_Boody_ "arse" vs. _booty_ "id."

[Jonathan Lighter]

But seriously.

If any common AAVE term is from Africa, it could be "boody/booty."

The glib ety. from "body" is not very satisfactory; and the referent
is universal (I almost wrote "inescapable," but that would be ridiculous).
So it seems, was the term, but only in AAVE until the advent of hiphop. If
early printings take the form "booty," that may be only because writers and
proofreaders assumed it was just a sense development of that SE word.

It could be, via the cliche' that pirates and conquistadors went in search
of "gold and booty." (What else could they be after?) But that strikes me as
a little too literary, even if the average ten-year-old didn't know what
"booty" meant.

Any reasonable ety. suggestions?

JL

On Sat, May 14, 2011 at 7:02 AM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: _Boody_ "arse" vs. _booty_ "id."
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Damned prescriptivists! They're everywhere!
>
> JL
>
> On Sat, May 14, 2011 at 12:38 AM, 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:      _Boody_ "arse" vs. _booty_ "id."
> >
> >
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> >
> > Some may remember an earlier post in which I mentioned the case in
> > which a black male author's use of "boody" was _sic_-ed by a black
> > female reviewer. My first impression was that she was annoyed by his
> > use of the obscenity. Further reading revealed that it was, rather,
> > the author's use of the spelling, _boody_, instead of -_booty_ .
> >
> > IAC, the book is Don't The Moon Look Lonesome and its author is Stanley
> > Crouch.
> >
> > As for my further blather about "emphatic devoicing" being the
> > probable origin of the feeling that the proper spelling of "boody" is
> > _booty_, causing people to relate the word to _booty_ in the pirate
> > sense, a clear example of this can be heard in the rap, Rapper's
> > Delight, by the Sugar Hill Gang. The rapper has the audience repeat
> > after him:
> >
> > "I. Am. Somebah.Tea!"
> >
> > --
> > -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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> > The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
> >
>
>
>
> --
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