[Ads-l] Antedating of "Politically Correct" (Communist Usage)

[Shapiro, Fred]

Larry,

You are exactly right.  I have actually  written about the "leftists mocking their more doctrinaire colleagues" usage many years ago, but forgot that stage when I sent today's email.

Fred


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From: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU> on behalf of Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
Sent: Sunday, July 5, 2020 3:53 PM
To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
Subject: Re: Antedating of "Politically Correct" (Communist Usage)

Without getting into the details or being able to provide relevant cites, I was under the impression (based on my own memories) that there was an intermediate state between the second phase ("non-satirical Communist usage”) and the third ("satirical use by conservatives"):  the jocular use by non-purist leftists to mock more hard-core leftists and/or to express a self-deprecation.  I haven’t checked the OED cites to see if this impression is supported there.

> On Jul 5, 2020, at 3:38 PM, Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at YALE.EDU> wrote:
>
> The OED's earliest usage of the phrase "politically correct," discovered by me, is dated 1793.  The OED's definition does not focus on the second phase of "politically correct," the non-satirical Communist usage, against which the third phase of "politically correct" (satirical use by conservatives) was a reaction.  In their citations they do include a 1934 cite from a Communist context.  I would suggest that the OED definition should add a sub-sense for Communist usage.  Here is the earliest I have found for that sub-sense:
>
> 1926 _Daily Worker_ 20 July 4/6 (ProQuest)  It was not an accident but a fairly legitimate and politically correct step of the British Communist Party to issue the slogan: "All power to the general council of the trade unions."
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
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