'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: meself
Date: 06 Oct 09 - 11:56 PM

ignorant

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Bert
Date: 06 Oct 09 - 11:24 PM

Ah! I love those songs. all of them from the mildly suggestive to the downright disgusting.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Diva
Date: 06 Oct 09 - 06:42 PM

Well in the bothy this year at Cullerlie Danny Couper was calling them love songs!

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 09:22 PM

Lubricious - search box above gives several references in the threads.

Ross

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Genie
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 08:41 PM

How about just "songs of lechery and debauchery?"

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: GUEST,TJ in San Diego
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 06:54 PM

I heard Jesse (Lone Cat) Fuller once opine that a particularly graphic verse was "some baaad boogy!"

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 08:37 AM

MytheGM-

I think it was from an early Josh White recording that I heard the song "The Lass with the Delicate Aire." Good catch!

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: manitas_at_work
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 08:02 AM

Rabelaisian?

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 02:16 AM

After the watershed.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 02:16 AM

Unexpurgated

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 02 Oct 09 - 01:35 AM

So, Charley, in the anonymous words [almost] of Arne Jnr's well-known song, whom have you in mind as "the lass with the indelicate aire"? Or are you too gentlemanly to say: a gentleman, as Bertie Wooster never tired of saying, being one who would never bandy a lady's name.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 01 Oct 09 - 09:57 PM

Well, my ears are much too delicate to hear all the smutty sounds that abound here, there, and everywhere.

But some of those sounds...maybe.


;o)

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Charley Noble
Date: 01 Oct 09 - 09:20 PM

Azizi, I do like the term "indelicate" for describing these old songs. In fact why not describe them as "indelicate aires."

Cheerily,
Charley Noble

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 01 Oct 09 - 05:58 PM

Already mentioned indirectly by Michael, another just came to mind, as it is a phrase Stan Hugill used a bit for shanties: "non-drawing room verses" or "non-drawing room version".

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 30 Sep 09 - 10:43 AM

Has anyone posted the euphemism "indelicate nature"?

That phrase is used in this comment that I happened upon while searching for something else:

"The Old She-Crab
Notes: This is one of the oldest of English language traditional ballads. F.J. Child deliberately excluded it from his canonical ESPB, presumably because of its indelicate nature. - EC"

from The Traditional Ballad Index

as quoted in this post by masato sakurai in thread.cfm?threadid=15048#738965 "Mr Radalum?"

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 10:13 PM

Another thread has just reminded me, in a different euphemiistic [mis]application of a nautical term, of use in this context of "Close to the wind".

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: meself
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 09:58 PM

I believe it is in To the Lighthouse that Virginia Woolf mentions two sailors "laughing at a joke that was not at all proper".

Has anyone mentioned the term "bathroom humour"? It's gone out of vogue, but I think it's time we brought it back ....


On another matter - in Canada, "Anglo" is usually encountered as a linguistic descriptor - anyone English-speaking, or English-speakers collectively, may be characterised as "Anglo" (or, more properly but more syllabic, "Anglophone").

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Steve Gardham
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 06:11 PM

Currently being mentioned on other threads and about to be published. Peter Buchan's mss at Harvard titled 'Secret Songs of Silence' calls them 'High-kilted'. This is in early 19thc NE Scotland.

I'm guessing here but I'd say 'high-kilted' refers to what might become visible if one wore one's kilt too high.

In publishing/collecting/scholarly circles the most common term used is 'bawdy'. Others include...Barrack-room ballads...Locker-room...merry muses....dirty ditties....vulgar verse....poetica erotica...common muse. In Britain the most basic ones would generally be known as 'rugby songs' as they were perceived by most to have been the domain of rugby players sung in the bath and the bar after the match. In reality they were mainly the province of schoolboys and the armed forces.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 29 Sep 09 - 03:30 PM

dodgy

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 11:19 PM

Rowan — no, not same guy. Just coincidence that 2 'disobligers' the width of the whole world apart should have shared a nickname. But very many thanks for response. And g'day right back to you.

Gibb — yes, 'Rabelaisian. a most valued contribution indeed.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 11:06 PM

Rabelaisian

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Rowan
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 06:36 PM

G'day, MtheGM.
Budgie is the Mudcat nom de plume of Warren Fahey, who is a major contributor in the Oz folk scene. You'd have to ask him whether he ever used that moniker in Britain.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 02:03 PM

Good Call Az -

Training up one of the boys the letters

RCL

was a code word we developed for being "too Dutch" for "American sensibilities."

It clued him in to cultural differences without public embarassment.

The Dutch are very "open" and the letters indicated to the lad that he was being too:
Rude
Crude
or
Lewd....so it was time to watch his words.

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 09:49 AM

"Lewd" is another word that has the same meaning as "bawdy".
I don't think that word had been posted.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tug the Cox
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 08:06 AM

A young folk singer walked into a bar, and asked for a double entendre......so the barman gave her one.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 07:48 AM

Nice.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tim Leaning
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 07:47 AM

Near to the Knuckle ?
disolute

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 28 Sep 09 - 01:39 AM

Noted, Rowan: thanks. You will find that I too rejoice in the 'naval engagement' line & have contrib'd it recently to the below-line thread on 2-line Jokes, inspired to do so by thread on "What You Dance To'..

This Budgie - who he? I ask becoz I used to know a guy by that name in Cambridge, England, nearly 40 years ago, who specialised in 'disobliging' songs & used sometimes to distress some of the more delicately·nurtured at a folk club I ran there at the time. he became a policeman, I recall, in which capacity I met him once at a Cambridge Folk Festival in the 1970s, since when have lost touch with him. Could by any chance be same guy, I wonder?

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Rowan
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 11:31 PM

Last night a song was introduced as "Containing a lot of nautical terms. You can read into the song what you like, but it is a song containing a lot of nautical terms"

As when dancing used to be defined (in speech, rather than in writing) as "a naval exchange without loss of seamen".

Many of the songs MtheGM's asking about would be regarded as "rude, crude and unattractive", to use a term current where I am (Oz) and many could also be described as politically incorrect. Being known to be coarse at times, I was asked by Budgie to join his workshop on Filthy songs and recitations at the National last Easter but, although my intentions were honourably dishonourable, illness caused me to dishonour my promise to contribute. But it was a great workshop.

Cheers, Rowan

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 10:24 PM

Gr8 example, Tootler, 4 which many thanx.

Stand by to go about.....

Michael ;>}

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Tootler
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 06:29 PM

Returning to the original subject of the thread.

Last night a song was introduced as "Containing a lot of nautical terms. You can read into the song what you like, but it is a song containing a lot of nautical terms"

I leave it to your imagination how those nautical terms could be interpreted [grin]

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Uncle_DaveO
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 12:40 PM

Referring to WASP, I guess I'm a SOPAGA--"Sort-of-Pink American-German Atheist".   None of those W-A-S-P letters fit me, and I'll resent it if you call me that.

Dave Oesterreich

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 11:47 AM

I just can't imagine many Irish Americans would appreciate being called "Anglo-Americans".

It's bit like the way WASP sometimes seems to get used to refer to people who might be "white", but are neither Anglo-saxons nor Protestants.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Gweltas
Date: 27 Sep 09 - 12:05 AM

You can "send someone up" by imitiating/mimicing them (or a characteristic of their personality) by imitating their speech, or mannerisms in an exaggerated manner in order to invite laughter at their expense. If you "send yourself up" you behave in a manner that invites laughter at your own expense. Charlie Chaplin's wonderful send up/satirising of Adolph Hitler in "The Great Dictator" is a classic example of a send up.

I have never encountered the term "disobliging" being used in the context of this thread either in Ireland, or here in Cornwall,UK.

"Four letter words" are commonly referred to as "rude words" in both Ireland and the UK.

Rude is also used as a positive description of a person's appearance such as saying that someone "is looking rudely healthy" (in very good health)

Here is my list, and apologies if I've accidentally repeated one from an earlier posting !!

Salacious
Explicit
Obscene
Grotty
Sleazy
Tasteless
"Close to the bone"

XX

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 10:48 PM

McGrath, I think that may be how that "Anglo" referent got started.

Be that as it may, my point was that it's possible that the saying "send someone up" might be familiar to White Americans but I'm not sure about that, since sometimes White American colloquialisms are unfamiliar to me since I'm not White American.

Is it? (known to White Americans?, I mean?)

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: BobKnight
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 10:40 PM

Ross, I know the term "orra man" or "orra loon." My father was a horseman in his younger days, but it can also mean dirty, unsavoury, or disgusting.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 08:35 PM

I'd rather assumed that then term "Anglo" was linguistic, and was a way of distinguishing English speakers from Spanish speakers.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 07:44 PM

The Anglo-American ethnic group, a person who is European American or English Canadian.

I think my eyes glazed over at that point. Of course it's offensive to apply that to people with no English ancestry. But why on earth should Canadians get a whole different set of rules?

Anyone know what cretin wrote that Wikipedia page?

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 07:27 PM

"improper"

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 02:40 PM

"Anglo-American ethnic group, a person who is European American" - I would have thought that European Americans of non-English descent would be likely to object to the term.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:59 PM

Are you Kingstonians ever known to enjoin anybody to 'Nob·Off!'?

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Les from Hull
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:30 PM

The generic term round here would be 'mucky'. But in folk song singarounds they are known as 'nobbing songs'. In fact to us earnest students of the folk song there are only two kinds of song - nobbing songs and non-nobbing songs, although personally I believe there is a sub-category - 'songs of unrequited nobbing'.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Lighter
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:03 PM

Have never heard of "disobliging" in this sense in all my decades on this planet.

Sounds like English humor to me.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 12:14 PM

In the immortal words of Lorelei in 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes' —
"Goodness How Sad".

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: dick greenhaus
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 12:10 PM

Most of us folks that sing 'em jut call 'em dirty.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 11:34 AM

What a comprehensive catalogue, Gibb Sahib. Out·of·sight!

Can anybody follow THAT?

Btw, nobody has responed to my question re 'disobliging' — does anyone else use it, or know it in any context outside the Bert Lloyd influence? I should be most interested to know.

Best to all Catters, in entirely prim·&·proper, drawing-room terms - which reminds me, no-one has come up with that fine old gentlemen's-club sort of usage, 'smoking-room'!

Michael

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Gibb Sahib
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 11:06 AM

crude
coarse
blue
spicy
picante/piquant (sp?)
slack (this is the Jamaican English term)
titillating
of prurient interest (just kidding...reminds me of the Dead Kennedys obscenity trial)
chatpata (Indian term!)
tasty, savory, etc
spunky
lively
x-rated
erotic
exotic
gross
indecent
inappropriate
unexpurgated
uncensored
adult, adults only
red light
candid
ballsy
bold
REAL
"authentic" (ha ha)
art
racy
filthy
saucy
salty
sinful
wicked
French
off-color
colorful
unwholesome
caliente
sordid
seedy
pornographic

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Jack Campin
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 10:46 AM

"Clarty" in Scots.

(And on the tangential bit of this thread, I don't see why somebody shouldn't be described as both Anglo-American and African American, if they had both English and African ancestry. It's up to the individual which bits of their ancestry matter to them).

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 10:34 AM

Suibhne O'Piobaireachd and MtheGM, thanks for defining that term for me.

**
Somewhat off-topic:

Sharon, I've started to copy off of the people in California, Arizonia, New Mexico and other Western states in using the term "Anglo" for White people. By extention, "Anglo-American colloquialism" are colloquialisms that are likely to be known by Anglos (White people) in the USA, and may not be as commonly known or as well know among Black people (African Americans).

See this Wikipedia page about the term "Anglo-American":

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anglo-American

Here's an excerpt from that page:

"English American, a North American of English heritage, origin, or background
Pertaining to Anglo-America, a term denoting an area of mixed English and American influence or heritage, or those parts of or groups within the Americas which have a tie to or which are influenced by England; or simply English-speaking America.
The Anglo-American ethnic group, a person who is European American or English Canadian."

-snip-

However, I have a problem with this part of that definition as it is now given: Anglo-American- "a person who is European American or English Canadian" because there are People of Color who are European American and English Canadian.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: GUEST,Effsee, nae at hame
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 09:59 AM

The great Jeannie Robertson used to introduce such songs as containing "a wee threed (thread) o' blue". ;-)

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 07:12 AM

Haven't come across that meaning of "orra", Bob. The "orra man" on a farm was the guy who picked up all the jobs not assigned to specific farm-servants, who wouldn't normally operate outside their trade.

Ross

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Ross Campbell
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 07:05 AM

Blue?

Any more info on the "chap book" reference, Gargoyle? In the UK, this would simply be a collection of printed pages, possibly with woodcut or other illustration, stapled or stitched together to form a booklet, distributed in much the same way as broadsheet ballads (and probably by the same peole). i.e., not restricted to bawdry.

Ross

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: BobKnight
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 07:03 AM

Locally we would say "rough" or in Scots "roch" which is the same thing. Another Scots word is "orra," which means unsavoury, or dirty.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 06:41 AM

Randolph referred to his as "UNPRINTABLE"

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: GUEST,.gargoyle
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 06:37 AM

Immortalia
Randy
Hash Songs
Rugby Songs
Burlesque
Chap Book
Eight page bible
The Horn Book

Sincerely,
Gargoyle

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Leadfingers
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 06:00 AM

When I first went SemiPro after escaping from The Service , I had an A5 handout describing me as a purveyor of 'Feelthy' songs

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 05:36 AM

Thanks Anahata. I happen to live 5 miles north of Cottenham!

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: treewind
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 05:30 AM

In the correspondence between Ella Bull (who collected songs from the family servants and other local people in Cottenham just north of Cambridge) and Percy Merrick and Lucy Broadwood she described the words of some of them as "rather coarse" or "unedifying".
(this was in about 1905)

Anahata

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: gnomad
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 04:46 AM

dirty, vulgar, unsavoury, off-colour

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: SharonA
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 04:41 AM

MtheGM: In what Azizi refers to as "Anglo-American English" (not a term in common usage in the US), the word "rude" has the meaning she describes as well as the meaning that you describe... except that we would not refer to a bawdy song as a "rude song". We would say that it is rude to sing a bawdy song in the supermarket or at a church social, for example.

Sharon (living at the other end of Pennsylvania from Azizi's)

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: giles earle
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 03:19 AM

how about: smutty

or the pretentious and verbose: "displaying a somewhat earthy humour"

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 03:10 AM

Many thanks for contributions so far. I am particularly glad to be reminded of 'ribald', a rather delightfully old-fashioned tut-tut tch-tch sort of word; appropriate for, e.g., the contents of D'Urfey's 'Wit & Mirth; or Pills To Purge Melancholy'.

Has anyone come across the 'disobliging' use from anyone other than Bert Lloyd, or using it as a conscious influence from him as I tend to use it? I find it rather a charming & whimsical word for the purpose; & wonder if Bert invented it, or if it is some sort of Suffolk dialect [he was a Suffolk man originally]. Always meant to ask him but never got around ... tho how much one could, in view of some recent threads about his habits of invention/adaptation/tradition·claiming, have relied on whatever answer he might have given is open to question.

Meanwhile — please keep 'em coming...

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 03:00 AM

To 'send up' means to parody, or pastiche, or in other ways imitate someone's style in an exaggerated manner for comic effect — as one might say that much of John Gay's 'The Beggar's Opera' [although the phrase would not have been used in the 1720s, being a mid-20c usage, I suspect] was a send-up of the conventions of Handel Opera or Italian opera as sung at the time. Or that many early Disney cartoons were send-ups of musical conventions of the time. Or that many of the plots of Popeye, Bugs·Bunny&Daffy·Duck, &c [& also Charlie Chaplin] were send-ups of Victorian melodrama. So, if Robert Service had written Eskimo Nell in an exaggerated form of his usual style, one would describe him as 'sending himself up'.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Jack Blandiver
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 02:59 AM

A send-up is a parody; to send oneself up is to self-parody - which can be deliberate (as is the case above) or not, as the case may be!

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 02:36 AM

"Send himself up"?

Up where?

I believe that's another example of English being a foreign language, unless it's used in Anglo-American English (a language I generally know pretty well, but sometimes colloquialisms some Anglo-Americans use are unfamiliar to me, as I'm sure some African American colloquialisms are unfamilar to some people who aren't Black Americans).

I'd appreciate you letting me know what "Send himself up" means.

Thanks.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 02:10 AM

'The Ball of Kerriemuir' [spelt, note, slightly differently - the Scotch town is actually called Kirriemuir] is on DT under that title, in letter T for 'The'. Not the exact version I know, but is it ever? — mine starts "There were four-&-twenty virgins came doon frae Inverness, And when the ball was over there were 4-&-20 less".

There is much about Eskimo Nell [also on DT] in the "'Naughty' songs by well-known writers" thread [I think I have that name right; something very like that anyhow.] It is a spoof of the sort of poem Robert Service used to write, & much dispute as to whether he actually wrote it to send himself up [which tends to be the US view], or whether it is originally a spoof of British origin of the 'Wild West', which view I tend to. For reasons I give on that thread, backed up by some others who claim to know more of its history, I think Noel Coward is a probable attribution.

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:56 AM

In the USA, "rude" means "impolite" but impolite means that you don't have good manners-you didn't say "please", "thank you" or "you're welcome" when you should have.

Here rude doesn't mean "nasty".

For what it's worth, Michael, I don't recognize the two examples that you gave-'Eskimo Nell' and 'The Ball of Kirriemuir'.

I suppose they might be found on this forum or elsewhere on the Internet...

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:35 AM

Interesting, Azizi, that this usage of 'rude' is unfamiliar to American ears. In Britain, 'rude' is probably the most common word for 'unmannerly, ill-mannered' &c. A parent will tell a child that it is very *rude* to push thru a door ahead of someone else, or to fail to offer a seat to a standing lady in a bus or an underground [subway] train, or to put out one's tongue at anyone — RUDE is definitely the word that would spring first to a mother's lips on any such occasion - as well as being quite commonly used to describe the sort of words to the songs we are talking of. And words like 'fuck', 'shit', and so on, are commonly called 'rude words'. And 'Eskimo Nell' is a rude poem & 'The Ball of Kirriemuir' is a rude song. &c &c &c...

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Azizi
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:27 AM

Risque

[That's three "r" words, along with "ribald" and "raunchy". And there's another "r" word which also is used-"rude". At least I think that word means what we're talking about when I've seen it used by children, teens, and adults from the UK to describe some risque children's taunts. I don't think that "rude" is used the same way in the United States, at least I haven't found that word to be used that way among African Americans.

**

Here's another euphemism to describe those kind of songs or rhymes:
"off-color".

And children call them "nasty" songs or rhymes Or "bad" songs or rhymes (with "bad" meaning not good and not the Black slang form of "bad" which means "very good".)

Subject: RE: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: Janie
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 01:07 AM

Ribald? Raunchy?

Subject: 'naughty'; 'bawdy' - what else?
From: MGM·Lion
Date: 26 Sep 09 - 12:52 AM

A current thread is called 'naughty' songs &c [NB the quote marks]. Another commonly used term is 'bawdy'. Bert Lloyd, as I had to define after quoting it to another regular [American] poster who didn't quite understand what he meant by it, used to call such songs 'disobliging'. As I mentioned in the same post, a source singer had to be much persuaded by the early collector Priscilla Wyatt-Edgell to sing her a certain song, as it was, he thought, unsuitable for a lady's ears, being, in his words 'outway rude'.

Can anyone think of any other adjectives or euphemisms used to describe the sort of song I obviously have in mind?