the meat and the motion

[Jonathan Lighter]

Seriously, I've long believed that affectionate, passionate, and X-rated
grunting was very likely to have devloped figurative meanings back at the
dawn of language. I had no idea that Freud thought so too.

You know what they say....

It's at least as plausible as the bow-wow theory and the ding-dong theory,
though doubtless
all sorts of influences contributed.

JL
On Wed, Jan 27, 2010 at 10:31 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: the meat and the motion
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> At 5:07 PM -0800 1/27/10, Arnold Zwicky wrote:
> >On Jan 27, 2010, at 4:27 PM, Larry Horn wrote:
> >
> >>
> >>At 3:37 PM -0500 1/27/10, Charles Doyle wrote:
> >>>It's not the meat, it's the motion. 1951 The saying may have entered
> >>>oral tradition from the title and recurring line of a
> >>>rhythm-and-blues song written by Henry Glover and recorded by The
> >>>Swallows: "It Ain't the Meat (It's the Motion)." Or, the song may
> >>>have been built around an existing proverb, as yet undiscovered.
> >>>Proverbial uses of the expression do not appear in print until the
> >>>1980s, after Maria Muldaur's popular rendition of the song in 1974
> >>>had nudged it--and the saying--toward the (white) mainstream.
> >>>Interestingly, in the song the term _meat_ refers sexually to a
> >>>woman ("It ain't the meat, it's the motion / Makes your daddy want
> >>>to rock");
> >>
> >>I distinctly remember Maria (D'Amato) Muldaur singing "...that makes
> >>your mama want to rock".  I don't have that one on my iTunes,
> >>curiously, although I have 15 other songs of hers, but that's my
> >>memory.
> >
> >i do [have it on my iTunes], and she has "mama".
> >
> Thanks.  But now I really have to get it myself--when I checked the
> local public library listings, none of the usual albums containing
> the song ("Waitress in a Donut Shop", "Meet Me Where They Play the
> Blues", soundtrack from The L Word Season 3) were available, but I
> see I can find it on a CD (along with songs of Dusty Springfield, Pat
> Benatar, Luther Ingram et al.) called "Music for Lonely Housewives".
> They've got me pegged!
>
> LH
>
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