[Ads-l] a can of whoop-ass

[Jonathan Lighter]

The 1976 vowel (which of course I prefer) was / U /  rather than / ^ /.

JL

On Wed, Aug 12, 2015 at 1:17 AM, Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM>
> Subject:      Re: a can of whoop-ass
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> On Tue, Aug 11, 2015 at 6:14 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > "...can of whoop-de-ass"
>
> I've heard only "whup-ass," for the past sixty years. I prefer the
> traditional spelling. Since there's nothing in the rules of English
> orthography that precludes the spelling of [^] as _oo_,  there can be no
> argument other than tradition for the preference of _whup_. But no less a
> light than Robert Gover, whose command of Negroid speech-patterns is equal
> to that of the great Joel Chandler Harris, at the very least, also opts for
> _whup_. One cannot beat that with a sludge-hammer.
>
> The Musical Banquet of Choice Songs - Page 69
> https://books.google.com/books?id=3DsYyqnO79-woC
> 1790 - =E2=80=8ERead
> A Norlan' laird neist trotted up, Wi' bassen'd nag, and siller whup...
>
> --=20
> -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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