To bogart the joint---What does it mean?
Stephan Neuhaus (HiWi Mattern)
I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
If anyone knows what it means when old Humphrey gets stoned, I ask him
or her to send me a mail.
I never knew that HB was a junkie. :-)
--
Stephan
Replys to: neu...@informatik.uni-kl.de
No .sig? OH, COME ON!
Donald C Hubin
>
>I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
>context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
>Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
>
>If anyone knows what it means when old Humphrey gets stoned, I ask him
>or her to send me a mail.
I dont' know the etymology of the phrase, but it means to hog the
joint--to keep it to yourself rather than passing it along after
taking a toke. This was sometimes the result not of selfishness but
of the holder forgetting that she or he was still holding the joint.
Or so I've heard. ;-)
--
Donald C. Hubin | Depart. of Philosophy, The Ohio State University
| Columbus, OH 43210 USA (614)292-7914
-----------------+---------------------------------------------------------
hub...@osu.edu | or dhu...@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
Paul Crowley
longer than is fair... The dictionary had no idea where this usage came
from. I don't remember which dictionary now.
____
\/ o\ Paul Crowley ai...@castle.ed.ac.uk \ /
/\__/ Part straight. Part gay. All queer. \/
"I say we kill him and eat his brain."
"That's not the solution to _every_ problem, you know!" -- Rudy Rucker
Natalie Maynor
started out with "Don't Bogart the joint, my friend." It meant hog
the joint, hold it too far inside the mouth, etc.
--
--Natalie (n...@ra.msstate.edu)
;;;;NG83
>It means to hold onto it and not let another person have it. There is
>a song that goes "Don't Bogart that joint, my friend, pass it over to
>me. You've been hanging onto it and I sure would like a hit."
We used the expression when I was in college at Ohio State. I believe we
picked the expression up from that song. If I remember correctly, the
song was in the movie "Easy Rider" (ca. 1970). It was sung by a group called
the Holy Modal Rounders. There may have been a reference in the Alice B.
Toklas movie as mentioned earlier, that other viewers thought was a joke, but
we did use it some.
Christopher Meacham
mea...@violet.berkeley.edu (Internet)
meacham@ubcviole (Bitnet)
Shawn Boyd
>I recollect from some dictionary of slang that it means to hang onto it
>longer than is fair... The dictionary had no idea where this usage came
>from. I don't remember which dictionary now.
of the use of his hands visually effective in that it portrayed a "macho
kind of guy." Nowadays, you probably won't catch any Rambo/T2 type characters
sitting in a bar with a cigarrette dangling from their mouth, but at the time
that Casablanca was made, it was considered very "cool."
Shawn Boyd
JOSEPH T CHEW
"Don't bogart the bathroom," a warning that my dreams of a long,
indulgent soak were on a collision course with her makeup schedule.
She's a fan of "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas," and I certainly can't
think of any etymologies that refer directly to Bogey's movies or
life, so I tend to agree with Graham Toal.
Maybe we can start "don't mitchum the joint" (i.e., don't get busted)???
--Joe
"Just another personal opinion from the People's Republic of Berkeley"
Graham Toal
>
>I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
>context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
>Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
>
>If anyone knows what it means when old Humphrey gets stoned, I ask him
>or her to send me a mail.
>
>I never knew that HB was a junkie. :-)
There was a film in the sixties whose name I've forgotten; something
like 'Goodbye Alice B Toklas', but probably not that exactly; in an early
scene a bunch of middle-aged-middle-class 'straights' were being taught
about drugs and shown how to smoke grass. Part of the instruction was
not to 'Bogart', which he explained meant holding on to the joint rather
than passing it round.
My friends & I cracked up at this; we assumed it was part of the script
to show how the characters didn't really have a clue about 'hip' slang.
If the word really existed, it certainly didn't make it to our neighbourhood.
G
PS The reason I can't remember very well may or may not be
connected to the subject of this thread ;-)
Tony Wesley
>Hello.
Hi
>I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
>context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
>Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
It means to hold onto it and not let another person have it. There is
a song that goes "Don't Bogart that joint, my friend, pass it over to
me. You've been hanging onto it and I sure would like a hit."
--
He is but a stranger to himself. Tony Wesley/RPT Software
awe...@vela.acs.oakland.edu voice: (313) 274-2080
Compu$pend: 72770,2053 data: (313) 278-9146
Advenient Whimwham
>Hello.
>
>I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
>context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
>Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
>
>If anyone knows what it means when old Humphrey gets stoned, I ask him
>or her to send me a mail.
>
>I never knew that HB was a junkie. :-)
>
I'm posting this since I'm not entirely sure myself and it's
always interesting to make a fool out of oneself publicly.
"Don't Bogart That Joint, My Friend" was the title of song
that was popular with us hippies at the end of the Sixties.
The song was featured in the great film EASY RIDER (if
memory serves).
My crowd never used the term much, but then we were snotty
hippy English majors and creative-writing grad students
who never called anyone "man" either.
However, my understanding of the term, and the way it was
generally used in those halcyon days, was to mean "don't
hold the joint, man; take your toke (drag, that is) and pass
it on." The image was of Bogey taking an elegant pose with a
smouldering cigarette in his hand. Dope was too precious to
waste it by just letting it burn. And we most often smoked a
joint jointly, in the interest of economy and in the
interest of not getting totally ripped, man.
I have no information about what controlled substances Bogey
may or may not indulged in, but I wouldn't be surprised,
either.
--
Frank Richard Aloysius Jude Maloney
just me
For a good time write uunet!microsoft!frankm
For an even better time try fra...@microsoft.com
DANIEL BROWN
I believe that the song was performed by the Fraternity of Man.
--
Daniel Brown (br...@castor.cs.uga.edu)
Help! I'm being repressed!
Jon Bosak
The song "Don't Bogart That Joint" was definitely *not* by the Holy
Modal Rounders (who were responsible for "Euphoria," among many other
fine songs), and I don't believe that it can be credited to the
Fraternity of Man. If memory serves, the recording everyone remembers
was by the Flying Burrito Brothers.
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
Jon Bosak Sunnyvale, California : bo...@netcom.com j...@svl.novell.com
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
Mitch Blank
>In article <10...@vela.acs.oakland.edu> awe...@vela.acs.oakland.edu (Tony Wesley) writes:
>
>>It means to hold onto it and not let another person have it. There is
>>a song that goes "Don't Bogart that joint, my friend, pass it over to
>>me. You've been hanging onto it and I sure would like a hit."
No, no, no.
It means to toss it on the floor and grind it out with ones foot. The
implication in the context given is that the speaker believes there is
one remaining drag left in the joint and that it would be premature to
extinguish it.
Didn't you ever watch a Bogart movie? :-)
Bruce Krueger
>The song "Don't Bogart That Joint" was definitely *not* by the Holy
>Modal Rounders (who were responsible for "Euphoria," among many other
>fine songs), and I don't believe that it can be credited to the
>Fraternity of Man. If memory serves, the recording everyone remembers
>was by the Flying Burrito Brothers.
>+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
well, no, as a matter of fact, the version everyone I know remembers is
by Little Feat (Lowell George and Co..), and it's on a number of their
albums, most notably _waiting for columbus_, the live double album that
may be the high point (*ahem*) of their recording career. oddly, I've
heard that the tune in question didn't make it to the CD.
and it was always my interpretation of the term in question that it
was an attempt to cajole/coerce someone holding onto a joint too long
(taking multiple drags, talking, whatever) to share the wealth and pass
it to someone else.
what might be interesting would be to see what came first, the term in
widespread usage, or the song. (i.e. was the song responsible for the
proliferation of an obscure or even invented bit of jargon?)
remember mellow yellow? *ha*
Carlos Dragonslayer Butler
neu...@dost.informatik.uni-kl.de (Stephan Neuhaus (HiWi Mattern)) drops complete science:
>Hello.
>
>I recently heard the phrase ``To bogart the joint'' on the radio. The
>context was quite obscure and I wasn't able to figure out the semantics.
>Then I looked in my DCE and in my Dictionary of Slang. No luck.
>
>If anyone knows what it means when old Humphrey gets stoned, I ask him
>or her to send me a mail.
There have been many postings regarding some song in the
Sixties about this phrase refering to holding on to a joint
longer than your share.
In a modern sense, I believe the term means something
different. One reason being that it used to be commonly used by
inner city youth who hadn't the foggiest idea about some song in
the Sixties. At the time the phase was popular, marijuana cigarettes
weren't even called 'joints'.
Joint was used at the time to refer to a place. 'To bogart a
joint' meant to invade a place and take it over. It is synonymous
with 'to bum-rush the joint'.
--
Carlos Dragonslayer Butler| "People often condescend
bu...@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu | what they fail to comprehend.
Lord of House | Ignorance makes life easier.
| Peace, knowledge, love and happiness."
;;;;NG83
> well, no, as a matter of fact, the version everyone I know remembers is
> by Little Feat (Lowell George and Co..), and it's on a number of their
> albums, most notably _waiting for columbus_, the live double album that
> may be the high point (*ahem*) of their recording career. oddly, I've
> heard that the tune in question didn't make it to the CD.
The Rolling Stone Encyclopedia of Rock & Roll, First Edition (1983),
Pareles and Romanovski, eds., has this paragraph under the entry for
the group Little Feat:
"The band was formed by Lowell George and Roy Estrada, both former
Mothers of Invention; Richie Hayward, ex-Fraternity of Man (of 'Don't
Bogart That Joint' on the _Easy Rider_ soundtrack); and classically
trained pianist Bill Payne."
This entry gives the year 1978 for the Waiting for Columbus album. So,
the version that many of us remember is from the film, Easy Rider, and was
recorded by the Fraternity of Man. The soundtrack of Easy Rider became a
gold album (1,000,000 copies sold) in January of 1970. This is probably
the vehicle by which the "bogart" expression was spread. Mitch Blank may
be right that one meaning was to flick the joint way before friends got
a last toke. This was my instant thought when I read the original query.
I think the expression may have had both meanings given to it; to hold the
joint too long, or to throw it away too soon.
(I was completely wrong about the Holy Modal Rounders. They did "If You
Wanna Be a Bird" on the Easy Rider soundtrack. One of *my* favorites.)
Christopher Meacham mea...@violet.berkeley.edu
SURGEON GENERAL'S WARNING. Caution: Bogarting may be hazardous to your
long-term memory.
Anne Williamson
>
>The song "Don't Bogart That Joint" was definitely *not* by the Holy
>Modal Rounders (who were responsible for "Euphoria," among many other
>fine songs), and I don't believe that it can be credited to the
>Fraternity of Man. If memory serves, the recording everyone remembers
>was by the Flying Burrito Brothers.
>
This is not to say that there were not other recordings, of course.
Jon Bosak
OK, OK, I stand corrected (or at least better informed) on who recorded
"Don't Bogart that Joint." If Rolling Stone says it was The Fraternity
of Man, I won't argue it. But I will say a couple of things based on
experience.
1. "To bogart" was a genuine verb in California in the sixties, and it
meant hogging the joint (or simply forgetting to pass it along, which
was easy to do). It did not (in that time and place) mean throwing
something away.
2. With regard to the following statement by bu...@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu
(Carlos Dragonslayer Butler):
CDB> There have been many postings regarding some song in the
CDB> Sixties about this phrase refering to holding on to a joint
CDB> longer than your share.
CDB> In a modern sense, I believe the term means something
CDB> different. One reason being that it used to be commonly used by
CDB> inner city youth who hadn't the foggiest idea about some song in
CDB> the Sixties. At the time the phase was popular, marijuana cigarettes
CDB> weren't even called 'joints'.
CDB> Joint was used at the time to refer to a place. 'To bogart a
CDB> joint' meant to invade a place and take it over. It is synonymous
CDB> with 'to bum-rush the joint'.
Carlos, you've got it wrong. "Joint" was in fact the generic term for a
marijuana cigarette during the sixties, followed in frequency (in
California) by the terms "number" and "doob" (or "doobie"). Your
interpretation of the phrase "to bogart a joint" is entirely incorrect.
It does, however, bring to mind an ancient gag by a southern comedian of
my father's generation named something like Brother Dave Gardner in a
recording made during the late fifties or very early sixties. A biker
turns to his girl at a roadside diner and says, "Hey, baby, let's blow
this joint [leave this place]," to which she replies, "Don't you want to
share some with the waitress?"
It took me several years to get that one....
![[Alan M Stanier]'s profile photo](http://lh3.googleusercontent.com/a-/ALV-UjXwu5ddF7RS8bsdUnsVRn1HNLz0atXtFr-jGQdvMkrlcjdjsw=s40-c)
[Alan M Stanier]
}
}The song "Don't Bogart That Joint" was definitely *not* by the Holy
}Modal Rounders (who were responsible for "Euphoria," among many other
}fine songs), and I don't believe that it can be credited to the
}Fraternity of Man. If memory serves, the recording everyone remembers
}was by the Flying Burrito Brothers.
The song is actually called "Don't bogart me", and it is by
The Fraternity of Man.
It's on the soundtrack of Easy Rider, and I have the LP in front
of me as I type.
--
Alan M Stanier | Thought The Harder, Heart The Keener (Essex Univ. Motto)
al...@essex.ac.uk | Courage The More, As Our Strength Diminishes (Next Line)
Carlos Dragonslayer Butler
>2. With regard to the following statement by bu...@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu
>(Carlos Dragonslayer Butler):
>
>CDB> There have been many postings regarding some song in the
>CDB> Sixties about this phrase refering to holding on to a joint
>CDB> longer than your share.
>CDB> In a modern sense, I believe the term means something
>CDB> different. One reason being that it used to be commonly used by
>CDB> inner city youth who hadn't the foggiest idea about some song in
>CDB> the Sixties. At the time the phase was popular, marijuana cigarettes
>CDB> weren't even called 'joints'.
>CDB> Joint was used at the time to refer to a place. 'To bogart a
>CDB> joint' meant to invade a place and take it over. It is synonymous
>CDB> with 'to bum-rush the joint'.
>
>Carlos, you've got it wrong. "Joint" was in fact the generic term for a
>marijuana cigarette during the sixties, followed in frequency (in
>California) by the terms "number" and "doob" (or "doobie"). Your
>interpretation of the phrase "to bogart a joint" is entirely incorrect.
This was a valid statement in the 60's but that was 20 years
ago. The original poster said he heard the phrase the other day. Now
the radio personality could have meant the 60's meaning but there is
a more modern meaning that is not wrong. Many inner city kids were
using the phase just as I described in the mid 80's.
Jon Bosak
Carlos quotes this recent interchange:
JB> 2. With regard to the following statement by bu...@uxa.ecn.bgu.edu
JB> (Carlos Dragonslayer Butler):
>
> CDB> There have been many postings regarding some song in the
> CDB> Sixties about this phrase refering to holding on to a joint
> CDB> longer than your share.
> CDB> In a modern sense, I believe the term means something
> CDB> different. One reason being that it used to be commonly used by
> CDB> inner city youth who hadn't the foggiest idea about some song in
> CDB> the Sixties. At the time the phase was popular, marijuana cigarettes
> CDB> weren't even called 'joints'.
> CDB> Joint was used at the time to refer to a place. 'To bogart a
> CDB> joint' meant to invade a place and take it over. It is synonymous
> CDB> with 'to bum-rush the joint'.
>
JB> Carlos, you've got it wrong. "Joint" was in fact the generic term for a
JB> marijuana cigarette during the sixties, followed in frequency (in
JB> California) by the terms "number" and "doob" (or "doobie"). Your
JB> interpretation of the phrase "to bogart a joint" is entirely incorrect.
And then continues:
CDB> This was a valid statement in the 60's but that was 20 years
CDB> ago. The original poster said he heard the phrase the other day. Now
CDB> the radio personality could have meant the 60's meaning but there is
CDB> a more modern meaning that is not wrong. Many inner city kids were
CDB> using the phase just as I described in the mid 80's.
Sorry, I misunderstood your posting. I thought that we were talking
about two times, (a) the present, and (b) the 1960s, which is the time I
took you to be referring to with phrases such as "at the time" and "it
used to be commonly used." I now see that you meant these to refer to a
third time, the mid-1980s, which (due, no doubt, to rapidly advancing
decrepitude) I don't think of as a time in the historical past but
rather still part of the linguistic present. I have no direct
information regarding the English usage of mid-1980s inner-city youth
and will therefore take your statement as an interesting datum on the
way language changes.
JOSEPH T CHEW
I'd never been to California before 1984, having lived in the Midwest,
Deep South, and Southwest. My wife has never lived anywhere _but_
California. Quite often we discover that not only words but entire
areas of pop culture filtered through the country at different rates
and sometimes appear to have missed some part of it entirely. Gotta
be careful about using regional knowledge (however accurate) to draw
national conclusions.