"Chinese overtime" (and "textiled hikers")

[Laurence Horn]

Thanks.  Derelict of me not to have checked the OED.  And it's
reassuring to know that we can (just barely ;-)) blame it on the
Sixties, which we already know is solely responsible for the
breakdown in moral order, loss of respect for authority, and priestly
sex abuse.  My only quibble is with the Wiktionary claim that it's an
adjective (much less one with comparative and superlative forms); for
most speakers, I'd wager that "textile beach", "textile hiker", etc.
are nominal compounds, not adj/n phrases (cf. *That beach/hiker seems
textile).  There is this description of a beach from an unavailable
geocities travel diary, however, indicating that for at least one
person "textile" is indeed an adjective:

"A few hundred meters further south it's fairly mixed and then it
gets more and more textile."

LH

At 12:01 AM -0400 6/18/11, Garson O'Toole wrote:
>OED has the relevant sense of "textile" with a first citation in 1970:
>
>textile A adj. 3. Naturism. Non-naturist; spec. applied to places,
>etc., prohibited to nudists. Cf. B. 3.
>
>1970    Newsweek 25 May 55/2   Its guests follow a daily routine
>little different from that of the 'textile tourists'-or non-nudists-in
>nearby hotels.
>
>Wikitionary includes definitions for "textile" that attempt to reflect
>the sense developed in the naturist community:
>
>textile
>Adjective
>textile (comparative more textile, superlative most textile)
>     (naturism) clothing compulsive.
>         A textile beach
>Antonyms
>     (naturism): clothing optional, nude, naturist
>http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/textile
>
>The following citation in 1969 might be an example of "textile beach"
>in the sense outlined above:
>
>Cite: 1969 July 27, Chicago Tribune, Germany's North Sea Coast by H.
>P. Koenig, Start Page H5, (Quote Page 9), Chicago, Illinois.
>(ProQuest)
>
>Up at Kampen one even can locate a real live, working nudist colony.
>On Textile beach a bathing costume of some sort is necessary; along
>Abyssinia beach one can venture out clad in no more than a brave
>smile.
>
>In 1971 the New York Times used "textile free" and "textile tourists",
>but this is after the Newsweek cite:
>
>Cite: 1971 August 29, New York Times, Don't Forget to Pack Your
>Birthday Suit by Judy Klemesrud, Start Page XX1, (Quotes Page 10), New
>York. (ProQuest)
>
>The relatively inexpensive Adriatic resorts are especially favored by
>members of Germany's FKK (it stands for Freikorperkultur, or the
>culture of freeing the body), which claims now to have a million
>members constantly on the search for what they call "textile free"-or,
>in other words, nudist-beaches. ...
>
>She said that people who don't take their clothes off on  the beach
>are soon surrounded by  a circle of nudists who stare silently at the
>"textile tourists" until they either leave the beach-or shed their
>garments.
>
>Garson

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org