"spoofy" and "shimming" in Utah, 1919

[Laurence Horn]

At 8:09 PM -0500 3/6/11, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>If, as has been alleged, "jazz" was sex slang before it was zest and music
>slang, that fact may well have escaped the notice of editors in 1912 and
>later.
>
>Such a word would *never* have appeared in public print in that
>era. So knowledge of it could only have come from conversation.  If the word
>was relatively new - say ten or twenty years old for the sake of argument -
>and largely restricted to the red-light district of just one or two big
>cities - it is perfectly possible that the few early journalists quoted (and
>even the Original Dixieland Jazz Band) knew nothing about it.
>
>Once it became associated publicly with energy and music, there would be no
>reason not to print it.
>
>Because of the social and media taboos of the period, the question will
>probably remain moot.
>
>I agree that the weight of the evidence now is that the sexual
>meaning is secondary, but the pre-existence of "jasm" in a sexual as well as
>a non-sexual sense, plus the relatively early assertion of a sexual meaning
>(i.e., not many decades later as is the case of many false etymological
>claims) leaves its primacy as a real possibility, IMO.
>
>JL

On such a chronology, would the afore-attested
use of "jas(s)/jaz(z)" in a minor league baseball
context (those "jazz curves" as such as
attributed to Pacific Coast League pitchers) have
provided a kind of laundering service during the
post-coital but pre-musical phase of its
trajectory?

LH

>On Sun, Mar 6, 2011 at 7:56 PM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>>  ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>  -----------------------
>>  Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>  Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
>>  Subject:      Re: "spoofy" and "shimming" in Utah, 1919
>>
>>
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>  On Sun, Mar 6, 2011 at 1:28 PM, George Thompson <george.thompson at nyu.edu>
>>  wrote:
>>  > [I]f a newspaper editor knew that in his region "jazz" was known as an
>>  obscenity, when "jazz" became a national musical fad, he would have shown
>>  some embarrassment in printing the word, or would have refused to print it
>>  at all. Â Here we have the student paper in Salt Lake City printing "jass
>>  orchestra" and "jazzing", with no qualms, to add to a number of other
>>  papers, north & south, east & west, that printed the word before 1920.
>>
>>  Your logic is impeccable. However, it raises - or should that be
>>  "begs"? (for those with no sense of humor, the question is meant to be
>>  interpreted as facetious and not as a genuine request for guidance) -
>>  the question: how and when did _jass_ / _jazz_ come to take on, for a
>>  brief period, the relevant meaning?
>>
>>  OTOH, one might argue that, given that Mormons are not known to get
>>  down, even today, perhaps the editor was simply unhip.
>>
>>  --
>>  -Wilson
>>  -----
>>  All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint
>>  to come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
>>  -Mark Twain
>>
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>
>
>
>--
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