> dittybopper" was someone who dealt hands-on with some form of
> >> telegraphy: telegrapher, telegraphic-intercept operator, transcriber
> >> of intercepted telegraphic commo. My WAG is that this is based on the
> >> _dit-dah_ of telegraphy, with no connection to "diddy- / dittybopper"
> >> in any of its other meanings.
> >>
> >> Although I've never seen this use in the print medium, it's easily
> >> found on the Web on any ASA-alumni site. The old Agency had a kind of
> >> college-frat feel to it. Hence, there are several alumni sites. Since
> >> I was involved in voice intelligence and not signal intelligence, I
> >> first came across the word in this use on alumni sites. Hence, not
> >> even a WAG as to how old it is.
> >>
> >> -Wilson
> >> =96=96=96
> >> All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"=96=96a strange complaint
> t=
> > o
> >> come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
> >> =96Mark Twain
> >>
> >> ------------------------------------------------------------
> >> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> > --=20
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
> --
> -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.
>  –Mark Twain
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>

-- 
"If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."

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