This sample of the unique argot of early 20th-century Chicago youth gangs is from sociologist Frederick Thrasher’s landmark study The Gang: A Study of 1,313 Gangs in Chicago, published by the University of Chicago in 1927. I haven’t heard the term “loogin” since I left my hometown of Winnipeg, where I think the preferred spelling was “loogan.” There it signified a loud, loutish, potentially dangerous hoser. I wonder if Thrasher wasn’t missing the mark in overlooking the sexual connotations of both fruit and punk, usage of which as a synonym for catamite dates back to the 16th century.
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4 Comments
I’m confused by the definition of “tipper-tapper”, “to spar back and forth with hands open”. Does that mean it’s like an awesome bad-ass kung fu beatdown, or is it more like Guy Maddin’s “Sissy-Boy Slap Party”?
Also, how come this list doesn’t include the rules for Fizzbin?
And if you want even more outmoded criminal slang, there’s a 1736 (or 1737, depending on whom you ask) dictionary that’s a treasure trove of wacky words:
http://www.fromoldbooks.org/NathanBailey-CantingDictionary/transcription.html
My favorites are “kill-devil” (rum), “clapperdodgeon” (beggar), “free-booters” (unpaid soldiers who collect plunder), and “cramp-word” (death sentence).
“or is it more like Guy Maddin’s ‘Sissy-Boy Slap Party’?”
I’m thinking the latter: Thrasher gets all bent out of shape about what a morally degraded world these kids live in, but in the photos they look like lil Jackie Coogan.
Hey, don’t knock Jackie Coogan. He’s the only Pope we have these days. At last we have a Pope who can put a light bulb in his mouth to do that trick.