"the finger" in 1932 Hollywood epic

[Ben Zimmer]

On Mon, May 14, 2012 at 12:15 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
> BTW, the 1932 ex. is unequivocal both in appearance and context. It could
> be argued that the gesture in the 1886 photo is not what it seems, but
> given the exposure time of cameras in the 1880s (not that I know precisely
> what that was) it may be that Radbourn had to hold his pose for several
> seconds. The image isn't blurred as I would expect it to be if his hand
> had innocently been in motion while the shutter was open.
>
> Whose shoulder is his other hand resting on?  Was there some animosity
> there?

As this was a joint photo with players from both the Boston Beaneaters
and New York Giants, it's possible Old Hoss Radbourn's gesture was an
acknowledgment of an early Boston/New York baseball rivalry.

At least that's the suggestion of Ira P. Robbins in his 2008 UC Davis
Law Review article, "_Digitus Impudicus_: The Middle Finger and the
Law" (p. 1415).

http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/threatlevel/2010/03/middlefinger.pdf

--bgz

--
Ben Zimmer
http://benzimmer.com/

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