#55710
02/08/2002 5:19 AM
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320 |
Lately I've run into the word dish used to mean gossip. Does anyone know where this originated?
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#55711
02/08/2002 8:12 AM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 144
member
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member
Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 144 |
My guess would be that it is an abbreviation of 'dish the dirt'. The dirt was gossip and someone would dish it up. Where that came from though I don't know.
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#55712
02/08/2002 5:01 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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dish has been used figuratively for a long time:
1606 Shakes. Tr. & Cr. v. i. 10 Thou full dish of Foole. 1608 I Per. iv. vi. 160 My dish of chastity. 1708 Motteux Rabelais v. vii. (1737) 24 Roger+had a Dish of Chat with her. 1753 Gray Lett. Wks. 1884 II. 241 To entertain you with a dish of very choice erudition. 1820 Lady Granville Lett. (1894) I. 183 This new dish of Continental troubles. 1836 Backwoods Canada 183 For the sake of a dish of gossip.
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#55713
02/09/2002 2:24 AM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,891
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Ah, well, so when did it get to mean an attractive lady Tsuwm?
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#55714
02/10/2002 1:17 AM
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Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 2
stranger
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stranger
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 2 |
I don't know about "the latest dish," but I've always liked the word "quidnunc" for a person who gossips. It literally means "what now?" in Latin.
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#55715
02/10/2002 12:22 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I must quote Dr. Sowder here, past professor of American Literature at Longwood.
When lecturing us 18-year-olds (centuries ago) on the evil of gossip, he smiled his huge-lipped smile and said,
The definition of a bitch is a woman who must tell the truth..
I always liked thinking about that definition and noticing, centuries since, how often that definition has proven to be true.
Best regards,
WildWords
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#55716
02/10/2002 2:23 PM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 3,439
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Oh, you're in trouble now!
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#55717
02/11/2002 1:47 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,773
Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,773 |
My Slang and Euphemism Dictionary says:
dish...4. to engage in gossip; to dish out gossip. (US homosexual use, mid 1900s-pres.)
Unfortunately, it doesn't speculate on how the term came to be used in connection with gossip.
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#55718
02/11/2002 2:56 AM
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Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289
veteran
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veteran
Joined: Nov 2000
Posts: 1,289 |
The word 'gossip' as a noun originally was 'godsib', i.e., someone who was related to another by being a godparent. So that if I am someone's godfather, the parents of my godchild are my godsibs and vice versa. This originally presumed a kinship or very close friendship, so that gossips were quite intimate with each other. You find the word used frequently in Bocaccio, also in some English works. The word seems to have gone out of use by the late 17th century. (This is without LIU -- doubtless one of the OED possessors can provide more accurate info.)
As to the modern use of the word, gossips are not exclusively women, contrary to what many men may think. There are a couple words I have heard for a male gossip, but offhand, I can't think what they are. Let's hear what y'all have heard or seen.
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#55719
02/11/2002 3:04 AM
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320 |
Sparteye: Thanks for the reference. The verb form is familiar, going back at least to Lorenz Hart's lyric (and the singular does seem appropriate here) to The Lady Is a Tramp: ''Won't dish the dirt with the rest of the girls." What seemed new to me was dish as a noun, as in "Wait till you hear the latest dish about *****."
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#55720
02/11/2002 3:26 AM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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as I tried to suggest above, but seemingly wasn't obvious enough about it, it could be just a truncation of "a dish of gossip."
-ron o.
Lege meas labras.
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#55721
02/11/2002 12:59 PM
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Joined: Oct 2000
Posts: 5,400
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dish is also used in a idiom by teen age girls all the time--She can dish it out, but she can't take it--
used about a someone who is known to gossip, but gets in a huff if any own says anything about her.. the same goes for teasing.. or name calling... any one who acts one way, but expect other to act towards them differently..
the kind of person who says "do as i say, not as i do".
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#55722
02/11/2002 9:21 PM
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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,605
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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"She can dish it out, but she can't take it" -- used about a someone who is known to gossip, but gets in a huff if any own says anything about herWhich reminds me of the concluding stanza of an Ogden Nash poem (no surprise there!  ) titled A Little Bit of Gossip Does Me Good: Oh, I do love a little bit of gossip.
But for scandal or for spite there's no excuse!
To think of Mrs. Page
Telling lies about my age!
Well! Her tongue is like her morals: rather loose.
Mrs. Murgatroyd eats opium for breakfast,
And then claims I'm running after Mr. Wood.
That's the sort of vicious slander
That arouses all my dander,
But a little bit of gossip does me good.
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#55723
02/11/2002 11:33 PM
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Joined: Sep 2000
Posts: 2,891
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Carpal Tunnel
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Do people still use dish to mean a pretty woman, as in, "Hey, did you see Patricia? She is such a dish!"?
Y'all got me so confused in my punctuation thread I have no idea where all my question marks and exclamation points go anymore dag nabbit.
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#55724
02/12/2002 2:34 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 771
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 771 |
We're not ones to go 'round spreadin' rumors
Really, we're just not the gossipin' kind ~
No, you'll never hear one of us repeatin' gossip,
So you better be sure and listen close the first time!
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#55725
02/12/2002 2:51 AM
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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,605
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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An incendiary question: Who gossips more, men or women?  [ducking for cover -e]
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#55726
02/12/2002 10:38 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872 |
An incendiary question: Who gossips more, men or women?
I see this as a question not of quantity, but of quality.
Men gossip about lofty events, like should Russia invade China, will the New York Jets trade Warren Miletkzy for a top pick running Back, etc., while the gossip of women is more trivial, like, where they will want dinner after what movie, what house to buy, where they will let their husband sit in that new house, etc..
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#55727
02/12/2002 10:44 AM
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Joined: Jun 2001
Posts: 2,636
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 2,636 |
Chile, you been listenin in on the wrong women, that's a fact.
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#55728
02/12/2002 11:32 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,156
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 1,156 |
Who gossips more, men or women? I would like to proudly report that my brother won the award for biggest gossip in his high school graduating class of 287 people (of whom about half were girls). (Just try having a phone conversation with this guy without being interrupted at least 5 times by call waiting!!!  )
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#55729
02/12/2002 11:55 AM
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Joined: Aug 2001
Posts: 2,605
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Chile, you been listenin in on the wrong women, that's a fact. Consuelo is cross-threading to "terms of endearment".
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