Brit slang: Dog's Body? Dog's Potty? Dog Spotty?

[Chas.E]

I keep hearing a song lyric in thick cockney accent on one of my old british punk albums, but I just can't make it out. It sounds like dogspotty or dogsbody, but it doesn't parse. Just what the hell are they really saying? And what does it mean? I think I know, but I figured I better doublecheck.

[Zarathustra]

In Stephen King's It, "It" referred to the humans whose mind It controlled, and who did Its bidding, as "dogsbodies". Don't know if he made up or adapted the term in some way.

[superdenseprotohippy]

"Dogsbody": Noun. A person who does the menial and boring tasks.

Go here (http://www.peevish.co.uk/slang/index.htm) for more of those wacky Brit colloquialisms.

[Chas.E]

Thanks, this was apparently NOT the interpretation I was leaning towards, I was thinking more along the lines of dog's potty, like a piece of dog sh*t.
This is just the sort of thing you can't search on the web, since you must know the spelling before you can search for the words. So I appreciate the assist.

[superdenseprotohippy]

Ah, think nowt of it, me old mucker.

[Pjen]

Could it be that old favorite 'dogs bollocks'?

[Tenar]

I think "dogsbody" is a fairly old expression. I am 99% sure that I recall seeing it in some Shakespeare plays. I wonder if it is a play on "God's body," an old oath which was frequently mispronounced, presumably to cut down on it's profanity. Odds bodkins! No, I have no cite, just speculation. Sorry.

[Wendell Wagner]

I just checked a couple of dictionaries. They say that it was originally British naval slang for a dish of boiled dried peas. Sometimes the same name was used for other unappetizing dishes frequently served on ships. Perhaps the name came from some sailor's comparison of the dish to a dead dog. Later it was applied to junior naval officers (perhaps because they were considered as worthless as the dish). These meanings were first recorded in the 19th century. By the 20th century, the term entered standard British use, meaning roughly what we mean when we call someone a gofer. It's a person with a position that consists mostly in doing trivial jobs for someone in a higher position.

[Johnny L.A.]

When I hear "dog's body" I think of two things: Spitfire pilot Douglas Bader, and a tall girl I used to work with. The girl was not a "dog", but her torso seemed too long in proportion to her legs -- like a dog's body.

[London_Calling]

Originally posted by Wendell Wagner
I just checked a couple of dictionaries. They say that it was originally British naval slang for a dish of boiled dried peas.


Followed with a nice pudding of Spotted Dog / Spotty Dick.

Hey ! a canine menu - who says British cuisine isn't top dog.

[Tinker Grey]

Originally posted by Tenar
I think "dogsbody" is a fairly old expression. I am 99% sure that I recall seeing it in some Shakespeare plays. I wonder if it is a play on "God's body," an old oath which was frequently mispronounced, presumably to cut down on it's profanity. Odds bodkins! No, I have no cite, just speculation. Sorry. Could you be thinkg of "Dogberry", the constable in Much Ado About Nothing?

Tinker

[wooba]

superdenseprotohippy said it best..
if you've ever seen the TV series BlackAdder, Balldrick is Blackadders dogsbody

[Telemark]

Darn it wooba you beat me to it. Baldrick is a classic dogsbody, and a member of the House of Commons.

[KneadToKnow]

I gather from DAVEW0071's use (http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=33616) of the term that it also has a connotation of "henchman" or "soldier."

[KneadToKnow]

Actually, "minion" was the word I had used in that other thread.

[handy]

My friend recently gave me a book on rhyming british slang & I couldn't make much sense of it. But there be such a book.

[Diane]

Spotty Dick

:eek:

Add that to my list of something I don't want to eat.

Speaking of British slang, what does it mean to "get squelchy"? I have heard it said on "Coupling" and "British Men Behaving Badly". Gotta love that BBC!

[casdave]

Dogsbody, closest US equivalent would be a gofer - go for this gp for that but its also a person who does thankless tasks in service for another.


Get squelchy - Looking at the programs that use this term its supposed to be a humorous euphemism for becoming sexually aroused to the point of secretion of natural lubricants but it is just an invented term by the scriptwriters rather than anything used as one of our quaint olde worlde colloquiallisms.

[London_Calling]

Originally posted by casdave
Get squelchy <...snip, ouch !...> its supposed to be a humorous euphemism for becoming sexually aroused to the point of secretion of natural lubricants .. [/B]

By 'eck, lad. If that rabbit doesn't turn a girls head, nothing will !


BTW, we do all know Diane that you knew the answer. Geez, the things some women do to get a little dirty talk !

[Diane]

OMG, was I THAT obvious? :eek:

[minty green]

The song in the OP, incidentally, is apparently the Sex Pistols classic "Anarchy in the U.K."

'Cause I wanna be anarchy
No dogsbody