[Ads-l] obscene slang on TV

[Laurence Horn]

> On Jun 1, 2020, at 6:44 AM, Jesse Sheidlower <jester at PANIX.COM> wrote:
> 
> Link to the episode/time? There's a bunch of stuff out there, and these are long episodes.
> 
> The earliest example of "pearl necklace" in the sexual sense is 1984 (in OED); Green's Dictionary of Slang has 1993. (I do know of a 1972 example of _pearl_ 'drop of semen'.) So this would be a really nice antedating, if real. Maybe it got by the censors because no one knew what it meant, and it could plausibly be its standard meaning.
> 
> Jesse Sheidlower

That was my guess when I read Bill’s post—it would be like some of the purported early occurrences of “gay” in the 1930s that would have been understood by those who understood it and overlooked by the others (including the censors), a kind of no-harm no-foul dog whistle. Or perhaps a better example is the “gunsel” story we’ve discussed.  Michael Quinion gives a nice synopsis, including the featured role of Dashiell Hammett, at http://www.worldwidewords.org/topicalwords/tw-gun1.htm.  The difference is that unlike the chronology of “pearl necklace” or “gay” case, the loaded meaning of “gunsel” didn't survive the polysemy.    

LH
> 
> On Mon, Jun 01, 2020 at 04:40:07AM +0000, Bill Mullins wrote:
>> I just watched the pilot episode of Police Woman on youtube (actually an episode of Police Story).  In it, Angie Dickenson's first undercover assignment is as a hooker, and before she goes in, Charles Dierkop asks her if she knows what a "pearl necklace" is.  I'm surprised that got by the censors in 1974.
>> 
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