Whoers
When I was a kid, in Brooklyn, in the 'sixties, we always pronounced the common word for a prostitute as two syllables: who-er. I had no idea how it was spelled, having never seen the word in print before my teens, as far as I can remember, but I assumed it was either whoer or hooer.
If you wanted to insult another kid you'd say, "Your mother's a whoer."
There was a transient hotel in the old neighborhood, the Hotel Oak. Everybody said it was a whoer house.
Some of the older guys in the neighborhood would talk about going to Pacific Street, in now-gentrified Boerum Hill, to pick up whoers. I have no idea where they went once they picked them up, but I do know that several of them picked up the clap.
There was a knock-knock joke that went around P.S. 217 that depended on the two-syllable pronunciation. A boy would say to a girl, "Knock-a knock-a." If the girl replied, "Who's there?" the boy would say, "No, you have to do it with an Italian accent: who's-a there-a." So the girl would say, "OK, who's-a there-a?" And the boy would say, "Me-a." And the girl would say, "Me-a who-a?" And the boy would laugh and point at the girl and say, "Ha ha, you're a whoer!"
When I finally saw the word "whore" in print I was confused. I was able to figure out from the context that it was the same word, but it seemed like a strange way to spell whoer. I wondered if it was a typo.
Since I left the old neighborhood, in 1978, first for Park Slope, then the East Village, then back to Park Slope, a snob-appeal neighborhood that's nothing like the Brooklyn of my youth, I've hardly ever heard the two-syllable pronunciation of whore. But recently, as I was walking in Bensonhurst, on my way to lunch at Tanoreen, I overheard two Brooklyn boys, maybe ten or eleven years old, talking, and one of them said, "Yeah, she's a real whoer." It was strangely comforting.
* * *
Note: Just after I posted this I decided to Google whoer and hooer. Whoer, I learned, is a term for fans of the TV show "Dr. Who," so some of those whoers may find thir way to this post. More importantly, I learned that "hooer" is common Irish slang for a prostitute, though often used as a term of endearment, a way it was never used in Brooklyn. I guess it's something like "How are you, you old bastard." Anyway, I suspect the Brooklyn pronunciation may have come from the large number of Irish in the borough.
If you wanted to insult another kid you'd say, "Your mother's a whoer."
There was a transient hotel in the old neighborhood, the Hotel Oak. Everybody said it was a whoer house.
Some of the older guys in the neighborhood would talk about going to Pacific Street, in now-gentrified Boerum Hill, to pick up whoers. I have no idea where they went once they picked them up, but I do know that several of them picked up the clap.
There was a knock-knock joke that went around P.S. 217 that depended on the two-syllable pronunciation. A boy would say to a girl, "Knock-a knock-a." If the girl replied, "Who's there?" the boy would say, "No, you have to do it with an Italian accent: who's-a there-a." So the girl would say, "OK, who's-a there-a?" And the boy would say, "Me-a." And the girl would say, "Me-a who-a?" And the boy would laugh and point at the girl and say, "Ha ha, you're a whoer!"
When I finally saw the word "whore" in print I was confused. I was able to figure out from the context that it was the same word, but it seemed like a strange way to spell whoer. I wondered if it was a typo.
Since I left the old neighborhood, in 1978, first for Park Slope, then the East Village, then back to Park Slope, a snob-appeal neighborhood that's nothing like the Brooklyn of my youth, I've hardly ever heard the two-syllable pronunciation of whore. But recently, as I was walking in Bensonhurst, on my way to lunch at Tanoreen, I overheard two Brooklyn boys, maybe ten or eleven years old, talking, and one of them said, "Yeah, she's a real whoer." It was strangely comforting.
* * *
Note: Just after I posted this I decided to Google whoer and hooer. Whoer, I learned, is a term for fans of the TV show "Dr. Who," so some of those whoers may find thir way to this post. More importantly, I learned that "hooer" is common Irish slang for a prostitute, though often used as a term of endearment, a way it was never used in Brooklyn. I guess it's something like "How are you, you old bastard." Anyway, I suspect the Brooklyn pronunciation may have come from the large number of Irish in the borough.
posted by Peter Cherches at 5:25 PM
8 Comments:
I had the same experiences as you, of course, mispronouncing the word till I was about 15. Eventually I learned to pronounce it correctly, as "ho."
I think Mailer used the word in "Naked and the Dead" also, a literary usage I can't recall elsewhere, but I am sure it's out there.
And in "Atlantic City", Burt Lancaster pronounces it that way.
Thanks for those references.
Keep 'em coming, folks.
This word was used frequently in my neighbourhood (Birkenhead England) when I was growing up in the 60's and 70's and like you I never saw the word in written text but whoer is close enough for me and I still use the word myself but it does attract some strange looks from people...cheeky whoers!!!
Thanks for posting this article. I'm a court reporter doing a transcript and I came across a word pronounced as "hoo-ers" by the Italian-Canadian witness in his late 60s or 70s.
I guess he must've lived in New York at some point because "whores" makes sense with what he said:
"He had some whores he had to go visit before coming home." Hahaha Gotta love Google....
I think the Irish pronunciation is not "whooer" but "hoor". The expression "He's a cute hoor" means more or less "he's a clever son-of-a-bitch" ("cute" in the Irish sense of clever, cunning, wily, said to be derived from "acute"). "He's a cute hoor" can be said either reproachfully or admiringly.
I grew up in Brooklyn in the 50's and early 60's. In my neighborhood (Brownsville - East New York), the pronounciation was more like "who-ah". I was also concerned when I first saw the word "where in print.
I meant "confused" rather than "concerned".
Post a Comment
<< Home