[Ads-l] body = 'human being as a complete person'

[Laurence Horn]

> On Sep 1, 2015, at 3:35 PM, Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> Not quite the same - because for Burns (I assume) it was a familiar idiom.
> It just meant "person," without implying that some special aspect of
> personhood was being emphasized.

Point taken. But it could be argued that there *is* a special aspect of personhood emphasized in the following couplet. From the version in _Merry Muses of Caledonia_:

O gin a body meet a body,
   Comin' thro' the rye;
Gin a body f___k a body,
   Need a body cry.

Gin a body meet a body,
   Comin' thro' the glen;
Gin a body f___k a body,
   Need the world ken.

Rhetorical questions, to be sure.

LH


> 
> For the opposite, cf. 20th C. " warm body" = 'person as interchangeable and
> nondescript.'
> 
> JL
> 
> 
> 
> On Tue, Sep 1, 2015 at 3:15 PM, Robin Hamilton <
> robin.hamilton3 at virginmedia.com> wrote:
> 
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Robin Hamilton <robin.hamilton3 at VIRGINMEDIA.COM>
>> Subject:      Re: body = 'human being as a complete person'
>> 
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> "Gin a body meet a body / Coming through the rye ..." -- R. Burns.
>> 
>> 
>> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: Jonathan Lighter
>> Sent: Tuesday, September 01, 2015 3:46 PM
>> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
>> Subject: body = 'human being as a complete person'
>> 
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail
>> header -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at GMAIL.COM>
>> Subject:      body = 'human being as a complete person'
>> 
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> 
>> Dec. 24, 2014:
>> 
>> 
>> "Every 28 hours a Black body is slain by a cop, security or vigilante.
>> EVERY 28 FUCKING HOURS. This is what genocide looks like."
>> 
>> A Minnesota spokesman for #Blacklivesmatter has repeated this phrase
>> several times on CNN, though leaving out "security or vigilante."
>> 
>> Traditionally a person has been considered as more than a mere body, but
>> maybe that's changing.
>> 
>> JL
>> 
>> --
>> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>> 
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> 
> 
> 
> -- 
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
> 
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