LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.02 (01) [E]

Tue Dec 2 15:15:03 UTC 2008

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L O W L A N D S - L - 01 December 2008 - Volume 02
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From: Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (04) [E]

Surely "rag time" refers to "non-standard timing" - ie, the timing that
wasn't
standard 4/4, and which probably - in the actual playing of the
African-American musicians of the time, probably came to something like
7/12,
5/8, 2/5, or something of that sort.

Or "shaggy" timing, to ears that held 4/4 to be perfection itself.

Just my 0.02c - don't spend it all at once - we do have a recession on!

Wesley Parish

On Tuesday 02 December 2008 06:37, Lowlands-L List wrote:
<snip>

>
> From: Kevin & Cheryl Caldwell <kevin.caldwell1963 at verizon.net>
> Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (02) [E]
>
> Rag paper is actually very high quality, not low quality.  See
> http://painting.about.com/od/artglossaryr/g/defragpaper.htm .
>
> I suspect "rag" as a disparaging term for a newspaper refers to the
quality
> of the writing, not the paper it's printed on.
>
> Some American schools whose mascot is the tiger call their school
newspaper
> "Tiger Rag", which is also the name of a well-known ragtime song.
>
> Kevin Caldwell
>
> ----------
>
> From: Brooks, Mark <mark.brooks at twc.state.tx.us>
> Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (02) [E]
>
> Heather asked:  "How do any of you think the English epression 'local rag'
> meaning 'local newspaper' might have got its name?"
>
> I used to work in a copy/printing company.  When we talked about high
> quality paper, we would call it by the percent of "rag" it contained.  Rag
> in this case meant cotton.  So when we printed Doctoral Dissertations we
> always put them on 100% rag.  You could also find 50% rag and so on.
> However, in our case it meant a higher quality of paper than the standard
> copy paper.
>
> Regards,
>
> Mark Brooks

--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Gaul is quartered into three halves.  Things which are
impossible are equal to each other.  Guerrilla
warfare means up to their monkey tricks.
Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom
of the foolish.
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people.

----------

From: Wesley Parish <wes.parish at paradise.net.nz>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (05) [A/D/E]

Rags, most probably.  It's only relatively recently that wood fibre has been
used almost exclusively as the source of cellulose fibre - before that -
well, Napolean's invasion of Egypt used up a whole lot of mummy windings for
paper in a spectacular case of cultural vandalism.

And no, I don't see it as unrelated to the forum - I did some work for the
local University Library in 2000-01, computer-cataloging a donation of
several hundred musical scores donated by a local prominent musician's widow
to the library.  The paper from the 1880-era scores was quite different from
the 1900-era scores, etc.

Most of the 1880-era and 1900-era scores were from major German music
publishers, several being from recognizable Lowlands cities.

Wesley Parish

On Tuesday 02 December 2008 09:53, Lowlands-L List wrote:
<snip> ----------

>
> From: heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk <heatherrendall at tiscali.co.uk>
> Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (04) [E]
>
> from Heather Rendall
>
> re rag paper
>
> Whoops! My mistake and apologies to all those connected with the paper
> trade. I suppose I was thinking about the paper that was used in old 50s
> comics and other cheap books / magazines in which you could almost see
> pressed threads.
>
> What would this have been made out of?
>
> Sorry not really a Forum problem! But I'm interested.
>
> Heather
>
> ----------

<snip>
--
Clinersterton beademung, with all of love - RIP James Blish
-----
Gaul is quartered into three halves.  Things which are
impossible are equal to each other.  Guerrilla
warfare means up to their monkey tricks.
Extracts from "Schoolboy Howlers" - the collective wisdom
of the foolish.
-----
Mau e ki, he aha te mea nui?
You ask, what is the most important thing?
Maku e ki, he tangata, he tangata, he tangata.
I reply, it is people, it is people, it is people.

----------

From: Diederik Masure <didimasure at hotmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (02) [E]

Ron: 'rag' for worthless newspaper might come from Yiddish, but needn't have
started in the USA perse. Also in other lowland languages we find this use,
at least in Dutch where we use 'vod' ('rag', also piece of cloth that you
use for cleaning) for worthless newspapers, or any worthless printed/written
material as a whole, so that a book or a pupil's assignment might
be referred to as 'vod', in the latter case usually by the teacher;) . Cfr.
'vodje papier'
Greetings, Diederik

----------

From: Jorge Potter <jorgepot at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Etymology" 2008.12.01 (02) [E]

Dear Heather,

No, it's the other way around. Paper made from rags is better than that made
from woodpulp.

I was born and brought up by the paper mills of the Black River Valley in
New York State. Later I lived in the Fox Valley of Wisconsin with
Kimberley-Clark, Marathon, Institue of Paper Chemistry, etc.

Jorge Potter

•

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