In 1918, a dancer sued the publisher of a journal for libel for an article linking her name with the heading, “Cult of the Clitoris.” The publisher’s defense rested on the assertion that she could not possibly been libeled in that no one knew what a clitoris was.
When the dancer herself was questioned whether she knew the term, she answered, “Yes but not particularly.” The author of the article swore he had tried to find a title “that would only be understood by those it should be understood by.” He added how he had telephoned a village doctor to whom he mentioned the word and was told that it “was a superficial organ that, when unduly excited or overdeveloped, possessed the most dreadful influence on any woman, that she would do the most extraordinary things,” adding how “an exaggerated clitoris might drive a woman to an elephant.”
A Doctor testifying on the publisher’s behalf said that he had shown the term to fifty or sixty friends, none of whom knew its meaning ( presumably most of these were fellow Doctors). He added,“ Of course clitoris is a Greek word; it is a medical term…nobody but a medical man or people interested in that kind of thing, would understand the term.” (Lucy Bland, ‘Trial by Sexology? Maud Allen, Salome, and the “Cult of the Clitoris Case” in Lucy Bland and Laura Doan, eds., Sexology in Culture: Labeling Bodies and Desires.)
Directly from the desk of Dr. Bawdy – http://bawdylanguage.com/blog
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