franchise

[Jonathan Lighter]

As always, Garson has come up with some trenchant information.

It seems to me that it's one thing to say figuratively that one "holds the
franchise" on some subject or sort of entertainment. In other words, it's
metaphorically "as if" the "holder" had some special or even exclusive legal
authorization to do so. Garson's 1976 & 1985 exemplify that idea. (As I read
it, the "movie franchise" desired in 1968 means "a legal franchise from a
movie studio (to market tie-in goods)."

The notable shift in meaning occurs, however, when "franchise" itself comes
to denote not a legal right or authorization but, as OED says, "A general
title, format, or unifying concept used for creating or marketing a series
of products."

And it still looks as though this shift did not occur often, if at all, very
much before Leonard Nimoy's remark in the mid-'80s. Read today, it seems to
refer primarily to the very concept of _Star Trek_ and everything associated
with it; but twenty-five years ago it may have denoted specifically the
authorizing rights to produce new _Star Trek_ films and rerun old
shows. Practically, this may be a  distinction without a difference, but it
suggests further that the newer sense ("a marketing concept") really is far
more recent than the 1930s.

In any case, use of the 1936 quot. to exemplify the present sense still
seems to me quite misleading.

FWIW, here is the ex. that sent me to the OED to try to pin down this novel
sense of "franchise":

2009 J. R. Carr in _Journal of American Folklore_ CXXII 197: The heavily
synergistic _Pirates of the Caribbean_ franchise has lent its imagery to to
everything from breakfast cereal to pinball machines, so it was not
surprising when a collection of sea songs was recently released under the
_Pirates_ brand name.

This ex. fits precisely the  OED def. in question. To someone used to
thinking in terms of the customary meanings of "franchise," however, its
precise significance was elusive.
JL


On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 4:41 PM, Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Garson O'Toole <adsgarsonotoole at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: franchise
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Here are the first two cites given in the OED. A legal distinction can
> be drawn between the two: the Star Trek franchise is legally
> protected, and the G-Man "franchise" is not. Other movie producers are
> allowed to make films with a G-Man theme.
>
> 1936    N.Y. Times 9 July 17/2 (heading) Warner Brothers hold their
> G-Man franchise with ‘Public Enemy's Wife’ at the Strand.
>
> 1986    L. Nimoy in Los Angeles Times 14 June 6,   I think the studio
> [is]‥definitely interested in the future of the ‘Star Trek’
> franchise.
>
> Here are two more examples that are similar to the 1936 cite. I think
> all three cites illustrate a natural figurative pattern.
>
> Cite: 1976, The MGM Story: The Complete History of Fifty Roaring Years
> by John Douglas Eames, GBooks Page 357, Crown Publishers, New York.
> (Google Books snippet; Not verified on paper; Data may be inaccurate;
> WorldCat agrees with date)
>
> In The Moonshine War the bullets flew as thick as when Warner Bros,
> had a franchise on the Prohibition era, but the public didn't seem to
> care any more. The movie starred Patrick McGoohan as a revenue agent
> and Richard Widmark as a ...
>
> http://books.google.com/books?id=dBu0gvY3tMMC&q=franchise#search_anchor
>
> Cite: 1985, The Paramount Story by John Douglas Eames, Page Unknown
> and not visible, Crown, New York.  (Google Books snippet; Not verified
> on paper; Data may be inaccurate; WorldCat agrees with date)
>
> Oddly enough, the children pretending to be adults in Bugsy Malone
> were less offensive than those playing wise-guy children in The Bad
> News Bears, even though Bugsy and his companions were denizens of that
> sleazy underworld on which Warner Bros, held the movie franchise in
> the thirties.
>
> Here is a 1968 cite about licensing clothes based on the movie Funny
> Girl. It uses the word franchise with its traditional meaning, but it
> might also suggest the extended meaning that is used today.
>
> Cite: 1968 June 8, New York Times, "'Funny Girl' Takes Whirl Into
> Fashion" By Jundy Klemesrud, Page 20, New York. (ProQuest)
>
> Movie studios, in this case Columbia, generally like clothing tie-ins
> because they give their films publicity wherever the clothes are sold.
> And manufacturers are usually eager for a movie franchise because they
> realize that the only way most women will ever feel like movie stars
> is to dress like them. The clothes, therefore, are often best-sellers.
>
> If a manufacturer is eager for a "movie franchise" then one might
> expect that a movie producer would be motivated to create a "movie
> franchise".
>
> On Sun, Feb 6, 2011 at 8:52 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> > Sender: Â  Â  Â  American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> > Poster: Â  Â  Â  Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> > Subject: Â  Â  Â franchise
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > OED offers a good def. of the now-ubiquitous "franchise": Â "orig. *U.S.*
> A
> > general title, format, or unifying concept used for creating or marketing
> a
> > series of products (esp. films, television shows, etc.)."
> >
> > Its primary ex. is from the _N.Y. Times_ in 1936. Â However, there
> follows a
>  > half-century gap and in 1988 the same NYT had to define the word for
> its
> > readers.
> >
> > 1936 says, "Warner Brothers hold their G-Man franchise with =91Public
> Enemy=
> > 's
> > Wife=92 at the Strand."
> >
> > The uniquely early date, plus the tenor of "hold" (presumably "maintain")
> > suggests to finicky me that the writer was simply playing facetiously off
> > the established sense of an official authorization to trade in something,
> >
> > So I'd put the ex. in brackets - unless OED has a bunch of suppressed
> cites
> > showing continuity of usage between 1936 and 1986.
> >
> > I thought to look the word up because the newer meaning has never made
> much
> > logical sense to me. Not that there's anything wrong with that.
> >
> >
> > JL
> >
> > --=20
> > "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the
> truth."
> >
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