What in the UK is a cowboy?
Sol Taibi
about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
bloodthirsty war criminal.
Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
English is spoken?
In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
herds cows.
John Hall
wrote:
>... what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
>English is spoken?...
When I read it in the non-literal sense, it implies that someone goes
all-out for some goal, with no or little regard for the side-effects.
rzed
"Sol Taibi" <solomo...@computer.org> wrote in message
news:d3d33e5b.0204...@posting.google.com...
Not hardly! The American Cowboy rides tall in the saddle, shoots straight,
kisses his horse, tips his hat to the blonde lady, yodels, plays poker,
drinks redeye (in moderation, if he wears a white hat), and relishes the
wide open spaces. He's independent, with a hint of danger in his demeanor.
He carries his pistols right out in the open and isn't afraid to use them.
He don't take kindly to lawyer-talk and fences, and prefers dealing
directly with varmints he can face eye to eye. And he rides off into the
sunset, eventually.
Martin Ambuhl
>
> I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> bloodthirsty war criminal.
The description of GWB's policy as "cowboy" was hardly restricted to
left-wingers.
>
> Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> English is spoken?
>
> In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> herds cows.
That's crap. You never, I suppose, have heard of "cowboy" drivers?
This usage has been widespread in the US, used for assholes on the
freeways of Texas to life-endangering subway drivers in Boston.
--
It is better to be wrong than vacuous.
- Avram Noam Chomsky
Bob Stahl
cowboy + cows 30,400
cowboy + cattle 81,600
cowboy + sheep 40,600
cowboy + war 255,000
--
Bob Stahl
Richard Fontana
> Sol Taibi wrote:
> >
> > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > bloodthirsty war criminal.
>
> The description of GWB's policy as "cowboy" was hardly restricted to
> left-wingers.
>
> >
> > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > English is spoken?
> >
> > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > herds cows.
>
> That's crap. You never, I suppose, have heard of "cowboy" drivers?
Nevertheless, I'm sure there's something more at work in British uses
of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
j...@radidelmex.net
> Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> English is spoken?
I think it means a "movie cowboy" like Clint Eastwood; see maverick.
- an independent individual who does not go along with a group or party
where the group or party is the other nations.
j...@radidelmex.net
Michael J Hardy
> In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who herds cows.
That is certainly not true. "Cowboy" is a stereotyped
personality based on movie cowboys. -- Mike Hardy
Spehro Pefhany
> Nevertheless, I'm sure there's something more at work in British uses
> of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
> Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
> sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
I've heard "cowboy" applied by Brits to "broker" gray-market salespeople
in the electronics field who buy and sell temporarily scarce parts at
grossly inflated prices. It's clearly not complimentary. Calling Bush a
cowboy makes me think of some puffed-up swaggering fellow who empties his
six-shooters first and asks questions later.
In contrast, the American stereotypical cowboy image is almost entirely
positive. A rugged individualist, who says what he means and means what
he says. Tough as nails but with a soft spot. Honest as the day is long.
Slow-talking, when he says anything, but clever enough to outsmart city-
slickers. He has style, but shuns anything fashionable. The DVD "extras"
on _Shanghai Noon_ are interesting- such as the director trying to explain
the traditional Western bar-room fight scene (in which everyone joins in)
to Jackie Chan.
Best regards,
--
Spehro Pefhany --"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward"
sp...@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com
9-11 United we Stand
John O'Flaherty
>
> ... although thinking of Dubya as a "motherless calf" amuses.
Git along, little Georgie...
--
john
Harvey V
wrote:
>> Nevertheless, I'm sure there's something more at work in British
>> uses of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people
>> especially Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans
>> and such. It's sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so
>> polite.
>
> I've heard "cowboy" applied by Brits to "broker" gray-market
> salespeople in the electronics field who buy and sell temporarily
> scarce parts at grossly inflated prices. It's clearly not
> complimentary. Calling Bush a cowboy makes me think of some
> puffed-up swaggering fellow who empties his six-shooters first and
> asks questions later.
"Cowboy" is most commonly used here in the UK for people like rogue
builders -- the guys who take an old lady's money for a full roofing
job and then just paint it to make it look new before they disappear.
(Then they come back next wewek and paint your drive black while
charging for new tarmac.....)
In this sense it has the connotations of an unregulated or lawless
shyster who can't be trusted to do what's right -- which I assume is
the general meaning for UK journalists who apply it to GWB and his
foreign policy.
As you say, it's definitely not complimentary.
--
Cheers,
Harvey
Evan Kirshenbaum
cowboy + war + movies 58,100
cowboy + war + indians 21,700
cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys and war on the
same page.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |ActiveX is pretty harmless anyway.
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |It can't affect you unless you
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |install Windows, and who would be
|foolish enough to do that?
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com | Peter Moylan
(650)857-7572
R H Draney
<kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>"Bob Stahl" <urbul...@pacbell.net> writes:
>
>> cowboy + cows 30,400
>> cowboy + cattle 81,600
>> cowboy + sheep 40,600
>>
>> cowboy + war 255,000
>
>cowboy + war + movies 58,100
>cowboy + war + indians 21,700
>cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
>
>There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys and war on the
>same page.
cowboy + irving 17,200 hits
cowboys + irving 26,800
A few of these may refer to Frank Gallup's "The Ballad of Irving"...a
larger number doubtless refer to the suburb of Dallas in which the NFL
Cowboys are headquartered....
And purely for contrast (since the original question was what it means
in the UK):
"don't come the cowboy with me sonny jim" 178 hits
M.J.Powell
<solomo...@computer.org> writes
In UK it means someone who is unskilled in the job he has taken on and
charges exorbitantly, ie 'a cowboy builder', 'a cowboy plumber' etc.
Mike
--
M.J.Powell
John Dean
"Harvey V" <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote in message
news:Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9...
My heroes have always been cowboys, and they still are it seems ...
--
John Dean
Oxford
De-frag to reply
Sol Taibi
In short, the non-USA version of a "cowboy" is that of Hollywood.
Leftist UKers don't like that, so they call GWB a cowboy.
Clue: GWB is a Connecticut prep school boy like his daddy.
That is, the American equivalent of most UK left wing journalists!
Sol Taibi
Is there a British stereotype about folks from Connecticut?
Nelson Rockefeller had a "working class" New York accent. Which he
went to a speech therapist to acquire.
Richard Fontana
> Clue: GWB is a Connecticut prep school boy like his daddy.
> That is, the American equivalent of most UK left wing journalists!
I don't think it's reasonable to call GWB a *Connecticut* prep school
boy. He was born in New Haven, yes (while Poppy was finishing his
education in the immediate Postwar Era) but otherwise GWB is clearly
some sort of Texan, though perhaps an atypical one given his elite
background and the Eastern background of his parents. He attended prep
school at Phillips Factory^W Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, a very
different state from Connecticut. From what I've read, and this isn't
at all too unbelievable, GWB didn't feel like he had that much in
common with the typical prep school kid of those days -- he identified
more with the students from Non-Eastern Regions and with the kids on
athletic scholarships. He saw himself as a Texan, and to that extent
as an outsider.
I'm not sure whether a Connecticut prep school boy is the US equivalent
of a UK "left-wing journalist", but I suppose it's possible. If it's
the case that the typical UK left-wing journalist is from a relatively
elite social background and attended one of the so-called "public
schools", that would increase the likelihood.
Donna Richoux
> "Bob Stahl" <urbul...@pacbell.net> writes:
>
> > Sol Taibi <solomo...@computer.org> wrote:
> > > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> > > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > > English is spoken?
> > > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > > herds cows.
> >
> > cowboy + cows 30,400
> > cowboy + cattle 81,600
> > cowboy + sheep 40,600
> >
> > cowboy + war 255,000
>
> cowboy + war + movies 58,100
> cowboy + war + indians 21,700
> cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
>
> There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys and war on the
> same page.
cowboy + peace 97,200
cowboy + friend 303,000
cowboy + love 444,000
I keep trying to tell Bob about the pointlessness of this search
formula, but them Bay Area folks is stubborn.
No one has mentioned what I thought is the current UK meaning for cowboy
-- something about fly-by-night undependable (maybe fraudulent?)
contractors, like roofers.
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Rodolphe Audette
>
> I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> bloodthirsty war criminal.
>
> Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> English is spoken?
I think it refers to what western movies used to show: people with very
limited intellectual sophistication. Unsubtle. People with rudimentary
feelings:
"There's the good fellow and there's the bad fellow, all is either white
or black."
"Either you're with us or you're against us."
Very Bush.
Rodolphe Audette
Bob Stahl
>Bob Stahl:
> > cowboy + cows 30,400
> > cowboy + cattle 81,600
> > cowboy + sheep 40,600
> >
> > cowboy + war 255,000
>
> cowboy + war + movies 58,100
> cowboy + war + indians 21,700
> cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
>
> There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys
> and war on the same page.
cowboy + US + Afghanistan 9,350
cowboy + US + UK + Afghanistan 1,990
cowboy + US + AU + Afghanistan 695
cowboy + US + FR + Afghanistan 384
cowboy + "Tony Blair" + Afghanistan 649
cowboy + "Tony Blair" - Bush + Afghanistan 85
cowboy + "Cold War" 7,980
cowboy + "Iran-Contra" 1,140
cowboy + war + "Middle East" 7,470
cowboy + "Gulf War" 4,480
cowboy + Israel + Palestine 2,080
Huh... www.topozone.com returns 15 US states with
towns named Palestine.
cowboy + "head of the snake" 48
(split about evenly among references to the US as
"head of the snake", to wrestling personalities,
and to actual cowboys and rattlesnakes)
Googling -- it's an art, not a science, folks.
--
Bob Stahl
Richard Fontana
Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
even know that Connecticut exists. My own stereotypes about
Connecticut people (based on my experiences of living here) are
really just variations on more familiar stereotypes about people from
West Virginia, the rural South, etc. (NTTAWWTT).
> Nelson Rockefeller had a "working class" New York accent. Which he
> went to a speech therapist to acquire.
Sort of like Tony Blair? I have no memory or knowledge of what Nelson
Rockefeller's speech was like, so I can't say. Somehow I doubt that I
would think of it as "New York working class". Maybe I can find some
recordings on the Web somewhere. All I know is that Rocky called
everyone "fella".
Bob Stahl
>...I keep trying to tell Bob about the pointlessness of
>this search formula, but them Bay Area folks is stubborn.
Speaking of searches -- I've been trying to track the connection between
former East Bay Express writer Alice Kahn and "Yuppie" (she wrote an article
the phenomena in 1982 or 1983, but I'm not sure she coined it, as some say),
as well as "p.c." (which I'm fairly sure she cited around the same time, in
writing about Berkeley city politics) -- the Net is too riddled with hearsay
to come up with anything conclusive. Sometimes you just have to go to
library, or the newspaper office. I'll check back later on that.
--
Bob Stahl
david56
>
> "Harvey V" <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote in message
> news:Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9...
>
> >
> Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys ....
>
"Don't come the cowboy with me, Sonny Jim!
I know lots of those and you're not one of them"
Kirsty MacColl
--
David
I say what it occurs to me to say.
The address is valid today, but I will change it to keep ahead of the
spammers.
Donna Richoux
[restoring lost quote, necessary to understand gist. Have you got one of
those troublesome newsreaders like a few others here?]
>j...@radiDELMEx.net wrote
>>
>> I think it means a "movie cowboy" like Clint Eastwood; see maverick.
>>
>> - an independent individual who does not go along with a group or
party
>>
>> where the group or party is the other nations.
> ... although thinking of Dubya as a "motherless calf" amuses.
I believe you will find the meaning was "unbranded stock," not
"motherless calf." Unbranded cattle were vulnerable to being stolen and
branded by someone else. Whether or not an unbranded yearling's mother
was alive was beside the point.
I notice the Dictionary of the Old West (Watts, 1977) favors the theory
that the name came from Texan Samuel A. Maverick, although it says there
are other claims that it came from mauvric, mavoric, or mavorick. If it
did come from one of those other sources, it was attached quite soon by
anecdote to Maverick.
Maverick was descended from the Samuel Maverick who was the first
permanent settler in the East Boston area, and for whom there is a
public transit station named.
Both were undoubtedly related to Bret and Bart. Listening to that theme
song on TV is an early memory of mine (age 4).
--
Best --- Donna Richoux
Michael J Hardy
New York City (not that there's anything wrong with that) wrote:
> Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
> is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
> even know that Connecticut exists.
Where I come from everyone who's passed fourth grade knows there
is a state called Connecticut, and where it is on the map. But no
stereotypes come instantly to mind, so in that sense I don't know it
exists. I tend to assume whatever characteristics people in that part
of the country have, would be shared by Connecticutters. I've heard
all beaches in that state are private property. And I know there's an
Ivy League university in New Haven. And Hartford is where a lot of
insurance companies are headquartered. I guess that last is a stereotype;
I'm not sure whether it's true.
> My own stereotypes about Connecticut people (based on my experiences
> of living here) are really just variations on more familiar stereotypes
> about people from West Virginia, the rural South, etc.
Richard, that's a reason for me to be puzzled by your weird notion
of considering Connecticut to be part of the Midwest. I've seen the
southeastern part of Ohio, near West Virginia. It struck me as having
characteristics stereotypically associated with West Virginia and the
rural South. To me that's a reason to think it's stretching things to
consider Ohio part of the Midwest. Satisfying those stereotypes is in
conflict with my own mental associations with "Midwest." Obviously the
Midwest is more affluent than Boston or NYC. In Boston there's a higher
per-capita income than in the Midwest, but dollars are not worth as much
here, and there are some world-class universities, and a larger number
of otherwise excellent universities than the number of people would
suggest, but in more commonplace amenities like houses and cars and
streets and literacy of ordinary high-school graduates, as opposed to
people at the aforementioned universities, Boston seems like a slum
compared to the Midwest. And in NYC I saw Interstate Highway 95 go
right under several gigantic apartment buildings and thought I was
in Calcutta. -- Mike Hardy
R H Draney
> Where I come from everyone who's passed fourth grade knows there
>is a state called Connecticut, and where it is on the map. And Hartford is where a lot of
>insurance companies are headquartered. I guess that last is a stereotype;
>I'm not sure whether it's true.
Useful stereotypes for people visiting the US:
(1) All insurance companies are in Connecticut.
(2) All credit cards come from Delaware.
(3) All breakfast cereal is from Battle Creek, Michigan.
(4) All rebate forms are mailed to Young America, Minnesota....
That should do for starters....r
Donna Richoux
>
> Speaking of searches -- I've been trying to track the connection between
> former East Bay Express writer Alice Kahn and "Yuppie" (she wrote an article
> the phenomena in 1982 or 1983, but I'm not sure she coined it, as some say),
> as well as "p.c." (which I'm fairly sure she cited around the same time, in
> writing about Berkeley city politics) -- the Net is too riddled with hearsay
> to come up with anything conclusive. Sometimes you just have to go to
> library, or the newspaper office. I'll check back later on that.
Her article was June 83, according to a "countercultural timeline":
June Alice Kahn's article on Yuppie in Express
Surely some library in the Bay Area will have the June '83 Express, if
you want to find the original.
Merriam-Webster says 1982 for first record of "yuppie".
Our own Evan K's page on coinages says Bob Greene, 1983, Chicago
Tribune. Evan, do you have a fuller citation?
When you say "p.c.", do you mean you think she was the first, or among
the first, to abbreviate it? Because we know the two-word phrase
"politically correct" goes way back.
Harvey V
wrote:
> John Dean wrote:
-snip-
>> Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys ....
>
> "Don't come the cowboy with me, Sonny Jim!
> I know lots of those and you're not one of them"
>
> Kirsty MacColl
There's a light in your eyes tells me somebody's in.....
One of the best songs. Ever.
Geez, I liked that woman's songwriting.....
--
Cheers,
Harvey
Spehro Pefhany
> is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
> even know that Connecticut exists. My own stereotypes about
> Connecticut people (based on my experiences of living here) are
> really just variations on more familiar stereotypes about people from
> West Virginia, the rural South, etc. (NTTAWWTT).
As a (North) American, I first think of a place to live for rich people
that is near NYC and has room for enormous houses. Could be totally
off-base, it is based mostly on watching David Letterman. I also think of
precision machine tool manufacturing, particularly in connection with
Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven.
Harvey V
wrote:
>> Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one,
>> that is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of
>> Americans don't even know that Connecticut exists. My own
>> stereotypes about Connecticut people (based on my experiences of
>> living here) are really just variations on more familiar
>> stereotypes about people from West Virginia, the rural South,
>> etc. (NTTAWWTT).
>
> As a (North) American, I first think of a place to live for rich
> people that is near NYC and has room for enormous houses. Could be
> totally off-base, it is based mostly on watching David Letterman.
> I also think of precision machine tool manufacturing, particularly
> in connection with Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven.
The image I have of it is the river valley -- New Hampshire border? --
with picture-postcard views of villages/clapboard churches/steeples.
The US equivalent of the Cotswolds.
Admittedly, that's from having passed through there in about 1972 --
travelling from Ottawa to a geography department field study week at
Worcester, Mass -- so it may not have been colonised by the Letterman-
referenced types at that time. (Or if it had been, I didn't know
anything about it.)
--
Cheers,
Harvey
John Varela
wrote:
> In contrast, the American stereotypical cowboy image is almost entirely
> positive.
There is a variant. When the cowboys finished a trail drive and at last
came into Dodge City they were like sailors on shore leave, whooping it up
and maybe riding down main street shooting in the air. They gave Marshal
Dillon no end of trouble.
Frederick Remington's well known statue, "Coming Through the Rye", shows
some cowboys celebrating like this.
http://nationalcowboyhalloffamestore.safeshopper.com/15/96.htm?893
It's this latter image that leads to calling a rackless driver a "cowboy",
and it's probably what the "left wing journalists" are thinking of in their
ignorance.
--
John Varela
Harvey V
wrote:
-snip-
> It's this latter image that leads to calling a rackless driver a
> "cowboy",
Is a "rackless driver" some guy named Bubba that forget to fit the gun-
rack to his pick-up?
(Sorry....couldn't resist......)
--
Cheers,
Harvey
Michael J Hardy
> Useful stereotypes for people visiting the US:
>
> (1) All insurance companies are in Connecticut.
>
> (2) All credit cards come from Delaware.
Well, yes, everybody knows those. I think the reason for credit
cards coming from Delaware is that that state's laws make things
convenient for companies that issue those.
> (4) All rebate forms are mailed to Young America, Minnesota....
This one I'd never even heard of, even though I've long known
of that town. What's this about?
> (3) All breakfast cereal is from Battle Creek, Michigan.
Heresy! General Mills and Pillsbury are Minneapolis firms.
Death to Kellogg's! (General Mills and its Betty Crocker Kitchens
are headquartered in a suburb called Golden Valley. The mailing
address you see in the fine print on cereal boxes is a PO Box in
Minneapolis.) (Dairy Queen and some other food-related companies
are also headquartered in Minneapolis.)
Mike Hardy
Shakib Otaqui
Harvey V <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote:
> [...]
> "Cowboy" is most commonly used here in the UK for people like rogue
> builders -- the guys who take an old lady's money for a full roofing
> job and then just paint it to make it look new before they disappear.
> (Then they come back next wewek and paint your drive black while
> charging for new tarmac.....)
>
> In this sense it has the connotations of an unregulated or lawless
> shyster who can't be trusted to do what's right -- which I assume is
> the general meaning for UK journalists who apply it to GWB and his
> foreign policy.
>
> As you say, it's definitely not complimentary.
Sign on the side of a white van seen in south London:
Patel & Singh, Plumbers
You've tried the cowboys
Now try the Indians
--
R H Draney
> R H Draney (dado...@earthlink.net) wrote:
>
> Well, yes, everybody knows those. I think the reason for credit
>cards coming from Delaware is that that state's laws make things
>convenient for companies that issue those.
This is alluded to in an excellent episode of "The Dick Van Dyke
Show"...when Rob (the head writer and therefore "management") gets a
raise, and Buddy and Sally (technically his "employees") don't, he
checks with his personal accountant (!) to see what would be involved
in incorporating himself and paying them out of his raise...after a
few seconds nodding into the phone, he tries to describe to his wife
what advice was offered and all he can remember is that he'd have to
move to Delaware....
(Richard Deacon gets one of his best lines in the same episode...when
the accountant--Roger Carmel--for the Alan Brady Show is explaining
the concept of "holding companies" to Rob using a vase of assorted
flowers as a visual aid, Mel walks in with some papers, sees a small
part of the exchange, and storms out muttering "been up here a
thousand times and he's never given *me* flowers")....
>> (4) All rebate forms are mailed to Young America, Minnesota....
>
> This one I'd never even heard of, even though I've long known
>of that town. What's this about?
I file for a fair number of rebates...I've noticed that the majority
go to a fulfillment center in Young America for some reason...(of the
remainder, a goodly number seem to go to El Paso)....
>> (3) All breakfast cereal is from Battle Creek, Michigan.
>
> Heresy! General Mills and Pillsbury are Minneapolis firms.
>Death to Kellogg's! (General Mills and its Betty Crocker Kitchens
>are headquartered in a suburb called Golden Valley. The mailing
>address you see in the fine print on cereal boxes is a PO Box in
>Minneapolis.) (Dairy Queen and some other food-related companies
>are also headquartered in Minneapolis.)
Some of these stereotypes go back a long time...association of Battle
Creek with cereal harks back to Harvey Kellogg and his sanitarium
(amusingly depicted in "The Road To Wellville")...the one that's
*really* lost on the modern consumer is why Shredded Wheat is the
"original Niagara Falls cereal"....
For a couple more weeks, you've also got Fingerhut, but I'm guessing
that's a sore spot....r
Evan Kirshenbaum
> Bob Stahl <urbul...@pacbell.net> wrote:
> >
> > Speaking of searches -- I've been trying to track the connection
> > between former East Bay Express writer Alice Kahn and "Yuppie"
> > (she wrote an article the phenomena in 1982 or 1983, but I'm not
> > sure she coined it, as some say)
[snip]
> Her article was June 83, according to a "countercultural timeline":
>
> June Alice Kahn's article on Yuppie in Express
>
> Surely some library in the Bay Area will have the June '83 Express,
> if you want to find the original.
>
> Merriam-Webster says 1982 for first record of "yuppie".
>
> Our own Evan K's page on coinages says Bob Greene, 1983, Chicago
> Tribune. Evan, do you have a fuller citation?
From our discussion of this last year
] This one should be checkable:
]
] The term "Yuppie" was first used in print by _Chicago Tribune_
] columnist Bob Greene in a March 1983 piece on Jerry Rubin, a
] hippie-turned-yuppie, and was bandied about extensively in the
] 1984 presidential campaign in which Colorado senator Gary Hart,
] a contender for the Democratic nomination, seemed tailor-made to
] appeal to the fiscally conservative but socially liberal yuppie
] voter.
]
] http://eightiesclub.tripod.com/id32.htm
]
] I've seen other claims that Rubin was the first person so described
] (as well as the claim that it referred to a political persuasion
] before it became a "lifestyle"). As Rubin was one of the
] co-founders of the Yippies, and being familiar with Greene's style,
] I find it quite plausible that he might have coined the word to
] describe the change in Rubin (and his followers) from fiscal
] radicals to fiscal conservatives (while remaining socially liberal)
] as Yippie-to-Yuppie.
I suppose that the "first used in print" might hide it having been
used elsewhere in speech. Yeah, it looks as though that might have
happened. From a transcript from the 5/26/99 _Today_ show
LEONARD: Mr. Greene, by the way, is well-qualified to comment on
this search for a new word, since he is the one given
credit for popularizing the term yuppie, introducing it
to the mass culture after overhearing possibly the word's
real inventor utter it in a New York bar.
http://www.bxmegalist.com/millenniumitis_ward_today_show.htm
Looks like I need to qualify the entry in my table.
--
Evan Kirshenbaum +------------------------------------
HP Laboratories |"You can't prove it *isn't* so!" is
1501 Page Mill Road, 1U, MS 1141 |as good as Q.E.D. in folk logic--as
Palo Alto, CA 94304 |though it were necessary to submit
|a piece of the moon to chemical
kirsh...@hpl.hp.com |analysis before you could be sure
(650)857-7572 |that it was not made of green
|cheese.
http://www.kirshenbaum.net/ | Bergen Evans
Bob Stahl
>....When you say "p.c.", do you mean you think she was the
>first, or among the first, to abbreviate it? Because we know
>the two-word phrase "politically correct" goes way back.
I didn't mean to imply that she coined the phrase or the abbreviation, just
that she may have been among the first writers in our time to use it in an
ironic sense, and may have helped vector its usage. As I recall, she was
writing on BCA (Berkeley Citizen's Action) internal politics and
self-criticism, which was often flavored with Marxist rhetorical stylings
(see http://berkeleyinthe70s.homestead.com/).
"Politically correct" was used in a 1981 post to net.jokes, and "politically
correct" or "politically incorrect" appear in a few posts on gay culture and
feminism in the early 1980s. Right wingers like David Horowitz didn't hijack
the term, and I don't think it was abbreviated, until the mid- or
late-1980s.
Regarding "yuppie" and related terms -- if "upwardly mobile" dates to 1949,
according to the MWD, we could pose that a writer may have penned the YUMP
phrase at any point between then and the 1980s, before somebody turned that
one into an acronym. Who knows. But neither "PC" nor "yuppie" had an
appropriate societal context to become widely popular until the Reagan and
Thatcher eras.
ObFontana, an interesting cite I just ran across is the "Yuppie/Nerd Ratio",
coined by an investment specialist with Comstock. "It compared the number of
25 to 34 year olds ('Yuppies') to the number of 45 to 54 year olds
('Nerds'). He developed it for bond market analysis. ... Yuppies (25-34 year
olds) tend to be spenders (buying houses, raising children, etc.), while
Nerds (45-54 year olds) tend to be savers. Nerds tend to be buyers of bonds,
while Yuppies tend to be net borrowers. This ratio is intended to show the
public's side of the supply/demand equation for bonds." (No date given.)
http://www.topline-charts.com/HotCharts/demographics.htm
--
Bob Stahl
Richard Fontana
> I espied that on 12 Apr 2002, "Spehro Pefhany" <sp...@interlog.com>
> wrote:
> > The renowned Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote:
>
>
>
> >> Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one,
> >> that is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of
> >> Americans don't even know that Connecticut exists. My own
> >> stereotypes about Connecticut people (based on my experiences of
> >> living here) are really just variations on more familiar
> >> stereotypes about people from West Virginia, the rural South,
> >> etc. (NTTAWWTT).
> >
> > As a (North) American, I first think of a place to live for rich
> > people that is near NYC and has room for enormous houses. Could be
> > totally off-base, it is based mostly on watching David Letterman.
> > I also think of precision machine tool manufacturing, particularly
> > in connection with Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven.
>
>
> The image I have of it is the river valley -- New Hampshire border? --
> with picture-postcard views of villages/clapboard churches/steeples.
>
> The US equivalent of the Cotswolds.
Er, well, that's not completely out of the question for the Far
Northern Portions of the Housatonic River valley, near the
Massachusetts border. But otherwise it's pretty much out of place.
For one thing, Connecticut doesn't border on New Hampshire. New
England looks sort of like this:
MAINE
VERMONT || NEW HAMPSHIRE
MASSACHUSETTS
RHODE ISLAND
CONNECTICUT
Richard Fontana
> The renowned Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote:
> >
> > Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
> > is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
> > even know that Connecticut exists. My own stereotypes about
> > Connecticut people (based on my experiences of living here) are
> > really just variations on more familiar stereotypes about people from
> > West Virginia, the rural South, etc. (NTTAWWTT).
>
> As a (North) American, I first think of a place to live for rich people
> that is near NYC and has room for enormous houses. Could be totally
> off-base, it is based mostly on watching David Letterman.
That's reasonably accurate for some significant subportions of
Fairfield County, but that's just the Extreme Southwestern Corner(TM)
of Connecticut. Also that same county contains lots of urban
decay too, or communities that merely, as my sister (who resides in
that county) puts it, "have a stigma".
N.Mitchum
----
> what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> English is spoken?
>
> In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> herds cows.
If you live in the US, you've got rather out of touch. "Cowboy"
has many different connotations for Americans, the home of the
cowboy. Why do you think the ad men used the image to sell
Marlboros for all those years? Because they wanted us to
associate their product with cow herding?
----NM
Richard Fontana
> Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu>, who is from
> New York City (not that there's anything wrong with that) wrote:
>
> > Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
> > is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
> > even know that Connecticut exists.
>
> Where I come from everyone who's passed fourth grade knows there
> is a state called Connecticut, and where it is on the map. But no
> stereotypes come instantly to mind, so in that sense I don't know it
> exists. I tend to assume whatever characteristics people in that part
> of the country have, would be shared by Connecticutters. I've heard
> all beaches in that state are private property.
No, that's not true; in fact it's dead wrong. For example, there's
Sherwood Island State Park. That contains a beach.
What *is* true is that all the beaches in Connecticut are
definitionally inferior, because they're on the Sound.
> And I know there's an
> Ivy League university in New Haven.
Well, more accurately, an Ivy League college within a prominent
associated university, but yes. New Haven also
has Albertus Magnus College and Southern Connecticut State University
(though that spills over into Hamden).
> And Hartford is where a lot of
> insurance companies are headquartered. I guess that last is a stereotype;
> I'm not sure whether it's true.
It used to be true that Hartford was the "Insurance Capital of the
United States", but I'm not sure it is anymore. The major insurance
companies have gradually been migrating out of Hartford and towards
other states, like, yes, Iowa. Were it not for the fact that it's the
state capital, Hartford would have long ago died out completely.
I think it's even the case that some of the insurance companies with
"Hartford" in their name have relocated to other climes.
> > My own stereotypes about Connecticut people (based on my experiences
> > of living here) are really just variations on more familiar stereotypes
> > about people from West Virginia, the rural South, etc.
>
>
> Richard, that's a reason for me to be puzzled by your weird notion
> of considering Connecticut to be part of the Midwest. I've seen the
> southeastern part of Ohio, near West Virginia. It struck me as having
> characteristics stereotypically associated with West Virginia and the
> rural South. To me that's a reason to think it's stretching things to
> consider Ohio part of the Midwest. Satisfying those stereotypes is in
> conflict with my own mental associations with "Midwest." Obviously the
> Midwest is more affluent than Boston or NYC.
Whoa! I can't accept the truth of that; in fact I think I can assert
the falsehood of it. I'm not really talking about poverty here though.
I've seen plenty of urban disaffluence in the Midwest, and some
non-urban disaffluence too. I'm not really sure how they compare; the
regions have rather similar problems.
> In Boston there's a higher
> per-capita income than in the Midwest, but dollars are not worth as much
> here, and there are some world-class universities, and a larger number
> of otherwise excellent universities than the number of people would
> suggest, but in more commonplace amenities like houses and cars and
> streets and literacy of ordinary high-school graduates, as opposed to
> people at the aforementioned universities, Boston seems like a slum
> compared to the Midwest.
I cannot disagree very strongly with these statements. Boston is
basically a slowly-dying city. It's in much better shape
than Hartford, though. It actually continues to have the illusion of
attractiveness to a certain degree. Then again I haven't really been
up there recently.
> And in NYC I saw Interstate Highway 95 go
> right under several gigantic apartment buildings and thought I was
> in Calcutta.
Odd. I don't think I-95 goes anywhere near any Indian neighborhoods.
Richard Fontana
> associated university, but yes. New Haven also
> has Albertus Magnus College and Southern Connecticut State University
> (though that spills over into Hamden).
Oh, also the "University of New Haven".
Frances Kemmish
> The renowned Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote:
>
>>Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
>>is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
>>even know that Connecticut exists. My own stereotypes about
>>Connecticut people (based on my experiences of living here) are
>>really just variations on more familiar stereotypes about people from
>>West Virginia, the rural South, etc. (NTTAWWTT).
>>
>
> As a (North) American, I first think of a place to live for rich people
> that is near NYC and has room for enormous houses. Could be totally
> off-base, it is based mostly on watching David Letterman.
That's pretty accurate - at least for Fairfield County.
>I also think of
> precision machine tool manufacturing, particularly in connection with
> Bridgeport, Hartford and New Haven.
>
Like the part about insurance companies, that rather out of date.
Fran
Donna Richoux
>
> I cannot disagree very strongly with these statements. Boston is
> basically a slowly-dying city.
Then why are there twice as many skyscrapers in the business district as
when we moved out in 1992? And streets that used to have neglected
warehouses are all gentrified and trendy? I think Boston has been
steadily prospering ever since the technological revolution set in in
the 1950s, with Rt. 128 and all that. Certainly no significant downturn
since I first moved there in 1980.
> Then again I haven't really been
> up there recently.
Yes, I see.
Frances Kemmish
I think that's in West Haven
Michael J Hardy
> The major insurance companies have gradually been migrating out
> of Hartford and towards other states, like, yes, Iowa.
... which raise another non-Battle-Creek cereal issue.
I already mentioned that General Mills is in Minneapolis.
Isn't Quaker Oats in Iowa? Or at least they have a big production
plant there?
> > Obviously the Midwest is more affluent than Boston or NYC.
>
> Whoa! I can't accept the truth of that; in fact I think I can assert
> the falsehood of it. I'm not really talking about poverty here though.
> I've seen plenty of urban disaffluence in the Midwest, and some
> non-urban disaffluence too.
So have I, but driving around Boston makes it look as if
houses and streets throughout the whole city are almost uniformly
inferior to what is typical in the Midwest.
> > And in NYC I saw Interstate Highway 95 go right under several
> > gigantic apartment buildings and thought I was in Calcutta.
>
> Odd. I don't think I-95 goes anywhere near any Indian neighborhoods.
It doesn't, as far as I know. But I meant my stereotype of
Calcutta involves overcrowding. When thousands of people live in
as undesirable a location as right on top of a freeway, that seems
like third-world overcrowding. -- Mike Hardy
Tony Cooper
>
> (Dairy Queen and some other food-related companies
> are also headquartered in Minneapolis.)
Well, any fool can run a Dairy Queen. At least Mark Cuban
thinks so.
--
Tony Cooper aka: tony_co...@yahoo.com
Provider of Jots and Tittles
Bun Mui
> What in the UK is a cowboy?
>
> From: solomo...@computer.org (Sol Taibi)
> Reply to: [1]Sol Taibi
> Date: 12 Apr 2002 06:37:02 -0700
> Organization: http://groups.google.com/
> Newsgroups:
> [2]alt.usage.english
> Followup to: [3]newsgroup
>I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
>about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
>described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
>bloodthirsty war criminal.
Old West mentallity.
"Criminals Wanted Dead Or Alive"
Bun Mui
>
>Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
Steve Hayes
>I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
>about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
>described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
>bloodthirsty war criminal.
>
>Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
>what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
>English is spoken?
>
>In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
>herds cows.
Here it means a reckless driver, or someone who is irresponsible in the use of
firearms - "Shoot first, ask questions afterwards."
A person who looks after cows is called a "herdboy", is usually under 16,
doesn't wear a broad-brimmed hat, and doesn't carry a gun.
This use of the term no doubt derives from cowboy movies, where the cowboys
spent far more time shooting six guns than they do looking after cows. And no
matter which direction they shoot in, they cause someone to fall out of a
building and into a water barrel.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/steve.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
Alan Jones
"Donna Richoux" <tr...@euronet.nl> wrote in message
news:1fajokb.o0609i1qz9fd3N%tr...@euronet.nl...
> No one has mentioned what I thought is the current UK meaning for cowboy
> -- something about fly-by-night undependable (maybe fraudulent?)
> contractors, like roofers.
That's the usual everyday sense of "cowboy" in UK. The only bit you missed
out is that their work is incompetent, probably to the point of endangering
both residents and passers-by. The term is not restricted to the building
trade but is certainly closely associated with it.
However, to call President Bush a cowboy is probably a reference to his
(apparent) wild enthusiasm for firing off real and metaphorical guns in
Injun territory. Presumably there's also a sidelong glance at his home
state.
Alan Jones
Harvey V
<rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote:
> On Fri, 12 Apr 2002, Harvey V wrote:
>
-snip-
>> The image I have of it is the river valley -- New Hampshire
>> border? -- with picture-postcard views of villages/clapboard
>> churches/steeples.
>>
>> The US equivalent of the Cotswolds.
>
> Er, well, that's not completely out of the question for the Far
> Northern Portions of the Housatonic River valley, near the
> Massachusetts border. But otherwise it's pretty much out of
> place. For one thing, Connecticut doesn't border on New Hampshire.
> New England looks sort of like this:
>
> MAINE
> VERMONT || NEW HAMPSHIRE
>
> MASSACHUSETTS
>
> RHODE ISLAND
> CONNECTICUT
>
It must have been the Vermont/New Hampshire border that we travelled
down.
(Hey: it's been almost 30 years since I needed to know where I was
in that area!)
--
Cheers,
Harvey
Charles Riggs
<john...@frag.lineone.net> wrote:
>
>"Harvey V" <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote in message
>news:Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9...
>> As you say, it's definitely not complimentary.
>>
>Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys ....
>
>My heroes have always been cowboys, and they still are it seems ...
Must one have to have the same heroes as the American electorate to be
considered a full-blooded Yank? If so, I'm in trouble.
--
Charles Riggs
Sol Taibi
> Sol Taibi wrote:
> >
> > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > bloodthirsty war criminal.
>
> left-wingers.
>
Maybe so, but it was left-wingers that I was reading.
FWIW, American left-wingers do not call GWB a "cowboy".
So it's a pondian usage issue, not a political issue.
> >
> > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > English is spoken?
> >
> > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > herds cows.
>
> That's crap. You never, I suppose, have heard of "cowboy" drivers?
> This usage has been widespread in the US, used for assholes on the
> freeways of Texas to life-endangering subway drivers in Boston.
Sol Taibi
> On Fri, 12 Apr 2002, Martin Ambuhl wrote:
>
> > Sol Taibi wrote:
> > >
> > > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> >
> > The description of GWB's policy as "cowboy" was hardly restricted to
> > left-wingers.
> >
> > >
> > > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > > English is spoken?
> > >
> > > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > > herds cows.
> >
> > That's crap. You never, I suppose, have heard of "cowboy" drivers?
>
> of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
> Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
> sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
By British standards he isn't? Not criticizing, just asking.
Sol Taibi
> > of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
> > Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
> > sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
>
> in the electronics field who buy and sell temporarily scarce parts at
> grossly inflated prices. It's clearly not complimentary. Calling Bush a
> cowboy makes me think of some puffed-up swaggering fellow who empties his
> six-shooters first and asks questions later.
>
Much like the general stereotype of an American.
Sometimes accurate. Don't think it applies to GWB.
> In contrast, the American stereotypical cowboy image is almost entirely
> positive. A rugged individualist, who says what he means and means what
> he says. Tough as nails but with a soft spot. Honest as the day is long.
> Slow-talking, when he says anything, but clever enough to outsmart city-
> slickers. He has style, but shuns anything fashionable. The DVD "extras"
> on _Shanghai Noon_ are interesting- such as the director trying to explain
> the traditional Western bar-room fight scene (in which everyone joins in)
> to Jackie Chan.
Ourselves at our best. Were that we were all like this all the time.
>
> Best regards,
Sol Taibi
> > The renowned Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote:
>
>
> >> Nevertheless, I'm sure there's something more at work in British
> >> uses of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people
> >> especially Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans
> >> and such. It's sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so
> >> polite.
> >
> > I've heard "cowboy" applied by Brits to "broker" gray-market
> > salespeople in the electronics field who buy and sell temporarily
> > scarce parts at grossly inflated prices. It's clearly not
> > complimentary. Calling Bush a cowboy makes me think of some
> > puffed-up swaggering fellow who empties his six-shooters first and
> > asks questions later.
>
>
> builders -- the guys who take an old lady's money for a full roofing
> job and then just paint it to make it look new before they disappear.
> (Then they come back next wewek and paint your drive black while
> charging for new tarmac.....)
>
> In this sense it has the connotations of an unregulated or lawless
> shyster who can't be trusted to do what's right -- which I assume is
> the general meaning for UK journalists who apply it to GWB and his
> foreign policy.
>
This usage is very strange to this American, but very instructive.
To compare GWB to a Hollywood "bad guy" cowboy seems silly,
this makes more sense, though one could argue the accuracy.
david56
>
> Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote in message news:<Pine.GSO.4.44.02041...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu>...
> >
> > of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
> > Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
> > sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
>
> By British standards he isn't? Not criticizing, just asking.
Never really thought about it - it's a slightly strange question.
Senior politicians tend to be polite - rude people are not promoted by
their party.
Now, if you'd asked if Tony Blair is smarmy, then you might have
something. Margaret Thatcher, Harold Wilson, Ted Heath, John Major -
none of these was smarmy.
--
David
I say what it occurs to me to say.
The address is valid today, but I will change it to keep ahead of the
spammers.
Sol Taibi
> On 12 Apr 2002, Sol Taibi wrote:
>
> > Richard Fontana <rf...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu> wrote in message news:<Pine.GSO.4.44.02041...@sparky.cs.nyu.edu>...
> > >
> > > > Sol Taibi wrote:
> > > > >
> > > > > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > > > > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > > > > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > > > > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> > > >
> > > > The description of GWB's policy as "cowboy" was hardly restricted to
> > > > left-wingers.
> > > >
> > > > >
> > > > > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > > > > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > > > > English is spoken?
> > > > >
> > > > > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > > > > herds cows.
> > > >
> > > > That's crap. You never, I suppose, have heard of "cowboy" drivers?
> > >
> > > of "cowboy" in connection with GW Bush. To British people especially
> > > Bush must seem very close to stereotypes about Texans and such. It's
> > > sort of like how Americans think Tony Blair is so polite.
> >
>
> Is there an American stereotype (a modern, post-Mark Twain one, that
> is) about folks from Connecticut? I'll bet a lot of Americans don't
> even know that Connecticut exists. My own stereotypes about
> Connecticut people (based on my experiences of living here) are
> really just variations on more familiar stereotypes about people from
> West Virginia, the rural South, etc. (NTTAWWTT).
>
> > went to a speech therapist to acquire.
>
> Sort of like Tony Blair? I have no memory or knowledge of what Nelson
> Rockefeller's speech was like, so I can't say. Somehow I doubt that I
> would think of it as "New York working class". Maybe I can find some
> recordings on the Web somewhere. All I know is that Rocky called
> everyone "fella".
Remember "Charlie the Tuna"? He sounded exactly like Nelson.
I remember once (about 1967) listening to a public hearing on
WNYC (municipally owned radio station) hearing Nelson (then
Governor of New York) and David (then president of I forget
what big bank). Nelson sounded like "yer typical Noo Yaaawker".
David (Rockefeller, that is) sounded like he went to prep
school in Connecticut. Which they both did.
On a usage note: Did you know there's no Connecticut accent?
Eastern Connecticut: New England accent
Western Connecticut: Hudson Valley accent
But neither one of these is the "upper class" prep school accent.
Richard Fontana
I do remember Charlie the Tuna. I call Charlie's accent the "Faux New
York Beatnik" accent. I think I saw Charlie on a commercial recently.
That's not what I'd call a strongly working-class accent. But I really
should try to get a hold of a recording of Nelson before I comment
further on this.
> I remember once (about 1967) listening to a public hearing on
> WNYC (municipally owned radio station) hearing Nelson (then
> Governor of New York) and David (then president of I forget
> what big bank). Nelson sounded like "yer typical Noo Yaaawker".
I fail to understand what "yer" and "Noo" are supposed to imply there.
"Noo" seems to suggest a relatively back /u/, but New York speakers of
all types seem united in their tendency to use a fronted /u/ in "new".
I suppose by "aaaw" you mean to suggest a relatively close and
diphthongized /O/.
> David (Rockefeller, that is) sounded like he went to prep
> school in Connecticut. Which they both did.
I hear ya. No chance that Nelson's accent was an old-fashioned
non-rhotic elite one?
> On a usage note: Did you know there's no Connecticut accent?
> Eastern Connecticut: New England accent
> Western Connecticut: Hudson Valley accent
I don't know if this is accurate terminology. Western Connecticut may
be related to the Hudson Valley, but I think it's more like the general
Western New England accent that you also hear in Western Mass. and
Vermont. Closely related to the Inland North/Upper Midwest accents.
The picture may be more complicated than this. Eastern Connecticut
would be related to other Eastern New England accents; it's misleading
to just call such an accent "New England". We happen to think of
Boston and Maine accents when we think of New England, but that's just
the Coastal region. I think the Massachusetts accents change once you
get west of Worcester. People from Worcester itself have strong
"Boston"-sounding accents, non-rhotic and all.
When I speak of a "Connecticut accent" I generally mean accents
associated with the western part (two-thirds?) of the state, since I
haven't spent much time in the other part (which I think is at least
west of the Connecticut River).
> But neither one of these is the "upper class" prep school accent.
Of course, in general. I would guess that those East Coast prep school
accents (there *are* prep schools outside of Connecticut, you know)
are more closely related to the old elite accents of New York and Boston.
Of course the modern prep school accents are different from the old
ones, but even today you can encounter those weird lockjaw accents.
Sol Taibi
> On 12 Apr 2002 21:36:05 GMT, mjh...@mit.edu (Michael J Hardy) wrote:
>
> > R H Draney (dado...@earthlink.net) wrote:
> >
> > Well, yes, everybody knows those. I think the reason for credit
> >cards coming from Delaware is that that state's laws make things
> >convenient for companies that issue those.
>
> This is alluded to in an excellent episode of "The Dick Van Dyke
> Show"...when Rob (the head writer and therefore "management") gets a
> raise, and Buddy and Sally (technically his "employees") don't, he
> checks with his personal accountant (!) to see what would be involved
> in incorporating himself and paying them out of his raise...after a
> few seconds nodding into the phone, he tries to describe to his wife
The wife is Mary Tyler Moore.
dcw
Alan Jones <a...@blueyonder.co.uk> wrote:
>That's the usual everyday sense of "cowboy" in UK. The only bit you missed
>out is that their work is incompetent, probably to the point of endangering
>both residents and passers-by. The term is not restricted to the building
>trade but is certainly closely associated with it.
There's supposed to be a building firm called Patel and Patel, who
advertise: "You've had the Cowboys; now try the Indians".
David
Sol Taibi
> "Bob Stahl" <urbul...@pacbell.net> writes:
>
> > Sol Taibi <solomo...@computer.org> wrote:
> > > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> > > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > > English is spoken?
> > > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > > herds cows.
> >
> > cowboy + cattle 81,600
> > cowboy + sheep 40,600
> >
> > cowboy + war 255,000
>
> cowboy + war + movies 58,100
> cowboy + war + indians 21,700
> cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
>
> There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys and war on the
> same page.
>
More to the point most "old west" cowboys simply did their
job: herding cattle.
I won't go so far as to say that no cowboy ever killed an
Indian, but in general that's not what cowboys did.
Killing Indians was what the army did for a living, cowboys
herded cattle. And not a few of them *were* Indians.
Sol Taibi
> Evan Kirshenbaum <kirsh...@hpl.hp.com> wrote:
>
> > "Bob Stahl" <urbul...@pacbell.net> writes:
> >
> > > Sol Taibi <solomo...@computer.org> wrote:
> > > > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > > > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > > > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > > > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> > > > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > > > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > > > English is spoken?
> > > > In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> > > > herds cows.
> > >
> > > cowboy + cows 30,400
> > > cowboy + cattle 81,600
> > > cowboy + sheep 40,600
> > >
> > > cowboy + war 255,000
> >
> > cowboy + war + movies 58,100
> > cowboy + war + indians 21,700
> > cowboy + "civil war" 36,500
> >
> > There are other reasons why one might mention cowboys and war on the
> > same page.
>
> cowboy + friend 303,000
> cowboy + love 444,000
>
> I keep trying to tell Bob about the pointlessness of this search
> formula, but them Bay Area folks is stubborn.
>
> No one has mentioned what I thought is the current UK meaning for cowboy
> -- something about fly-by-night undependable (maybe fraudulent?)
> contractors, like roofers.
I got 30 google hits for Taibi + nuke.
None of them about me (sniff).
Sol Taibi
> Sol Taibi wrote:
> >
> > I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> > about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> > described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> > bloodthirsty war criminal.
> >
> > Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> > what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> > English is spoken?
>
> limited intellectual sophistication. Unsubtle. People with rudimentary
> feelings:
>
> "There's the good fellow and there's the bad fellow, all is either white
> or black."
>
> "Either you're with us or you're against us."
>
> Very Bush.
>
Not much to do with cattle.
FWIW, in the southwestern US, men who herd cattle for a living
are still called "cowboys".
Sol Taibi
> On 12 Apr 2002 06:37:02 -0700, solomo...@computer.org (Sol Taibi) wrote:
>
> >I have been reading some left wing UK journalissm
> >about the USA. Our president George W. Bush is
> >described as a "cowboy". "Cowboy" seens to mean
> >bloodthirsty war criminal.
> >
> >Without commenting on your political opinion of GWB,
> >what does "cowboy" mean in the UK? Or anywhere else
> >English is spoken?
> >
> >In the USA, it means nothing more than a man who
> >herds cows.
>
> Here it means a reckless driver, or someone who is irresponsible in the use of
> firearms - "Shoot first, ask questions afterwards."
>
> A person who looks after cows is called a "herdboy", is usually under 16,
> doesn't wear a broad-brimmed hat, and doesn't carry a gun.
And is black? But so were many of the USA cowboys, though you
won't see it in old movies.
Harvey V
wrote:
> news:<Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9>...
-snip-
>> "Cowboy" is most commonly used here in the UK for people like
>> rogue builders -- the guys who take an old lady's money for a
>> full roofing job and then just paint it to make it look new
>> before they disappear. (Then they come back next wewek and paint
>> your drive black while charging for new tarmac.....)
>>
>> In this sense it has the connotations of an unregulated or
>> lawless shyster who can't be trusted to do what's right -- which
>> I assume is the general meaning for UK journalists who apply it
>> to GWB and his foreign policy.
-snip-
> This usage is very strange to this American, but very instructive.
>
> To compare GWB to a Hollywood "bad guy" cowboy seems silly,
> this makes more sense, though one could argue the accuracy.
As you rightly say, one can well argue the accuracy of the view, but
it's definitely the meaning that you're seeing in UK journalistic
usage.
For an example of the non-political UK usage, take a look at
http://www.plumbers.org.uk/news/nov01.html
which has the following introduction to encourage plumbers to registser
with a professional institute:
Had enough of clearing up after the cowboys?
You’re a qualified plumber, you have spent years in
training, keep up-to-date with the latest regulations and
take pride in your work. You give a quote on a job, get
undercut by a cowboy, and then get called in a week or two
later to sort out the mess he has caused. Why didn’t the
houseowner call on you first?
--
Cheers,
Harvey
Pat Durkin
"Charles Riggs" <chr...@gofree.indigo.ie> wrote in message
news:utvfbu06ugkvi0fn5...@4ax.com...
Charles, you are usually a bit more "discriminating" in your word choice.
Do you really think the American electorate has cowboys as heroes?
Do you really choose Willie as the spokesman/determiner of the US political
identity?
As Harvey said (if the snipping runs true and if he was talking about this
understanding of "cowboy")
"it's definitely not complimentary".
So, be calm. As an ex-patriate, only your neighbors are likely to accuse
you of being a full-blooded Yank, and you can correct them as you wish.
By the way, do you have some kind of etymological source? Long ago, at
varying times, I encountered two different sources for the word "cowboy".
One source pronounced the origins as Irish, referring to (perhaps) mounted
cowherds or drovers, though those workers used pikes, rather than ropes, to
prod the cows. The other source claimed the Dutch had brought the word to
the US, though spelling it with assorted combinations of "ou" (as in
bouwerie, New Amsterdam).
Bob Cunningham
[ . . . ]
>Long ago, at varying times, I encountered two different sources
>for the word "cowboy". One source pronounced the origins as
>Irish, referring to (perhaps) mounted cowherds or drovers, though
>those workers used pikes, rather than ropes, to prod the cows.
How does one use a rope to prod a cow? Does the rope need to have lots of
starch in it?
>The other source claimed the Dutch had brought the word to
>the US, though spelling it with assorted combinations of "ou"
>(as in bouwerie, New Amsterdam).
In my copy of David Crystal's _The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English
Language_, in a sidebar entitled "Cowboy" on page 138, he says:
In American English, ["cowboy" can mean] a factory worker
who does more than the peace-work norms set by his union or
fellow-workers.
I commented on that in AUE six or seven years ago, citing it as an example
of the sort of lapse that even a recognized expert can suffer. It started
a discussion of the meaning of "cowboy" and whether or not David Crystal
had erred in his use of the word.
Donna Richoux
>
> By the way, do you have some kind of etymological source? Long ago, at
> varying times, I encountered two different sources for the word "cowboy".
> One source pronounced the origins as Irish, referring to (perhaps) mounted
> cowherds or drovers, though those workers used pikes, rather than ropes, to
> prod the cows.
On a long discussion about "poke" on this group, we established that
"cowpoke" came from a job on the railway cattle cars, controlling the
cattle with use of sticks. That's in Peter Watts' "A Dictionary of the
Old West." Later it was broadened to mean any cowhand or cowboy.
> The other source claimed the Dutch had brought the word to
> the US, though spelling it with assorted combinations of "ou" (as in
> bouwerie, New Amsterdam).
A Dutch word starting with kou? That is hard to imagine -- all there is
is koud (koude, kou) meaning "cold," and kous meaning "stocking," and
related compounds. The word for "cow" is "koe" (pronounced koo) and I
don't see any useful compounds there, either. And I can't think of
anything resembling "boy," except very loosely "bij," meaning "by" or
"bee."
I don't think of the Dutch settlers as being vast cattle ranchers,
anyway. If I had to look for foreign influences, I'd turn to
"caballero."
Watts (above) does not mention any foreign explanations for cow + boy.
He says
Westerners with a knowledge of the old days have claimed that the
word was seldom used within the cow community except when applied
to juvelines who herded or hunted cattle. However, it is certain
that the term was applied freely by others, at an early date, to
men herding cows. By the 1870s, the term seems to have been pretty
generally used for any man tending cattle. [Snip remarks about pulp
novels, and an actual gang in the 1880s called the Cowboys.]
Now here's something interesting. The _Dictionary of American English_
(U. Chicago, 1938) reports that there was a particular use of "Cow Boy"
that *predates* the Wild West.
1. During the Revolutionary War, a member of one
of the Tory guerilla bands that operated between the
American and British lines. Now historical.
1779 in Geo. Clinton papers IV 502 Your whig
Militia below have as great an itch for plundering,
as the Cow Boys.
I can't copy out all the early-19th-c. citations, but it looks as if
people were accused of being fearsome "Cow Boys" for quite some time. An
1868 entry refers to a Congressman who "denounced" three young men "as
being cowboys." That's before any citation for cowboy as ranch hand.
So now I'm wondering if the colloquial meaning that is recorded in the
20th century of "cowboys" as being reckless, dangerous characters, could
have roots in *this* sense. Certainly the application of the term in the
late 1800s to the ranch hands must have still carried such connotations
to some.
And did that same 18th c. sense show up in British English? The
guerillas were fighting on behalf of the British, after all. OED?
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
Sol Taibi
> > > > Nelson Rockefeller had a "working class" New York accent. Which he
> > > > went to a speech therapist to acquire.
> > >
> > > Sort of like Tony Blair? I have no memory or knowledge of what Nelson
> > > Rockefeller's speech was like, so I can't say. Somehow I doubt that I
> > > would think of it as "New York working class". Maybe I can find some
> > > recordings on the Web somewhere. All I know is that Rocky called
> > > everyone "fella".
> >
> > Remember "Charlie the Tuna"? He sounded exactly like Nelson.
>
> I do remember Charlie the Tuna. I call Charlie's accent the "Faux New
> York Beatnik" accent. I think I saw Charlie on a commercial recently.
> That's not what I'd call a strongly working-class accent. But I really
> should try to get a hold of a recording of Nelson before I comment
> further on this.
Rockefeller was governor when "Charlie" first came out.
It was pretty obvious at the time that the voice was
based on him. This may have been some kind of in-joke
that was lost on most of the country.
>
> > I remember once (about 1967) listening to a public hearing on
> > WNYC (municipally owned radio station) hearing Nelson (then
> > Governor of New York) and David (then president of I forget
> > what big bank). Nelson sounded like "yer typical Noo Yaaawker".
>
> I fail to understand what "yer" and "Noo" are supposed to imply there.
Just conventional bad spelling.
Isabelle Cecchini
Donna Richoux <tr...@euronet.nl> a écrit dans le message :
1fale60.1tcwa3rstykdrN%tr...@euronet.nl...
> [...]
> Now here's something interesting. The _Dictionary of American English_
> (U. Chicago, 1938) reports that there was a particular use of "Cow
> Boy" that *predates* the Wild West.
>
> 1. During the Revolutionary War, a member of one
> of the Tory guerilla bands that operated between the
> American and British lines. Now historical.
> 1779 in Geo. Clinton papers IV 502 Your whig
> Militia below have as great an itch for plundering,
> as the Cow Boys.
>
> I can't copy out all the early-19th-c. citations, but it looks as if
> people were accused of being fearsome "Cow Boys" for quite some time.
> An 1868 entry refers to a Congressman who "denounced" three young
> men "as being cowboys." That's before any citation for cowboy as ranch
> hand.
>
> So now I'm wondering if the colloquial meaning that is recorded in the
> 20th century of "cowboys" as being reckless, dangerous characters,
> could have roots in *this* sense. Certainly the application of the
> term in the late 1800s to the ranch hands must have still carried such
> connotations to some.
>
> And did that same 18th c. sense show up in British English? The
> guerillas were fighting on behalf of the British, after all. OED?
The OED gives 'cowboy' as 'a boy who tends cows', first cite by Swift in
1725.
We then cross the Atlantic ocean, and meet the 2nd meaning:
---------------------------------------
U.S. Hist. 'A contemptuous appellation applied to some of the tory
partisans of Westchester Co., New York, during the Revolutionary war,
who were exceedingly barbarous in the treatment of their opponents who
favored the American cause' (Bartlett Dict. Amer.).
1775-83 Thacher Mil. Jrnl. (1823) 285 Banditti consisting of lawless
villains within the British lines have received the names of Cow-boys
and Skinners.
---------------------------------------
Now what's interesting about the third meaning, that of
---------------------------------------
In the western U.S.: A man employed to take care of grazing cattle on a
ranch
---------------------------------------
is that the OED seems to link it with meaning #2, the one applied to the
'banditti' with this comment:
---------------------------------------
It is typical of the cow-boy that he does his work on horseback, and
leads a hard rough life, which tends to make him rough and wild in
character.
---------------------------------------
So your intuition about the original meaning, at least in the U. S.,
being that of a dangerous character, which then transferred to the
Western-type cowboys, seems to have the approval of the OED.
On the other hand, the meaning of 'cowboy' as
---------------------------------------
A boisterous or wild young man [...] a reckless or inconsiderate driver
of a motor vehicle, esp. a lorry.
---------------------------------------
is given by the OED as being firmly U.S. in origin. First cite:
---------------------------------------
1942 Amer. Speech XVII. 103/1 Cowboy, reckless driver
---------------------------------------
Isabelle Cecchini
Bob Stahl
>....We then cross the Atlantic ocean, and meet the 2nd meaning:
> ---------------------------------------
> U.S. Hist. 'A contemptuous appellation applied to some of the
> tory partisans of Westchester Co., New York, during the
> Revolutionary war, who were exceedingly barbarous in the
> treatment of their opponents who favored the American cause'
> (Bartlett Dict. Amer.).
> 1775-83 Thacher Mil. Jrnl. (1823) 285 Banditti consisting
> of lawless villains within the British lines have received
> the names of Cow-boys and Skinners.
Quoted from "Wolfert's Roost" by Washington Irving (1855):
"In a little while the debatable ground became infested by roving bands,
claiming from either side, and all pretending to redress wrongs and punish
political offences; but all prone in the exercise of their high functions,
to sack hen-roosts, drive off cattle, and lay farm-houses under
contribution: such was the origin of two great orders of border chivalry,
the Skinners and the Cow Boys, famous in revolutionary story; the former
fought, or rather marauded under the American, the latter under the British
banner. In the zeal of service, both were apt to make blunders, and confound
the property of friend and foe. Neither of them in the heat and hurry of a
foray had time to ascertain the politics of a horse or cow, which they were
driving off into captivity; nor, when they wrung the neck of a rooster, did
they trouble their heads whether he crowed for Congress or King George.
"To check these enormities, a confederacy was formed among the yeomanry who
had suffered from these maraudings. It was composed for the most part of
farmers' sons, bold, hard-riding lads, well armed, and well mounted, and
undertook to clear the country round of Skinner and Cow Boy, and all other
border vermin; as the Holy Brotherhood in old times cleared Spain of
banditti which infested her highways."
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~vantasselfamilyhistoryhomepage/wolf
ertsroost.html
--
Bob Stahl
John Varela
> By the way, do you have some kind of etymological source?
The dictionary is no help so I can guess as well as anyone. Much of
American Southwest cowboy culture derives from the Mexicans who were there
first. Common cowboy words derived from Spanish include ranch, lariat,
cinch, and rodeo. The Spanish word for cowboy is vaquero, which means
roughly "male person who has something to do with cows". That would
translate to English as cowman or perhaps as cowboy.
--
John Varela
Pat Durkin
> Pat Durkin <p...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > By the way, do you have some kind of etymological source? Long ago, at
> > varying times, I encountered two different sources for the word
"cowboy".
> > One source pronounced the origins as Irish, referring to (perhaps)
mounted
> > cowherds or drovers, though those workers used pikes, rather than ropes,
to
> > prod the cows.
>
>
> > the US, though spelling it with assorted combinations of "ou" (as in
> > bouwerie, New Amsterdam).
>
> A Dutch word starting with kou? That is hard to imagine -- all there is
> is koud (koude, kou) meaning "cold," and kous meaning "stocking," and
> related compounds. The word for "cow" is "koe" (pronounced koo) and I
> don't see any useful compounds there, either. And I can't think of
> anything resembling "boy," except very loosely "bij," meaning "by" or
> "bee."
Does the Dutch orthography not contain a "c" with the "k" sound?
Anyway, for my non-academic guessing-game purposes, I think "koe" would be
close enough for the cow part. We are not necessarily talking "literate"
here.
> I don't think of the Dutch settlers as being vast cattle ranchers,
> anyway. If I had to look for foreign influences, I'd turn to
> "caballero."
>
As I may have mentioned, I don't believe the origin of cowboy necessarily
involved "mounted" herdsmen or drovers. As I understand (and may be in
error) many people in the "old country" may not have owned land, but they
did own some few head of livestock, which they grazed communally upon a
village green, or outside the town walls, under the supervision of the young
people of the village. If there were goatboys (Heidi), then there may have
been cowboys. Yes, I assume.
Bowery, the [Dutch Bouwerie=farm], section of lower Manhattan, New York
City. The
Bowery, the street that gives the area its name, was once a road to the farm
... http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=bouwerie%2Bbowery
....
"The Bowery" Song & Coney Island By Richard Dutton
There was a "Bowery" in Manhattan and also one in Coney Island. I
recall reading that the word is derived from a Dutch word ("bouwerie",
I believe) that means something like "cow path". Both Manhattan and
Coney Island were settled by the Dutch and each had its "Bowery". '
http://mmd.foxtail.com/Archives/Digests/199906/1999.06.16.08.html
=========
I believe my source from way back when indicated "bouwerie" as referring
more to dairy or cattle (boeuf, beef), but I have no idea of a Dutch root
for cow, unless there was some cultural blending.
I expect my source may have been doing some free-associations, as I
frequently do. Thus far, I find the Dutch word for farm is rooted in
_buan_, but that is not a far cry from bovine. I think I liked the sound
of moo and bouw-, and thus misremembered or recreated the cowboy thing.
Another question in passing: could koe+bouwerie in some fashion yield a
sound like cowboy?
And lest I forget, Donna, "Thank you for your assistance." I realize my
pursuits are trivial, and would hate for a good resource like you, from whom
I "harvest" many useful ideas, to grow impatient with my questions and
replies.
Pat Durkin
"Bob Cunningham" <exw...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:mfmgbuconducpakf9...@4ax.com...
> >those workers used pikes, rather than ropes, to prod the cows.
>
> How does one use a rope to prod a cow? Does the rope need to have lots of
> starch in it?
starch. Prodding livestock must have been a popular pastime.
> In my copy of David Crystal's _The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English
> Language_, in a sidebar entitled "Cowboy" on page 138, he says:
>
> In American English, ["cowboy" can mean] a factory worker
> who does more than the peace-work norms set by his union or
> fellow-workers.
>
> I commented on that in AUE six or seven years ago, citing it as an example
> of the sort of lapse that even a recognized expert can suffer. It started
> a discussion of the meaning of "cowboy" and whether or not David Crystal
> had erred in his use of the word.
>
Considering the source ("Cambridge and English" stand out in the title), I
think that encyclopedia does a pretty fair job of translating.
I am unaware of that particular interpretation, but my experience on an
assembly-line doing piece-work is very limited. My mother was a union shop
steward and did a lot of piecework jobs, but I don't recall her referring to
anyone as a "cowboy" for exceeding a minimum. She did complain at times
when she felt the quotas were set too high, and penalties for rejects
awarded with favoritism. She was proud of her ability to garner a bonus for
exceeding the minimum.
Michael J Hardy
> In American English, ["cowboy" can mean] a factory worker
> who does more than the peace-work norms set by his union or
> fellow-workers.
That doesn't make sense. You must have read "piece work".
"Peace work" would mean what Colin Powell has been attempting.
Mike Hardy
Pat Durkin
"Isabelle Cecchini" <isabelle...@wanadoo.fr> wrote in message
news:a99tpt$1h0rp$1...@ID-68874.news.dfncis.de...
>
> Donna Richoux <tr...@euronet.nl> a écrit dans le message :
> 1fale60.1tcwa3rstykdrN%tr...@euronet.nl...
>
> > [...]
> > Now here's something interesting. The _Dictionary of American English_
> > (U. Chicago, 1938) reports that there was a particular use of "Cow
> > Boy" that *predates* the Wild West.
> >
> > 1. During the Revolutionary War, a member of one
> > of the Tory guerilla bands that operated between the
> > American and British lines. Now historical.
> > 1779 in Geo. Clinton papers IV 502 Your whig
> > Militia below have as great an itch for plundering,
> > as the Cow Boys.
> >
> > I can't copy out all the early-19th-c. citations, but it looks as if
> > people were accused of being fearsome "Cow Boys" for quite some time.
> > An 1868 entry refers to a Congressman who "denounced" three young
> > men "as being cowboys." That's before any citation for cowboy as ranch
> > hand.
> >
> >
> > And did that same 18th c. sense show up in British English? The
> > guerillas were fighting on behalf of the British, after all. OED?
>
> The OED gives 'cowboy' as 'a boy who tends cows', first cite by Swift in
> 1725.
Hey, I am grasping at straws here, so I will take this as some consolation.
(or was this not the Swift of Ireland?
Anyway, the various interpretations of the word do lend themselves to some
romantic uses, don't they?
Michael J Hardy
> Rockefeller was governor when "Charlie" first came out.
> It was pretty obvious at the time that the voice was
> based on him. This may have been some kind of in-joke
> that was lost on most of the country.
I don't think it would have been lost on most of the country,
since Rockefeller was a presidential candidate in 1968. -- Mike Hardy
Pat Durkin
> I espied that on 13 Apr 2002, solomo...@computer.org (Sol Taibi)
> wrote:
> > Harvey V <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote in message
> > news:<Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9>...
>
> -snip-
>
> >> "Cowboy" is most commonly used here in the UK for people like
> >> rogue builders -- the guys who take an old lady's money for a
> >> full roofing job and then just paint it to make it look new
> >> before they disappear. (Then they come back next wewek and paint
> >> your drive black while charging for new tarmac.....)
>
>
>
> > This usage is very strange to this American, but very instructive.
> >
> > To compare GWB to a Hollywood "bad guy" cowboy seems silly,
> > this makes more sense, though one could argue the accuracy.
>
>
> As you rightly say, one can well argue the accuracy of the view, but
> it's definitely the meaning that you're seeing in UK journalistic
> usage.
>
>
> For an example of the non-political UK usage, take a look at
>
> http://www.plumbers.org.uk/news/nov01.html
>
> which has the following introduction to encourage plumbers to registser
> with a professional institute:
>
>
> Had enough of clearing up after the cowboys?
>
> You’re a qualified plumber, you have spent years in
> training, keep up-to-date with the latest regulations and
> take pride in your work. You give a quote on a job, get
> undercut by a cowboy, and then get called in a week or two
> later to sort out the mess he has caused. Why didn’t the
> houseowner call on you first?
Sad, but true. Plumbers, especially, have a reputation for very
high-priced work, so people naturally try to find shortcuts. Trade unions,
I think, like dentists, lawyers, and some other technicians, have a standard
to uphold, primarily in the price department. I think it is the quoted
hourly wage, 1-hour minimum, plus parts that causes us to look elsewhere for
our once-in-a-lifetime calls for plumbing assistance--unlike car repairs,
where the hourly rate is posted for all to see. And we pay that price more
often, being in love with our cars, of course.
I wanted to say earlier, in response to your definition of cowboy operators.
An acquaintance of mine works in a state consumer protection office. It is
again coming up on the season for advance notices about "hit and run"
roofing, painting, driveway sealers, and purveyors of truckloads of asphalt
or concrete "left over from a job around the corner. Cheaper for me to get
rid of it here for $500 cash, than for me to haul it back to the shop. What
say?"
She says that many of these "fly-by-nights", but not all by any means, are
of a particular ethnic group, whose name she will not reveal, but with a nod
and a wink will indicate the people have a reputation as tricksters, who
migrate across country, following varying routes westward every year. (Well,
I think they are heading west in the early summer, when we start fulfilling
our New Year's resolutions.)
Donna Richoux
>
> Does the Dutch orthography not contain a "c" with the "k" sound?
Yes, but they are mostly the more recent loan words. K is the
traditional letter. My Dutch-English dictionary has 16 pages of entries
starting with C (cabaret.. cacao.. cadeau...) and 60 pages starting with
K (kaal... kaap... kaars... kaart... kaas...)
>
> Bowery, the [Dutch Bouwerie=farm], section of lower Manhattan, New York
> City. The
> Bowery, the street that gives the area its name, was once a road to the farm
> ... http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=bouwerie%2Bbowery
>
> There was a "Bowery" in Manhattan and also one in Coney Island. I
> recall reading that the word is derived from a Dutch word ("bouwerie",
> I believe) that means something like "cow path". Both Manhattan and
> Coney Island were settled by the Dutch and each had its "Bowery". '
> http://mmd.foxtail.com/Archives/Digests/199906/1999.06.16.08.html
Well, "bouwen" is to build, and the modern "bouwerij" is a building site
or building trade. All the meanings given in my dictionary relate to
building and construction -- except one, a meaning for "bouwen" meaning
"to grow, cultivate." So that must relate to the "Dutch Bouwerie=farm"
you give above. Modern Dutch dictionaries are hopeless about giving
anything historical, they make you buy separate books for that.
I don't see how you're going to get "path" out of that, though. Perhaps
there was another word to what you remember, that meant path, lane, way,
etc.
> =========
>
> I believe my source from way back when indicated "bouwerie" as referring
> more to dairy or cattle (boeuf, beef), but I have no idea of a Dutch root
> for cow, unless there was some cultural blending.
Nor have I, not owning any Dutch etymological dictionary. I checked "The
Roots of English" about the ancient history of "beef." It says that
bull, ox, cow, beef, butter, and bucolic all descend from the same
Indo-European root, GWOU-.
> I expect my source may have been doing some free-associations, as I
> frequently do. Thus far, I find the Dutch word for farm is rooted in
> _buan_, but that is not a far cry from bovine. I think I liked the sound
> of moo and bouw-, and thus misremembered or recreated the cowboy thing.
>
> Another question in passing: could koe+bouwerie in some fashion yield a
> sound like cowboy?
Well, I don't see how, myself.
>
> And lest I forget, Donna, "Thank you for your assistance." I realize my
> pursuits are trivial, and would hate for a good resource like you, from whom
> I "harvest" many useful ideas, to grow impatient with my questions and
> replies.
Oh, you're quite welcome. Thanks to you and to everyone else who ask
such interesting questions. I really enjoy looking through these great
reference books I've acquired over the years, but I have to get hooked
by the right sort of inquiry. Left to my own devices, I would never just
browse through them -- I have to be hunting for something. (And in my
contrary way, it's often to prove somebody wrong... which is hardly a
noble motive.)
Bob Cunningham
> Bob Cunningham (exw...@earthlink.net) wrote:
[quoting from David Crystal's _Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English
Language_, sidebar headed "Cowboy" on page 138, and noting that there was
a lapse on Crystal's part]
>> In American English, ["cowboy" can mean] a factory worker
>> who does more than the peace-work norms set by his union or
>> fellow-workers.
> That doesn't make sense. You must have read "piece work".
>"Peace work" would mean what Colin Powell has been attempting.
> Mike Hardy
You can see a photocopy of the sidebar at
http://home.earthlink.net/~exw6sxq/cowboy/cowboy.gif
. It does indeed say "peace" instead of "piece". Where did you think the
lapse was that I referred to?
Donna Richoux
>The Spanish word for cowboy is vaquero, which means
> roughly "male person who has something to do with cows". That would
> translate to English as cowman or perhaps as cowboy.
Vaquero is definitely considered to be the source of the English
"buckaroo." 1890 buccaro. Watts (Dictionary of the Old West) thinks it
was influenced by the English "to buck, bucking" as well.
For those who know no Spanish: B and V are basically interchangeable to
Spanish speakers -- the "same sound." (I don't really want to hear all
the fine details, which Spanish speakers do and don't.)
--
Best wishes -- Donna Richoux
Richard Fontana
> Sol Taibi (solomo...@computer.org) wrote:
[regarding the animated "Charlie the Tuna", the mascot for Starkist
brand Tuna]
> > Rockefeller was governor when "Charlie" first came out.
> > It was pretty obvious at the time that the voice was
> > based on him. This may have been some kind of in-joke
> > that was lost on most of the country.
>
>
> I don't think it would have been lost on most of the country,
> since Rockefeller was a presidential candidate in 1968. -- Mike Hardy
So was it, in fact, general knowledge that Charlie the Tuna was based
on Nelson Rockefeller? Given that Charlie the Tuna was a household
name. For example, Mike Hardy, do you agree with Sol?
Google:
"nelson rockefeller" + charlie + starkist 0
Another thing. Sol was saying that Nelson Rockefeller changed his
accent to become more electorally viable. But why would adopting a New York
city accent have helped him? He didn't run for mayor of New York city.
He ran for governor of New York state, successfully (serving during
1959-1973) and he ran unsuccessfully for President several times.
Why would having a New York *city* accent be the key to getting elected
governor? Possibly half of the voters in the state passionately hate
everything associated with New York city. Many in the other half would
have found a New York city accent undesirable even if they had one
themselves (see W. Labov, _The Social Stratification of Speech in New
York City_). Hillary Rodham Clinton certainly showed recently that an
Upper Midwest/Inland North accent with a fairly advanced Northern Cities
Shift can actually help you get elected, when your opponent has a
reasonably thick Long Island accent (Long Island accents being
generally closely related to New York city accents).
Now, the current mayor of New York, Medford (Mass.) native Michael
Bloomberg, has, I believe, New Yorkified his accent, though I think he
must have done this before he planned on going into elective politics.
Probably a Wall Street thing. But mayor's a *city* office, not a
*state* office.
What about the general appearance of Charlie the Tuna? See, e.g.,
http://www.starkist.com/images/menu/t_nav_charlie.gif
Does the *picture* look at all like Nelson Rockefeller?
Pat Durkin
Oops, that second site was another quotation. I forgot the " & ". or
else the first " ' " got cut off somehow. These sites are from a
travelogue and a reminiscence, certainly not to be blamed for my word
associations, though probably no more authoritative than my ideas.
Michael J Hardy
> > > Rockefeller was governor when "Charlie" first came out.
> > > It was pretty obvious at the time that the voice was
> > > based on him. This may have been some kind of in-joke
> > > that was lost on most of the country.
> >
> >
> > I don't think it would have been lost on most of the country,
> > since Rockefeller was a presidential candidate in 1968. -- Mike Hardy
>
> So was it, in fact, general knowledge that Charlie the Tuna was based
> on Nelson Rockefeller?
Well, I don't know if Charlie appeared on TV as early as the
1968 election campaign. If those commercials were appearing *during*
the campaign, then I would guess that the resemblance was mentioned
in the press and otherwise noticed. Whether it would have been remembered
long after Rockefeller lost the election is another matter.
Mike Hardy
N.Mitchum
-----
> It is misleading to say that in the US a cowboy is only someone who herds
> cows.
>....
I've heard a definition that puts the matter in perspective: the
cowboy is a semi-skilled migratory laborer. Knocks the romance
right out of the Ponderosa.
----NM
Richard Maurer
those of us on this side of the Big Water that
this European use of cowboy was solidly in use
for President Ronald Reagan by 1981.
I believe it was taken from the movies termed "Western"s,
where murder was bad, but the nearest official
sizable law enforcement was an hour's ride away
or longer, so that in practice the big ranchers
with many cowboys could bend or make whatever
rules happened to be convenient at the moment.
You would see in the movies this rancher at
the head of a group of thundering horses and riders
come up to someone, have a short bull-headed conversation,
then the group would thunder off in a new direction.
So when I hear a European refer to a political figure
as a cowboy, I want to take it in this "head rancher" sense,
because that makes the most sense.
I wonder it that is right or if the normal
mental image is of an isolated individual with a
six-shooter and a swagger, but no followers.
Perhaps there is no differentiation,
perhaps the idea of no followers is part of the image.
-- ---------------------------------------------
Richard Maurer To reply, remove half
Sunnyvale, California of a homonym of a synonym for also.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Bob Stahl
> It should be mentioned for the benefit of
> those of us on this side of the Big Water that
> this European use of cowboy was solidly in use
The image of Slim Pickens's cowboy-hat-waving character, Major T.J. "King"
Kong, astride the nuclear bomb at the end of Kubrick's "Dr. Strangelove or:
How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb", reflected what many on
the left thought of the right wing in the US from the mid-1960s through the
late 1980s.
By the 1980 campaign, the "Reagan Country" campaign poster, with the actor
wearing the white cowboy hat of a horse-opera hero, was an image the
Republicans could bank on. A "beaver quality" Stetson just like the one in
the poster can be ordered from www.reaganfoundation.org.
"Cowboy" was used to tag Oliver North, William Casey, and other Iran-Contra
figures as rogue foreign policy operatives in the mid-1980s.
By contrast, "drugstore cowboy" was used by Reagan's spokesman, Marlin
Fitzwater, in the late 1980s for Gorbachev, who the White House thought was
vetting disingenuous disarmament offers.
Bush's accent and shallow Texas roots helped earned him his spurs.
Speculating, I can think of a couple of candidates from the 2000 campaign
for whom the "cowboy" tag might have fit -- Cheney, from Wyoming, and
Thompson, from Tennessee. Gore, probably not.
--
Bob Stahl
Sol Taibi
>
> > Sol Taibi (solomo...@computer.org) wrote:
>
> [regarding the animated "Charlie the Tuna", the mascot for Starkist
> brand Tuna]
>
> > > Rockefeller was governor when "Charlie" first came out.
> > > It was pretty obvious at the time that the voice was
> > > based on him. This may have been some kind of in-joke
> > > that was lost on most of the country.
> >
> >
> > I don't think it would have been lost on most of the country,
> > since Rockefeller was a presidential candidate in 1968. -- Mike Hardy
>
> So was it, in fact, general knowledge that Charlie the Tuna was based
> on Nelson Rockefeller? Given that Charlie the Tuna was a household
> name. For example, Mike Hardy, do you agree with Sol?
>
> Google:
>
> "nelson rockefeller" + charlie + starkist 0
>
Proves nothing. It was "common knowledge" that Charlie
sounded like Nelson Rockefeller, and not just the accent.
Whether Starkist intended it or not.
> Another thing. Sol was saying that Nelson Rockefeller changed his
> accent to become more electorally viable. But why would adopting a New York
> city accent have helped him? He didn't run for mayor of New York city.
No one can be elected governor of New York without winning NYC.
I submit that even upstate, an NYC accent provokes less hostility
than a prep school accent.
Charles Riggs
wrote:
>Now here's something interesting. The _Dictionary of American English_
>(U. Chicago, 1938) reports that there was a particular use of "Cow Boy"
>that *predates* the Wild West.
>
> 1. During the Revolutionary War, a member of one
> of the Tory guerilla bands that operated between the
> American and British lines. Now historical.
> 1779 in Geo. Clinton papers IV 502 Your whig
> Militia below have as great an itch for plundering,
> as the Cow Boys.
It's an older word than I realized, too. The oldest citation in the
OED, ver 2, as Isabelle noted, is:
"Thacher Mil. Jrnl. (1823) Banditti consisting of lawless villains
within the British lines have received the names of Cow-boys and
skinners."
He clearly was talking about occurrences well before 1823, though.
Seems it had pejorative connotations somewhat before the Gene
Autry-type image was popularized.
The earliest "friendly" citation dates to 1849:
"The Mexican rancheros...ventured across the Rio Grande...but they
were immediately attacked by the Texan 'cow-boys'"
--
Charles Riggs
Charles Riggs
>
>"Charles Riggs" <chr...@gofree.indigo.ie> wrote in message
>news:utvfbu06ugkvi0fn5...@4ax.com...
>> On Fri, 12 Apr 2002 19:11:57 +0100, "John Dean"
>> <john...@frag.lineone.net> wrote:
>>
>> >
>> >"Harvey V" <whhvs@*removethis*operamail.com> wrote in message
>> >news:Xns91EEAFBB...@194.168.222.9...
>>
>> >> As you say, it's definitely not complimentary.
>> >>
>> >Mama, don't let your babies grow up to be cowboys ....
>> >
>> >My heroes have always been cowboys, and they still are it seems ...
>>
>> Must one have to have the same heroes as the American electorate to be
>> considered a full-blooded Yank? If so, I'm in trouble.
>
>Charles, you are usually a bit more "discriminating" in your word choice.
>Do you really think the American electorate has cowboys as heroes?
I do. Also, I've heard it reported that about 80% of Americans are
behind what Bush, an ersatz cowboy, is doing in his "war": he is their
hero.
>Do you really choose Willie as the spokesman/determiner of the US political
>identity?
Clinton? The story there, compared with how people view Bush, is
considerably more complicated, isn't it?
>As Harvey said (if the snipping runs true and if he was talking about this
>understanding of "cowboy")
>"it's definitely not complimentary".
When I say cowboy, it is almost never complimentary. When Joe Sixpack
speaks of cowboys, his bleary eyes almost manage to light up.
>So, be calm. As an ex-patriate, only your neighbors are likely to accuse
>you of being a full-blooded Yank, and you can correct them as you wish.
I don't care for that word, expatriate, because of the negative
meaning it can have. I'm not too wild about being called a Registered
Alien either, as the Department of Justice does in cases like mine. I
think I'll settle for how several people in town, who don't know me
well, refer to me: "you know, that Yank with the hat".
>By the way, do you have some kind of etymological source?
Not really, although I attempted to cite some original sources in
another post. This is more in Donna's department.
> Long ago, at
>varying times, I encountered two different sources for the word "cowboy".
>One source pronounced the origins as Irish, referring to (perhaps) mounted
>cowherds or drovers, though those workers used pikes, rather than ropes, to
>prod the cows.
There is something in the back of my mind about this. Something having
to do with Rings End, I think it was, in Dublin and cowboys. Joyce?
Too bad Brian isn't here; perhaps Padraig can tell us something about
it.
--
Charles Riggs
Bob Stahl
> Proves nothing. It was "common knowledge" that Charlie
> sounded like Nelson Rockefeller, and not just the accent.
The voice was Herschel Bernardi's, and the TV commercials
began in 1961.
I think it was simply a parody of hipsters of the day,
with a bow to the Bobby Darin singing-by-the-sea types
("Mack the Knife" charted for 26 weeks in 1959; "Beyond
the Sea" for 14 weeks, and "Beachcomber" for a week in
1960).
The fish had a beret and horn-rimmed glasses. Some did
think he looked like Phil Silvers and sounded a bit like
Rocky, who ran for president in 1960, 1964, and 1968.
--
Bob Stahl
Steve Hayes
(Shakib Otaqui) wrote:
> Sign on the side of a white van seen in south London:
>
> Patel & Singh, Plumbers
> You've tried the cowboys
> Now try the Indians
ROTFL!
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/steve.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
Steve Hayes
wrote:
>I espied that on 12 Apr 2002, jav...@earthlink.net (John Varela)
>wrote:
>
>-snip-
>
>
>> It's this latter image that leads to calling a rackless driver a
>> "cowboy",
>
>
>Is a "rackless driver" some guy named Bubba that forget to fit the gun-
>rack to his pick-up?
It's rack & pinion steering without the rack.
That would certainly give the impression of a cowboy driver.
Steve Hayes
>Donna Richoux:
>>....When you say "p.c.", do you mean you think she was the
>>first, or among the first, to abbreviate it? Because we know
>>the two-word phrase "politically correct" goes way back.
>
>I didn't mean to imply that she coined the phrase or the abbreviation, just
>that she may have been among the first writers in our time to use it in an
>ironic sense, and may have helped vector its usage. As I recall, she was
>writing on BCA (Berkeley Citizen's Action) internal politics and
>self-criticism, which was often flavored with Marxist rhetorical stylings
>(see http://berkeleyinthe70s.homestead.com/).
>
>"Politically correct" was used in a 1981 post to net.jokes, and "politically
>correct" or "politically incorrect" appear in a few posts on gay culture and
>feminism in the early 1980s. Right wingers like David Horowitz didn't hijack
>the term, and I don't think it was abbreviated, until the mid- or
>late-1980s.
In late 1982 I bought a NewBrain computer, and in 1983 a friend saw it in my
study and said "I see you've got a PC", and I thought it was ambiguous,
because t could mean "Politically correct", so the abreviation must have been
in use back then because I was familiar with it.
Isabelle Cecchini
Pat Durkin <p...@hotmail.com> a écrit dans le message :
ubh4de...@corp.supernews.com...
>
> "Isabelle Cecchini" <isabelle...@wanadoo.fr> wrote in message
> news:a99tpt$1h0rp$1...@ID-68874.news.dfncis.de...
> > [...]
> > The OED gives 'cowboy' as 'a boy who tends cows', first cite by
> > Swift in 1725.
>
> Hey, I am grasping at straws here, so I will take this as some
> consolation. (or was this not the Swift of Ireland?
>
Yes, it must the Swift of Ireland, as the citation given by the OED
refers to _Receipt to Stella_. I too thought the Irish track was worth
pursuing, especially as the second quotation is by a O'Keefe, in 1787,
in a work referred to by the OED as _Farmer_. O'Keefe's name does sound
Irish, but I have no idea who that author might be. My OED on CD does
not give a list of authors, nor the list of works cited. I have tried
looking for such a list on the OED site, but with no luck so far.
Anyway, the third and last writer who is cited by the OED in their entry
for 'cowboy' in that meaning is Andrew Lang, and he was a Scotsman. So
there ends the Irish trail for now, I'm afraid.
Isabelle Cecchini
Isabelle Cecchini
Bob Cunningham <exw...@earthlink.net> a écrit dans le message :
mfmgbuconducpakf9...@4ax.com...
> In my copy of David Crystal's _The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the
> English Language_, in a sidebar entitled "Cowboy" on page 138,
> he says:
>
> In American English, ["cowboy" can mean] a factory worker
> who does more than the peace-work norms set by his union or
> fellow-workers.
>
> example of the sort of lapse that even a recognized expert can
> suffer. It started a discussion of the meaning of "cowboy" and
> whether or not David Crystal had erred in his use of the word.
>
I don't know about the meaning of factory worker, but, as the issue
seems to be that of spelling, I am happy to tell you that the mistake
has been corrected; in my copy of the CEEL -- "...reprinted with
corrections 1999, 2000"--, the correct 'piece-work' appears. David
Crystal mentions in the preface to the paperback edition (1997), which
is reproduced at the beginning, that he has "taken the opportunity of
correcting a number of typographical errors..."
Maybe David Crystal reads a.u.e.
Isabelle Cecchini