ResidentSadist
Posts: 12580
Joined: 2/11/2007 From: a mean old Daddy, but I like you - Joni Mitchell Status: offline
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I really didn't want to write a paper about this so I only mentioned my first personal exposure to it with the leathermen in the 70s in my original reply. However, the Gor book speculations are killing me . . . lets just consider that the first Gor book was in 1966. The modern American and European BDSM culture usage of slave speak (illeism) predates that by far more than a dozen years. The roots of it reach back for ages. If you look at the BDSM we know, the culture we inherited from the leathermen who pioneered it, you will find that the illeism they used originated in the 1940s military. Military Illeism like "Sir, this soldier stands ready, sir" and the leathermen usage of it and uniforms like caps and vests. However, honorific illeism in slavery goes back ages and can be found in the earliest literature about slavery. Does this phrase sound familiar? "your humble servant awaits your orders" That doesn't have anything to do with BDSM but has everything to do with slavery and/or servitude. If you're gonna' hang credit for the western world's BDSM culture usage of third person illeism on a fictional series of books, blame the Charlie Chan books not Gor. Charlie Chan movies started in the 30s. Those manuscripts use "first son", "second son" and "your humble servant awaits your orders". All which have been ingrained in oriental culture and perspective for ages. If you think blaming Charlie Chan is stretch, which it is, blame it on the Orient. Consider the western world's BDSM culture interest in bondage and how it exposed us to oriental philosophies and perspectives while studying shibari disciplines. Although I do not think we were as influenced by it as much as the oriental culture, Middle Eastern harem politics had the the kadin, the "first girl" to bear the "first son". All these cultural influences go into the BDSM melting pot and now you can see the concept of how the leathermen's military rank protocols merged with other cultural perspectives and you got first boys, second boys, first girls, alpha slaves and they speak of them selves in third person. No matter how you look at it, John Norman's Gor books don't have a damn thing to do with the origins of illeism in modern BDSM because its first usage and origins predate him.
< Message edited by ResidentSadist -- 5/26/2012 11:48:17 PM >
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