As a consequence, I was considering language last night and how what is acceptable to say, and what is not, is such a transitory thing. I remember very clearly my Grandmother using that phrase to me as a small child to compliment me on working hard to clean my room. To her it was acceptable and a form of praise. Clearly it's roots are not though, as I presume it refers to how hard slaves were made to work by others in a less enlightened time. I also know my Granny was aware of this because she's the one who explained it to me when I asked her. The other thing that she taught myself and my brother was the bad version of Eeney meeney miny mo, but being a child I thought the word was "knicker" as in a pair of pants and found the concept of a pair of pants being chased and caught by the toe absoloutely delightful (I think I've mentioned my fertile imagination before!). But when my mother discovered what we were saying, it was gently explained to us how this version of the rhyme shouldn't be used anymore and "tiger" was a much better alternative, and that's the version that my little sister has always used, thankfully! There are other phrases and references which I can think off which just wouldn't be acceptable today either, but were commonly in use up to 15 or 20 years ago, which is a very short time really.
There have been times when these phrases have come to mind during the course of a conversation but, the edit button in my head does it's job and I don't use them, in fact I even feel bad that they are even still there in my repertoire of friendly phrases at all. If I feel this way and judging by the general reaction yesterday from people on hearing of Maryo's comment, others also feel this way, why then does Mary O'Rourke feel it's ok to use that kind of language? Is her edit button not working?
6 comments:
In Chicago we did not use that phrase to describe hard work. We used it ironically.
And we didn't substitute "tiger", either!
I'm really surprised at the tiger part! Is that still the case I wonder?
I think it just a case of saying something without thinking. I heard someone say the other day "Do you think I just got off a banana boat?" They had no idea of the origin of the saying.
Damn, I've just been singing "Tigger" (as in Winnie the Pooh) to my 3 year old niece.
We got the "Tiger" talk from an American family friend, nobody else was aware of there being anything objectionable about the original version.
Of course this was the 70's when you could go into Arnott's and buy a pair of "n***** brown" tights.
Oh Claire that made me laugh out loud very loudly! Imagine calling a particular shade of tights such a name! Only in this country! Thanks for the laugh though!
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