Buffs

[Gary Sisco]

We've been wondering, what is it that makes people with certain interests "buffs"? For example, jazz people are almost always called jazz buffs. People whose interest is the Civil War are Civil War buffs.

On the other hand, I've never heard someone called a bass-fishing buff. Or a Harley-Davidson buff. Or a modern English poetry buff.

Or even a rock and roll buff. Certainly not a hiphop buff.

What's the difference between a buff and a fan? Or a buff and student (of)? And why are certain interests given the buff treatment as a matter of course but not others?

Discuss.

[clinthopson]

Because jazz fans are always buffed.

I never cared for Buffy St. Marie.

[Monte Smith]

You can be a jazz aficionado.

[larrycohen]

You might listen to jazz in the buff, but I wouldn't recommend bass-fishing in the buff. You might get a hook caught in a painful place.

[Dr Dave]

I never knew:

[From the buff-colored uniform worn by New York volunteer firemen around 1920, originally applied to an enthusiast of fires and firefighting.]

[Gary Sisco]

Originally Posted by Monte Smith

You can be a jazz aficionado.

Good one.

May we be both buffs and aficionados?

[Scott Dolan]

Yes, but when you call yourself an aficionado you have to use a snooty accent.

[Vince Kargatis]

Originally Posted by Gary Sisco

What's the difference between a buff and a fan?

I take the connotation of a 'buff' as a knowledgeable fan. A 'fan' just needs to really like the subject, a buff I would presume has notable knowledge of it too.

[Uli]

what's a jazzbo?

[Ron Thorne]

buff ² Noun
Informal an expert on or devotee of a given subject: an opera buff [from the buff-coloured uniforms worn by volunteer firemen in New York City]

[Ron Thorne]

Originally Posted by Uli

what's a jazzbo?

Take your pick:

1.	jazzbo	31 up, 5 down
	A jazz musician, DJ, connoisseur or aficionado, esp. an older male. Term may have originated with Al "Jazzbeaux" Collins (1919-97), legendary Bay Area DJ. "These are the things this jazzbo knows ..." -- Robert Christgau, on Dave Frishberg

2.	Jazzbo	2 up, 7 down
	Word used to describe black people. Used by Jim Belushi in the movie 'Red Heat' '...just a bunch of jazzbo's hanging out on the corner.'

3.	Jazzbo	9 up, 28 down
	a pretentious ass-licker. has high opinions of himself and fellow 'chums'. wishes he had talent, but never will. can't stop 'whining'!! "looks like we've got another 'jazzbo' on our hands, alert the media"!!

Source: urbandictionary.com

[clinthopson]

I consider myself a jazz expert. Maybe not to some of you guys here but compared to the world at large, I am an expert.

Also a buff, an aficionado, a fan, a hipster, a cat and a toe tapper.

[patricia]

And although Clint is much too modest to say, a man who cooks, which in my book is akin to being worth his weight in rubies.

[Gary Sisco]

Jazzbo is also the formal name of my cat, Jazzbo Berserker. I call her Jazz for short.

I understand the difference between the words but it seems that "buff" is used only for particular things. I've never for example heard of someone who's a Normandy invasion buff. Or a Dead Sea Scrolls buff.

It seems to go along in everyday usage with certain things only, jazz being one.

[Cem]

Any relation to buffoon, I wonder? I have an inkling...

[Sergio Zamora]

It's probably just that those particular terms were created at a time when the word 'buff' itself was more commonly used, so it just defaulted to it. The word itself sounds kind of old fashioned.

Nowadays, you might hear the words like 'geek' in some instances, though there's a slight implied connotation that some folks might not like. That's why these terms are not entirely interchangeable: cinephile, film buff, movie geek.

[Gary Sisco]

And music snob -- which I've concluded means someone who has ears for what he loves.

[groover]

Originally Posted by clinthopson

Because jazz fans are always buffed.

Yes, it's probably because so many of us work out while listening to jazz.

[Gary Sisco]

Some new words, from The Weekly Spin:

Recently while browsing the Web I came across UrbanDictionary.com, which is sort of a wiki of contemporary slang. I found some of the newer words listed there amusing, like "hobosexual" (the opposite of metrosexual; someone who cares little about their looks), "consumerican," ("a particularly American brand of consumerism"), and "wikidemia" ("an academic work passed off as scholarly yet researched entirely on Wikipedia").
Then I came across a word that put me into a more thoughtful zone: "slacktivism."
"Slacktivism" (alternative spelling "slactivism") is a fusion of the words "slacker" and "activism," and UrbanDicationary.com defines it as "the act of participating in obviously pointless activities as an expedient alternative to actually expending effort to fix a problem." It refers to ersatz acts that people perform that they have somehow come to believe are full of meaning, like slapping a magnetic ribbon on your car to "support the troops," wearing a colored rubber wristband to "fight cancer," or refusing to buy gasoline on a certain day to protest high gas prices, instead of, say, actually changing your lifestyle to use less gas.

***********

I'm both a hobosexual and a hobohemian.

[Monte Smith]

Originally Posted by Gary Sisco

I understand the difference between the words but it seems that "buff" is used only for particular things. I've never for example heard of someone who's a Normandy invasion buff. Or a Dead Sea Scrolls buff.

It seems to go along in everyday usage with certain things only, jazz being one.

Your observation is accurate. A similar thing has happened with the word "denier." You can be skeptical of anything, but there are only three things you can be a "denier" of: the Holocaust, the Armenian Holocaust, and Global Warming.

[Douglas]

Originally Posted by Monte Smith

Your observation is accurate. A similar thing has happened with the word "denier." You can be skeptical of anything, but there are only three things you can be a "denier" of: the Holocaust, the Armenian Holocaust, and Global Warming.

Unless you are one of the twelve deniers of a sou.


sorry I know that's terrible. I'll be gone just as soon as I've found my impermeable.

[Gary Sisco]

Originally Posted by Monte Smith

Your observation is accurate. A similar thing has happened with the word "denier." You can be skeptical of anything, but there are only three things you can be a "denier" of: the Holocaust, the Armenian Holocaust, and Global Warming.

Good one. True, too. I'm always interested in these little questions of usage and how they develop.

[MRS]

If I get a friend to buy a Sonny Clark CD by playing him a bunch of Sonny Clark CDs does that make me a jazz fluff?

[al j]

from Wikipedia, natch:

"A fluffer is a hired member of the crew of a pornographic movie whose role on the set is to sexually arouse the male participants prior to the filming of scenes requiring erections.[1] The term was also extended to include female participants. Many adult film stars today maintain that fluffers are a thing of the past, needed in the '70s and '80s when the crew, shooting on celluloid, needed much more time to prepare a shot. Erectile dysfunction drugs such as Viagra have also taken part in replacing fluffers."

[shrugs]

so that's what you've been up too.....