{"id":408,"date":"2006-03-07T01:05:00","date_gmt":"2006-03-07T09:05:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp\/?p=408"},"modified":"2006-03-07T01:05:00","modified_gmt":"2006-03-07T09:05:00","slug":"other_matters_one_reason_i_mis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/2006\/03\/other_matters_one_reason_i_mis\/","title":{"rendered":"Other Matters: One Reason I Miss John Ciardi"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>From Ciardi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/redirect?link_code=ur2&#038;tag=rifftidougram-20&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=9325&#038;path=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fproduct%2F0060107669%2Fsr%3D8-2%2Fqid%3D1141708356%2Fref%3Dsr_1_2%3F%255Fencoding%3DUTF8\"target=\"_blank\"><em>A Browser\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Dictionary<\/em><\/a> (1980):<\/p>\n<blockquote><p><strong>Hip <\/strong>    <em>Mod. Slang (and prob. becoming pass\u00c3\u00a9). <\/em>Aware, knowing, up on, in the know. [Earlier <em>hep <\/em>with the same senses, perhaps modified from the military usage for counting cadence, itself a modification of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153left\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as in <em>hep-ri&#8217;-hep<\/em> (because \u00e2\u20ac\u0153hep\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is easier to say with great expulsive force. MMM* attests <em>hep<\/em> in this military usage by 1862; with the sense \u00e2\u20ac\u0153aware, knowing,\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as of 1903; the sense shift being from military alertness to alertness in any sense. <\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Ciardi being Ciardi, that wasn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t enough information about the word. He added,<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>J.L. Dillard, <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/redirect?link_code=ur2&#038;tag=rifftidougram-20&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=9325&#038;path=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fproduct%2F0394400127%2Fqid%3D1141708691%2Fsr%3D1-1%2Fref%3Dsr_1_1%3Fs%3Dbooks%26v%3Dglance%26n%3D283155\"target=\"_blank\"><em>Where Our words Come From<\/em><\/a><\/em>,asserts a straight-line connection between West African <em>hipi <\/em>and mod. slang <em>hippie<\/em>; but this assertion addresses only the present form <em>hip<\/em> without considering earlier <em>hep<\/em>, it suggests no conceivable line of transmission, and must be dismissed as a fetch based on surface resemblance only by a Negro scholar who is a bit overzealous in his otherwise admirable desire to show how much Africa culture has contributed to American life\u00e2\u20ac\u201das it has done richly, though that contribution is not assisted by willful etymology.]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>*(Mitford M. Matthews, <em><a href=\"http:\/\/www.amazon.com\/exec\/obidos\/redirect?link_code=ur2&#038;tag=rifftidougram-20&#038;camp=1789&#038;creative=9325&#038;path=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.amazon.com%2Fgp%2Fproduct%2F0226510115%2Fqid%3D1141708559%2Fsr%3D1-1%2Fref%3Dsr_1_1%3Fs%3Dbooks%26v%3Dglance%26n%3D283155\"target=\"_blank\"><em>A Dictionary of Americanisms on Historical Principles<\/em><\/a><\/em>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>From Ciardi\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s A Browser\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Dictionary (1980): Hip Mod. Slang (and prob. becoming pass\u00c3\u00a9). Aware, knowing, up on, in the know. [Earlier hep with the same senses, perhaps modified from the military usage for counting cadence, itself a modification of \u00e2\u20ac\u0153left\u00e2\u20ac\u009d as in hep-ri&#8217;-hep (because \u00e2\u20ac\u0153hep\u00e2\u20ac\u009d is easier to say with great expulsive force. MMM* attests [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-408","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-main","7":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/408\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/rifftides\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}