Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
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Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#2The story I heard when I was in music school was that the word jazz came from the days of slavery. It was intended as a coded way to let others know that there would be prayers and music that evening (e.g. Jass Tonight) but the 'S' would be flipped around. The word stood for "Jesus Amen Save our Souls".
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#3The story I heard when I was in music school was that the word jazz came from the days of slavery. It was intended as a coded way to let others know that there would be prayers and music that evening (e.g. Jass Tonight) but the 'S' would be flipped around. The word stood for "Jesus Amen Save our Souls".
I would immediately jump to unbelieving due to anecdotal nature of this claim but these are kinds of stories that tend to be propagated through stories told
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#4The story I heard when I was in music school was that the word jazz came from the days of slavery. It was intended as a coded way to let others know that there would be prayers and music that evening (e.g. Jass Tonight) but the 'S' would be flipped around. The word stood for "Jesus Amen Save our Souls".
Evan Morris, author of "The Word Detective" column that used to run in papers and alt weeklies, used to perennially comment that acronyms in English were quite rare until roughly WW1-WW2, and as such etymologies involving them ("to insure promptness", "port out starboard home", etc.) are virtually always false.
More to the point, TFA lays out various evidence why this particular theory is unlikely.
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#5The story I heard when I was in music school was that the word jazz came from the days of slavery. It was intended as a coded way to let others know that there would be prayers and music that evening (e.g. Jass Tonight) but the 'S' would be flipped around. The word stood for "Jesus Amen Save our Souls".
Evan Morris, author of "The Word Detective" column that used to run in papers and alt weeklies, used to perennially comment that acronyms in English were quite rare until roughly WW1-WW2, and as such etymologies involving them ("to insure promptness", "port out starboard home", etc.) are virtually always false. More to the point, TFA lays out various evidence why this particular theory is unlikely.
> "to insure promptness"
As in tipping service? It'd be ensure anyway, surely?
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#6Earlier quoted context omitted.
Evan Morris, author of "The Word Detective" column that used to run in papers and alt weeklies, used to perennially comment that acronyms in English were quite rare until roughly WW1-WW2, and as such etymologies involving them ("to insure promptness", "port out starboard home", etc.) are virtually always false. More to the point, TFA lays out various evidence why this particular theory is unlikely.
> "to insure promptness" As in tipping service? It'd be ensure anyway, surely?
Tip is old enough (1755) that they where the same word.
The cynic would be mostly right, at least for much of the history of English, as for hundreds of years insure and ensure were simply spelling variants, and had no more difference between them than theatre and theater.
However, in the middle of the 19th century some began to find fault with this, and proposed assigning meanings to ensure, insure, and assure in more orderly fashion.
https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/how-to-use-ins...
PS: Tip is unlikely to have started as an acronym in either case.
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#7> The word “jazz” probably derives from
> It should be clear by now that all of the popular stories about the origin of the word are wrong
Well that went from "probably" to clarity pretty quickly. (the rest of the article doesn't mention the probable claim again; the only possible reference is an OED quote about "jasm", not about "jazz").
While I'm sure the OED does make a compelling connection between "jazz" and "jasm", it seems a bit disorganised for the article not to reference this directly (presuming that's the author's source).
The tone is also so odd: it's as if it was written purely as a rebuttal to some pub debate that the author had been particularly worked up about, zealous exclamation-marks throughout.
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#8The story I heard when I was in music school was that the word jazz came from the days of slavery. It was intended as a coded way to let others know that there would be prayers and music that evening (e.g. Jass Tonight) but the 'S' would be flipped around. The word stood for "Jesus Amen Save our Souls".
As the article mention, everyone have their favorite theory. This one sounds particularly unbelievable though. "Jesus Amen Save our Souls" is not even a meaningful sentence. So it is likely a backronym from JASS rather than the other way around.
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#9Mandatory quote:
>If you have to ask what jazz is, you'll never know
- Louis Armstrong
Re: Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)
#10Earlier quoted context omitted.
Evan Morris, author of "The Word Detective" column that used to run in papers and alt weeklies, used to perennially comment that acronyms in English were quite rare until roughly WW1-WW2, and as such etymologies involving them ("to insure promptness", "port out starboard home", etc.) are virtually always false. More to the point, TFA lays out various evidence why this particular theory is unlikely.
> "to insure promptness" As in tipping service? It'd be ensure anyway, surely?
> As in tipping service?
The same. For whatever reason false etymologies based on acronyms abound, with "tip" and "posh" being among the better-known. There's also "for unlawful carnal knowledge" for fuck, "gentlemen only ladies forbidden" for golf, "constable on patrol" for cop, etc. I've even heard people claim rap derives from "rhythm and poetry". But basically they're all bunk, apart from words of quite recent coinage.
(I might add that tons of false etymologies without acronyms float around as well - "mind your Ps and Qs" being related to pints and quarts, stuff like that. Morris used to blame tour guides as being the worst culprits of keeping such things alive.)