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From: dsn@tove.UUCP (Dana S. Nau)
Newsgroups: net.singles
Subject: Re: "making love"
Message-ID: <174@tove.UUCP>
Date: Sat, 30-Mar-85 02:12:50 EST
Article-I.D.: tove.174
Posted: Sat Mar 30 02:12:50 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 1-Apr-85 02:58:04 EST
References: <455@umd5.UUCP>
Distribution: na
Organization: U of Maryland, Laboratory for Parallel Computation, C.P., MD
Lines: 25

> >I'm curious about the expression "making love" which up until (as far as I
> >can tell) about the early fifties had a meaning something akin to
> >"pitching woo".  Its current sordid overtones always make people who see
> >older films titter when they hear some innocuous male or female
> >lead say something like "make love to me darling" in an otherwise above
> >board scene of romantic dialogue.  Does anybody know how this innocent
> >phrase got "corrupted" into its current meaning?
> -- 
> Jay Elvove       ..!seismo!rlgvax!cvl!umd5!jay

The following comes from Neaman and Silver's book, "Kind Words:  a Thesaurus
of Euphemisms".  If I'm interpreting it correctly, "making love" had its
"sordid overtones" as far back as 1580:

* DISCUSSING UGANDA:  Fornicating.  This is a current British euphemism for
* MAKING LOVE (1580, Lyly's _Euphues_).  But Britishers say they GET THEIR
* KNICKERS (panties) IN A TWIST (become sexually aroused or have
* intercourse) in such LEGOVER SITUATIONS.  Australians who achieve sexual
* intimacy FEATURE WITH their partners--a term popularized by the "Barry
* McKenzie" comic strip in the 1960s.  They equate this with A SCORE BETWEEN
* THE POSTS, a 1970s Australian phrase of football origin.
-- 
Dana S. Nau,  Computer Science Dept.,  U. of Maryland,  College Park, MD 20742
ARPA:  dsn@maryland				CSNet:  dsn@umcp-cs
UUCP:  {seismo,allegra,brl-bmd}!umcp-cs!dsn	Phone:  (301) 454-7932