tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post114976405286369140..comments2023-10-30T04:09:45.910-04:00Comments on Letters and Surveys: Survey II: Shackingbrdhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09999205528107936871noreply@blogger.comBlogger7125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1150127831310069912006-06-12T11:57:00.000-04:002006-06-12T11:57:00.000-04:00AnneGG,That is such an important idea and concept,...AnneGG,<BR/><BR/>That is such an important idea and concept, that we really must do a special Survey on the subject. I have a lot of unresolved thoughts on this subject swimming in my head. <BR/><BR/>For instance, why did James Dobson say, <A HREF="http://www.family.org/welcome/press/a0032039.cfm" REL="nofollow">"We will look back 20, 30, 50 years from now and recall this as the day marriage ceased to have any real meaning in our country." </A> Hey, what about the day when the divorce rate for evangelical couples passed the divorce rate for the total population. That seems like it might have been a fairly dark day for the "focused folk"? I would think that the "focusers" should be pleased that monogamy is being chosen over promiscuity. I guess they think monogamy is only good for some categories of people.<BR/><BR/>My husband feels like the "dark day" might have happened back when the institution known as the church, turned marriage over to the institution known as the state. Was that the day when "focused people" realized they could get a tax break out of it? What does the state have to do with marriage?<BR/><BR/>I must work on a new survey.brdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09999205528107936871noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1150123509563584142006-06-12T10:45:00.000-04:002006-06-12T10:45:00.000-04:00I don't yet have anything to add on the origins of...I don't yet have anything to add on the origins of "shacking up," but I do want to say that I was having a very similar conversation yesterday (before I read this post) with a friend on the question of why legal gay marriage is such a threatening idea to many, as neither of us have found that the "threat to the American family" argument has any substance (That is, it's not a question of not having merit, but not having substance; what is being threatened precisely? From whence does this threat arise?). My friend suggested it must somehow link to money -- tax shelters and all that -- but I leaned more toward it being an issue of simple power. A monogamous gay couple might seem more threatening than gay promiscuity, in the same way that history shows whites more fearful of black marriage than of black promiscuity.The Crabby Hikerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/05999098106027408394noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1150082954647608972006-06-11T23:29:00.000-04:002006-06-11T23:29:00.000-04:00Following is a quote from Beloved by Toni Morrison...Following is a quote from <A HREF="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0307264882/qid=1150082294/sr=2-3/ref=pd_bbs_b_2_3/104-3361675-5071152?s=books&v=glance&n=283155" REL="nofollow"><EM>Beloved</EM> by Toni Morrison</A>. It is one of the scenes I was remembering. There is another in my mind, but I haven't quite located the specifics yet. I will have to keep rifling my brain files.<BR/><BR/>"When he asked her to be his wife, Sethe happily agreed and then was stuck not knowing the next step. There should be a ceremony, shouldn’t there? A preacher, some dancing, a party, a something. She and Mrs. Garner were the only women there, so she decided to ask her.<BR/><BR/>'Halle and me want to be married, Mrs. Garner.'<BR/><BR/>'So I heard.' She smiled. 'He talked to Mr. Garner about it. Are you already expecting?'<BR/><BR/>'No, ma’am.'<BR/><BR/>'Halle’s nice, Sethe. He’ll be good to you.'<BR/><BR/>'But I mean we want to get married.'<BR/><BR/>'You just said so. And I said all right.'<BR/><BR/>'Is there a wedding?'<BR/><BR/>Mrs. Garner put down her cooking spoon. Laughing a little, she touched Sethe on the head, saying, 'You are one sweet child. And then no more.<BR/><BR/>Sethe made a dress on the sly and Halle hung his hitching rope from a nail on the wall of her cabin."brdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09999205528107936871noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1149993045778632812006-06-10T22:30:00.000-04:002006-06-10T22:30:00.000-04:00I'm trying to remember a scene from a book, maybe ...I'm trying to remember a scene from a book, maybe from Morrison's Beloved, when Sethe married. She (or whoever else it was for whatever else book it might have been) collected surreptiously from her mistress scraps of white hankies, etc., sewed them together to make a veil or wedding dress. Then afterward she took the pieces apart again and returned them to the "big house".<BR/><BR/>Anybody remember that scene? They didn't just want to move into the same shack.brdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09999205528107936871noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1149992529126737872006-06-10T22:22:00.000-04:002006-06-10T22:22:00.000-04:00Oh, sorry--Oxford English Dictionary. (I also jus...Oh, sorry--Oxford English Dictionary. (I also just discovered a rather embarrasing grammar mistake in the first line of my last paragraph. "Your," is what I meant.)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1149992242838326942006-06-10T22:17:00.000-04:002006-06-10T22:17:00.000-04:00This is so helpful. I'll have to dig into this Hur...This is so helpful. I'll have to dig into this Hurston reference and see what it has to offer. I know this is a really dumb question, but since I'm not a scholar, I'll ask it, OED means????brdhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09999205528107936871noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-28353717.post-1149991043813455592006-06-10T21:57:00.000-04:002006-06-10T21:57:00.000-04:00The OED lists the following definition, the second...The OED lists the following definition, the second definition under the fourth entry for "shack" as a verb:<BR/><BR/>2. intr., Usu. with "up.": To obtain temporary accommodation, to shelter for the night; to lodge with (esp. as a sexual partner), to set up house with, to cohabit (with); hence, to have sexual intercourse with. <BR/><BR/>Of course, we already knew that. However, the first recorded use of the term in this way is in 1935 (again according to the OED) in Zora Neale Hurston's _Mules and Men_. She writes, "Ah..was doin' fine till Ah shacked up with a woman dat had a great big ole black cat." (I have no idea what the context is beyond the "shacking"; I haven't read it. Prof--come to our rescue!)<BR/><BR/>The second use is from a slang thesaurus in 1942, and dictionary also says that the term comes from specifically North American slang.<BR/><BR/>So it seems to mean that you're theory is right, considering the Hurston was the first to use it "literarily..." Also, it worked its way in pretty late, it seems to me; surely it was being used, like you say, by the beginning of the 19th century. I wonder if, with the compiling of the dictionary in the later 1800s, the word was never submitted because of its unsavory roots? (Both racist and sexually scandalous...)Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com