RIP - Reinhold Aman (1936 - 2019)

  You are likely to be familiar with his name. It is found in just about any magazine or newspaper article over the last three decades that has ‘dirty words’ as the subjects. Dr. Aman was a Dr. of the Dirty Stuff, a Professor of Profanity, a Lexicographer of the Lewd, or as he put it, a “Verbal Proctologist”. The go-to guy with information about invective, insults and sick jokes is gone.

   The large number of journalists who relied on his scholarly input for information about slurs and nasty slang words have not shown up in large numbers to note his passing. There were a few obituaries in German back in the spring, but otherwise information about his death is found mainly on social media and in blogs. There surely will be homages by academics in scholarly journals relating to language, philology and semantics, which are slow to publish.

    He was educated as a chemist, but after emigrating to the United States, focussed on language and earned a doctorate in medieval German literature. His specialty became ‘bad words’ and he started a journal that was devoted to them - Maledicta: The International Journal of Verbal Aggression. He was a linguist of the lingo used by the lascivious and ribald and he was devoted to the investigation of offensive language and cruel slurs. Columnists who wrote about cursing relied upon Dr. Aman as they did upon Dr. Spock if writing about children.

   Long before strong speech became violence and harsh words became sticks and stones, Aman got into trouble for the very “Verbal Aggression” he studied. He was not only a scholar of bad words, he used them frequently. During a bad divorce he sent his wife headlines cut from newspapers - headlines such as “Man Kills Ex -Wife” and “Estranged Wife Is Found Slain in Her Home”. It gets worse. He called the judge “Old Bitch Becker” and the attorney “Filthy Phillips” and suggested the "slimebags" should be slain. Since he sent some of the threats by the U.S. postal service, FBI agents soon showed up and Dr. Aman went to the ‘slammer’ or ‘hoosegow’ where he was able to continue educating himself about slang and profanity. His arguments that he was verbally aggressive, not physically so and that he only shot off his mouth not a gun did not work. He said he was only doing “what all powerless people do - draining off anger at adversaries through name-calling.” I am sure that he was not happy when name-calling became a potential hate crime.

Maledicta -The Journal

 

I have been discussing journals and magazines in a series called “Periodical Ramblings” and I probably would have gotten to Maledicta at some point. Here I will just provide you with some samples from it. You are likely to be very interested in what follows and if you have access to the library close by at Western University you will find Vols. 1-9, ranging from about 1977 to 1987. They are in storage, however, and you will probably be too embarrassed to ask to have them retrieved. If so, you can find a compilation - The Best of Maledicta - in the stacks.

   Before I list some article titles, here is a sample submission by Aman himself. It relates to the N-word, a subject about which I recently posted. He objected to the new term that was suggested as a replacement for the other word which is now also, I suppose, an N-word -"Negro".

Say What?
In Maledicta Monitor, [a related newsletter] I published various examples of silly "politically correct" language castration, such as replacing the good word "Negro" with the inaccurate, polysyllabic, patronizing and stupid term "African American." -- But the absolutely most idiotic p.c. term ever was recently created by the school board of Oakland, Calif., to get Federal funds: "Black English," a social dialect earlier upgraded to "Ebonics" (from ebony + phonics) now is called -- thanks to mouse-brained educators and bureaucrats -- "Pan-African Communication Behaviors." (San Francisco Chronicle 26 Dec 1996: A-11). -- Mother: "Do my son speak Black English?" Oakland School Board: "No, Ma'am, he do engage in Pan-African Communication Behaviors."

   Jokes were to be made about the new subject of Ebonics and here is a sample which is typical of the kind of racial humour that is often found in Maledicta:

"Hooked on Ebonics"
Leroy is a 20-year-old ninth-grader. This is his homework assignment. He must use each vocabulary word in a sentence.
Foreclose: If I pay alimony dis month, I ain't got no money foreclose.
Rectum: I had two Cadillacs, but my ole lady rectum both.
Hotel: I gave my girfriend da crabs, and da hotel ever'body.
Disappointment: My parole officer tole me if I miss disappointment, he gonna send me back to da big house.

   Here are some article titles from Maledicta:

American Condom Names

Bad Words in Tonga

Blasphemy Trial in Québec

Canadian Gay Jokes

Canadian Sexual Terms

Canadian Slurs

Celebrity Sick Jokes

Colorful Insults in Arabic, Armenian, Georgian, Swahili

Czech Ethnonyms

Do You Like Aural? British Phone Sex Ads

Domino's Pizza Jargon (e.g. bitch pie - pizza with PMS - Pepperoni, Mushroom and Sausage)

Door Whore and Other New Mexico Restaurant Slang

Doctors’ Slurs of Patients

Dutch Soldiers' Latrinalia

Dutch Terms of Abuse

Genital Pet Names

Glossary of Fart Euphemisms 

Lexical Categories of Homosexual Behaviour in Modern Burmese

The Lord’s Prayer in Ebonics

Mozart's Bizarre Verbal Behavior: A Case of Tourette Syndrome?

Offensive Rock Band Names

Pessimistic Prison Slang

Russian Women's Bawdy Verse

   And from an article about the phrase, "Shit Happens" here are some examples in a religious context:

Anglicanism

It's true, shit does happen -- but only to Lutherans.

Atheism

1. Shit doesn't happen.

2. I don't believe this shit!

3. No shit!

Fundamentalism

Shit happens because the Bible says so.

Catholicism

1. If shit happens, you deserve it.

2. You were born shit, you are shit, and you will die shit.

3. Shit happens to you because you are BAD.

Southern Baptist

Shit will happen. Praise the Lord!

I suppose the ultimate "Shit Happens" happened to Aman this year. Let us remember Reinhold this way.

Sources:

Jesse Sheidlower published a fine obituary in his blog " "Strong Language: A Sweary Blog About Swearing."

Another was recently published on the Linguist List, Dec. 17, 2019, by Tristan Miller. 

Aman's run-in with the law occurred in 1993 and there were many articles about his difficulties. I used: "The Damned One: Swearing Was Reinhold's Life. Now It's His Curse," David Streitfeld, Washington Post, Oct. 22, 1993.

Post Script:

According to one account, Aman was a fan of feral cats. Loyal readers will know I am not.
See: The Great Cat Cull.