"gink"?

[Jonathan Lighter]

Any Scot should recognize the vowel contrast there.


JL

On Wed, Aug 31, 2011 at 6:26 PM, Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at gmail.com> wrote:

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> Poster:       Dan Goncharoff <thegonch at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: "gink"?
>
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>
> I wish to declare I am neither a gunch or a ginch.
>
> TheGonch
>
> Sent from my iPhone
>
> On Aug 31, 2011, at 6:00 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> wrote:
>
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> > Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject:      Re: "gink"?
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > That's occurred to me, Doug, but "ginch" is a pretty obscure dialect term
> > from rural Scotland. I wonder how many people ever used it.
> >
> > The Concise Scots Dictionary lists only "gunch," BTW, with the extended
> > (20th C.) meaning of a "short, thickset person," primarily in Caithness.
> >
> > The distinction between "ginch" and "gunch" in spoken Scots, of course,
> > would often be problematic.
> >
> > JL
> >
> > On Wed, Aug 31, 2011 at 5:31 PM, Douglas G. Wilson <douglas at nb.net>
> wrote:
> >
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> >> Poster:       "Douglas G. Wilson" <douglas at NB.NET>
> >> Subject:      Re: "gink"?
> >>
> >>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >>
> >> On 8/31/2011 4:50 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
> >>> ....
> >>> But if we want to get conjectural, what the hell is the origin of U.S.
> >>> "ginch" ('sexually attractive or available young woman/women')? Big in
> >> the
> >>> '50s, IIRC.
> >> --
> >>
> >> Conjectural only: "ginch" = "small piece" (Scots): in Wright's EDD
> >> (Banff) and Warrack's "Scots Dialect Dictionary".
> >>
> >> (Cf. "gunch" = "big piece".)
> >>
> >> I think the earlier citations seem compatible with a non-obscene usage:
> >> perhaps comparable to "piece of fluff/skirt/etc.".
> >>
> >> -- Doug Wilson
> >>
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