The pointless flash-mob

[Jonathan Lighter]

What possible connection is there between "flash mob" and criminal "flash"?

Without real evidence, any relationship between current and 150-year-old
"flash mobs" must be considered coincidental.

If "flash drives" existed in 2003 (you plug in 'em briefly and then yank 'em
out), I'd think that has a closer semantic connection.

Of course, the fact that I know little of flash-drive history is deeply
shaming to me.

JL

On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 10:45 PM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com>wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       victor steinbok <aardvark66 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: The pointless flash-mob
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> A couple of additional points. There is an entry for "Flashmob" on Dutch
> Wiki--their "origin" information is the same as English, dating it back to
> 2003. There is /no/ entry at all for "flitsmeute". "Popkoor" has no
> separate
> entry, but does show up in a number of places, but that's to be expected
> for
> a fairly ordinary word--it might have an idiomatic meaning that I don't
> recognize (maybe "pop-troupe" for any sort of pop performance, including
> dance). Again, this is something I just don't know.
>
> The Dutch and the Japanese seem to be most fascinated with flash mobs--I
> found the earliest Dutch one in 2004, less than a year from the initial
> flashmob in NYC and there have been quite a few since. The rest are all
> over
> the map. Perhaps it had something to do with the use of Macs and iPhones
> ;-)
>
> VS-)
>
> On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 9:38 PM, victor steinbok <aardvark66 at gmail.com
> >wrote:
>
> >
> > I'll take a crack combining what I can recognize with a little
> > GoogleTranslate:
> >
> >  /Flitsmeute/ is an equivalent (calque) of /flash mob/. Of course, these
> > are
> > > well-formed compounds, but we wonder whether there is an alternative
> way
> > to express more
> > > clearly what a "flash mob" is.
> >
> >
> > Caveat--it seems somewhat doubtful that this is from 2002, especially
> since
> > GB has a double volume. The original compound that led to the first
> > "flash-mob" performance was "smart mob" and only /after/ the event did
> they
> > start referring to it as "flash mob". Or so Wiki says.
> >
> > The Australian connection is not trivial. Apparently it was a derivative
> > from the "flash dialect" of female convicts in Australia and Tasmania, so
> > there "spontaneous" protests were being referred to as "flash mob"--other
> > than that there is no apparent connection. The site linked to from Wiki
> has
> > moved, but it's redirected. There is a lot of information, but no
> original
> > language that I found--just comments on it.
> >
> > Most of the interesting information is under Smart Mob (except on
> > Australian
> > use), including the Howard Rheingold book reference from 2002. Flash Mob
> > claims that the term did not appear until people started blogging about
> the
> > original event.
> >
> > My [limited] understanding is that the Dutch use "flash mob" rather than
> > the
> > native "flitsmeute". Another word I found both in Flemish and in Dutch is
> > "Popkoor"=="pop choir", although the people involved do no actual singing
> > (not sure if "koor" is used in wider sense). It could be a Flemish/Dutch
> > difference--I have no idea.
> >
> > The Dutch publication you mentioned is the equivalent of MLA
> > publications--but I am sure you already knew that from "taal" in the
> title.
> > I can check with my Dutch friends for more details, but this is as far as
> I
> > can get with the information available.
> >
> > VS-)
> >
> > On Tue, May 3, 2011 at 7:22 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:
> > >
> > > Ah yes, I remember the event now.  So it is 2003.  Unless someone
> > > wants to tackle the following, allegedly from 2002:
> > >
> > > FLASH MOB flitsmeute al gebruikt als equivalent van flash mob. Dit
> > > zijn uiteraard welgevormde samenstellingen, maar wij vragen ons af of
> > > er een alternatief te bedenken is dat duidelijker uitdrukt wat een
> > > flash mob precies is. ...
> > >
> > >  From Onze taal: maandblad van het Genootschap Onze Taal: Volumes
> > > 71-72.  Genootschap Onze Taal (Netherlands) - 2002 - Snippet
> > > view.  [Journal; unconfirmed.]
> >
>
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