bodily

victor steinbok aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM
Thu Feb 24 20:29:04 UTC 2011


My point wasn't that it is ambiguous. When you hear "I want your
body", I doubt you would misunderstand that as "I need a subject for a
pathology lab". Surely, /taken as a whole/, the meaning is
unambiguously sexual. But it does not mean that there is a mini-George
Michael in your head, singing "I want your sex!" in translation, when
you hear it. [I can see Sinatra in this this place, but George
Michael? NEVER!] In this context, "body" just means "body" and does
not translate--alone--as "sex". Why would it be different for "bodily"
in the verse? Of course, it's about sex! Who's going to dispute that?
But it misses the whole point--see the "rattle" discussion for similar
points.

Not to put too fine a point on it, but when someone says, "I want
you!", they usually (but not always) imply "sexually". But it does not
mean that "you" means "sex". You have to take the whole chunk
idiomatically. But the way you're interpreting it, it would have to be
you==F.U.C.K. I just don't see it...

VS-)

On Thu, Feb 24, 2011 at 2:54 PM, Brian Hitchcock <brianhi at skechers.com> wrote:

> A fine point, Victor, and seemingly disingenuous.  There seems little need
> to "derive" implications -- "I want your body" is no more ambiguous than "I
> want to jump your bones" or "Let's get it on!".  Seriously, what else might
> you think the writer of the song would want her body for -- Medical
> research, perhaps?  Especially considering the context of  the chorus --
> what part of F-U-C-K is ambiguous to you? (or didn't you bother to decode
> the chorus?)
>
>
>
> Date:    Tue, 22 Feb 2011 16:42:26 -0500
>
> From:    Victor Steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
>
> Subject: Re: Subject: bodily
>
> Why would it not just mean "I want your body" (and whatever sexual
> implications one can derive from there)? Sure, the subtext is sexual,
> but does it really mean "carnally" here?

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