[Lexicog] "God bless his cotton-picking soul"

[David Tuggy]

In most usages where I've heard this, I don't think the notion of
obsession with tedious detail was at all prominent even if present. The
feeling I have is more of (a) insignificance and (b) an irritating
quality towards which the speaker nevertheless chooses to adopt an
attitude of indulgent tolerance.

Btw, it has been noted, rather accurately I believe, that in Southern
speech expressions "bless his heart" (including "God bless his
cotton-picking soul") function as a sort of oral disinfectant. You can
say just about anything derogatory about a person you want (couching it
appropriately, of course), then add on a "bless her heart" at the end,
and come away with the ability to claim you have not bad-mouthed the
person at all, but rather spoken very kindly about him or her.

--David Tuggy

William J Poser wrote:

>
> To me "God bless his cotton-picking soul" means
> "Even though he is obsessed with tedious detail, God bless him",
> often with the connotation "It's unpleasant, tedious work; thank
> goodness that he does it so the rest of us don't have to.".
>
> Bill
> --
> Bill Poser, Linguistics, University of Pennsylvania
> http://www.ling.upenn.edu/~wjposer/
> <http://www.ling.upenn.edu/%7Ewjposer/> billposer at alum.mit.edu



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