I wasn’t going to weigh in on this whole Janet Jackson’s breast at the Super Bowl scandal just yet. My plan was to wait until some knickers untwisted and see how it started to play itself out over the next few days. But, while reading this evening I came across this little gem and I thought it fit the situation enough to repeat it here.
“The first time I heard the word “hell” used in its common profane connotation on the screen was in Twenty Thousand Horsemen: since that time I’ve noted that “hell” and “damn” are common expressions in English offerings — but it has only been in the past two years that one finds such language in American movies. Even so recent a picture as The Blackboard Jungle evoked a gasp from the typical audience when a knife-wielding juvenile delinquent told his teacher to “go to hell.” Get that, now — nobody was shocked because the kid pulled a knife on his teacher. What shocked them was the fact that he came right out and said a nasty word on the screen. Bloody strange, what?
— Robert Bloch, “The Ealing Art”, May 1957
Michael Sauers is the Director of Logan Library in Logan, UT. Prior to this he was one of the founding staff and Technology Manager for Do Space in Omaha, NE. After earning his MLS in 1995 from the University at Albany's School of Information Science and Policy Michael spent his first 20 years as a librarian training other librarians in technology along with time as a public library trustee, a bookstore manager for a library friends group, a reference librarian, a technology consultant, and a bookseller. He has written dozens of articles for various journals and magazines and has published 14 books ranging from library technology, blogging, Web design, and an index to a popular horror magazine. In his spare time, he blogs at TravelinLibrarian.info, runs The Collector's Guide to Dean Koontz website at CollectingKoontz.com, takes many, many photos, and typically reads more than 100 books a year.
Unless otherwise stated, all opinions are my own and are not to be considered those of the City of Logan, UT.
View all posts by Michael Sauers
“The first time I heard the word “hell” used in its common profane connotation on the screen was in Twenty Thousand Horsemen: since that time I’ve noted that “hell” and “damn” are common expressions in English offerings — but it has only been in the past two years that one finds such language in American movies. Even so recent a picture as The Blackboard Jungle evoked a gasp from the typical audience when a knife-wielding juvenile delinquent told his teacher to “go to hell.” Get that, now — nobody was shocked because the kid pulled a knife on his teacher. What shocked them was the fact that he came right out and said a nasty word on the screen. Bloody strange, what?
