Origin of the term "the dozens"

[P L Patrick]

In general I worry a bit about treating African american performance
rituals and terms in a simplistic way, as though they aren't flexible,
influenced by region, generation, context etc. But a good source for
such quick definitions if they're needed is dictionaries such as Geneva
Smitherman's "Black Talk" (1994). About THE DOZENS she says:

"A verbal ritual of talking negatively about someone's mother (or
occasionally grandmothers and other female relatives) by ocming up with
outlandish, highly exaggerated, often sexually loaded, humorous
'insults'...[describes use]... The term, though not the ritual itself,
is believed to have originated during enslavement, wherein slave
auctioneers sold defective 'merchandise', e.g. sick slaves or older
slaves, in lots of a dozen; thus a slave who was part of a dozens group
was 'inferior'. Portrayed in the 1992 film 'White Men Can't Jump'."
(pp99-100)

This is quite different, as far as I know, from more general practices
of talking someone down, which could be called "cutting" or "ranking"
or "low-rating" someone.
	There is a related practice -- or maybe the same, called by a
different name-- in the Washington DC area, where it's known as JONIN'.
(I've only observed this with kids, but don't know if that's an
accidental restriction.) This is an example of regional usage which is
often overlooked in Black speech.
	Maybe someone somewhere says JONESIN' for the same activity,
but as far as I know that's quite different! and you don't wanna go
confusing the two... Sister G has JONES on p147, but makes no mention
of JONIN'.
	I'll take this opportunity to plug my website on African
American English:
	http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp/AAVE.html
I haven't done anything to update it in the last year or two, but if
viewers will give me feedback and suggestions I'll be grateful. It has
a bibliography, summaries of selected redaings, a course syllabus for a
graduate seminar dated 1997, a FAQ, links and a couple texts.
Contributions welcomed.
	--plp

On Wed, 01 Nov 2000 14:22:22 -0600 Harriet J Ottenheimer
<mahafan at ksu.edu> wrote:

> I believe some words currently in use (I am sure there are more that I
> don't know about) are jonesing, cutting, cut-lows, and ranking.
> --Harriet Ottenheimer
>

Prof. Peter L. Patrick
Dept. of Language & Linguistics
University of Essex
Wivenhoe Park
COLCHESTER CO4 3SQ
U.K.

Tel: (from within UK) 01206.87.2088
    (from outside UK) +44.1206.87.2088
Fax: (as above)           1206.87.2198
Email: patrickp at essex.ac.uk
Web: http://privatewww.essex.ac.uk/~patrickp