oh my lordy – going down?
Posted by jaqi on August 25, 2010
Handy info for everyone who ever wondered – in fact everything you ever wanted to know about cunnilingus but were too afraid to ask. Even my friends who are well-versed in the art will find the frankness amusing.
http://content.libida.com/how-to-cunnilingus
I’ve given some thought to the missing verb in ‘how to cunnilingus’. Do is clumsy, but I hardly want to criminalise the act with commit. Engage in makes it sound like you can only do it in marriage or a toilet cubicle; what’s left – execute? How to Execute Cunnilingus.
Clare said
Surely, but surely, it’s “perform”?
JR said
Inappropriately, “how to pull off cunnilingus” =^)
“Effect”? “Bring off” is a good one for connotation, though it sounds like a strangely archaic Britishism…
JR said
Is it the kind of activity one could successfully have a crack at?
I’ll get my coat…
jaqi said
Erm… “how not to suck at…”?
harry stevens said
Absolutely, totally, and utterly nothing ever, whatsoever wrong with the word “do”, except to some quaintly effete sensibility. We do an assignment, we do the dishes, we do origami, we do our tax return, we do sex, ( we used to “make love” ). We even “do” or we don’t “do”, mind-things like empathy or surprise. As in the faintly supercilious “I don’t *do* surprise.” A good old-fashioned Anglo-Saxon verb goes rather well with a good old-fashioned part of sex.
And not an evasion. The word “cunnilingus” itself is an evasion. No points for prettying things up with French, Latin or Greek derived words. This word means to lick cunt. Thus, How to Do Cunnilingus, or more plainly, How to Lick Cunt. And if that is just too plain or nasty, and you’d rather not go there, there are always pussy, fanny or twat available (or not !). I seem to remember Churchill promised the Brits “blood, sweat and tears” – not erythrocytes, perspiration and lacrimation.
“Hey son, have you done the dishes?” “Uh, not yet Dad, in a while, I’m just about to do cunnilingus.” Even pronounce it dialectically if you will ( Coon-i-lingus with the vowel as in “should” ? ). Mellors (the well-known gamekeeper) would not have been amused.
jaqi said
‘Do’ sex? Generally, I feel obliged to point out for those perhaps out of practice, we ‘have’ rather than ‘do’ sex. And there’s a whole new grammatical discussion right there… note that we don’t generally ‘have’ cunnilingus, either as recipient or agent – presumably there’s some fundamental difference in the degree of agency involved, but it’s subtle enough that I don’t think I can spare the space to attempt unpacking it.
And I beg to differ over whether the Latin term is an evasion; to those who speak Latin (for whom Latin terms are of use) it’s very blunt and specific. It does, however, highlight a common and longstanding confusion: cunnus refers to the vulva, that is, the female external genitalia as a whole. But does cunt? Or does cunt refer just to the vagina? I find a deplorable lack of clarity in the modern terms and usage – and it’s not like it’s unimportant. Attend only to the vagina in cunnilingus and frankly, your efforts will almost invariably fail.
Incidentally, I particularly detest the use of the word vagina to refer to the vulva – not only is it wrong for all the reasons listed above, but it’s one of the Latin terms that really showcases the old gender hierarchy (along with pudendum, from the Latin for shame, which refers to the external genitals – usually or particularly of the female). Vagina means sheath or scabbard – a staggeringly phallocentric definition. A more appropriate Latin word would be angustia, a noun (f) for narrow passage/place/space, a defile; a strait, or a pass. But note it already has the (probably/potentially misogynistic) associations of difficulties; meanness. Seems we can’t win.
harry stevens said
bit I left out: “Execute”, “commit”, “engage”, “perform” (least objectionable.) Lord *do* fooking help us !
jaqi said
I’m afraid Clare’s right: the most appropriate/least objectionable verb is perform, although it does sound a bit pompous and formal in the context. But then so does ‘cunnilingus’, I suppose. You could avoid the question with ‘how to excel at…’
harry stevens said
Birds do it, bees do it, even educated fleas do it, and what is it they do ? Why, they fall in lerve of course. To be sure, bonding (if that is what love is) has been observed in birds, that we know, but bees, and fleas, and little earwigees, pardon me if I remain well, shall we say, less than convinced. Leaving aside bonding for the moment, there certainly has been an awful lot of bonking and honking going on over the last ever so many extended evolutionary epochs. Tens and yes indeed hûndreds ( pronounced à la DCI Gene Hûnt of Ashes to Ashes, – TV show – not rock band, notoriety), hûndreds of millions of years of steady shagging has brought us to where we are today, which is to say that in matters of purely reproductive intensity it’s not all that tirribly different, Jemima lûv !
Even Homo, the genus that is, not the nancy chappies, although I’m pretty sure them too, has been “at it” for a million or more. And our highly esteemed friend and close relative Pan bonobus seems to have been particularly fond of ‘getting it off’ between all and sundry for even longer. My one scintillatingly exuberant question for today is whether during all these many millennia, the creatures that have been steadily copulating and populating, over all this time have quite unbeknown to themselves, actually been ‘having’ it or ‘doing ‘ it ?
Ah, that is a question of semantics I hear you criye ! A problem of linguistics, a matter of verbal usage analysis ! Apart from which does it even matter ? Probably not, but then, how much does? Certainly since sex was first invented, it has remained remarkably popular throughout the kingdom. What have changed however, and do continue to change, are those other outcomes of evolution, culture and language. Once language had evolved from mostly a series of grunts and whistles, then after a few more dozen millennia, came things like grammar no less, and even syntax. No this is not a potted history of linguistics, I am merely trying to get to the point ASAP. The point being that whether we will or no, the lingo moves on, so to speak. Mostly we don’t even notice it. The tectonic plates of verbal communication creak and groan and shift right under our little botties, and if we aren’t paying attention we can miss it.
An example. When I was a lad, nobody ‘did’ drugs. One would merely have been looked at with an expression of bemusement or even incomprehension for venturing such a construction. Your listeners might have imagined that you were possibly alluding to some sales rep. for a pharmaceutical company. People took drugs, swallowed them, smoked them or ‘shot’ them up, but did not ‘do’ them. Today it is perfectly acceptable, linguistically if not legally, to do drugs.
Has there been a similar shift occurring in the approach to sex, vis à vis ‘having’ or ‘doing’? Again one would need to present examples. My research in this area is at a preliminary stage.
Thus a video with a self-explanatory URL can be accessed at:
http://www.metacafe.com/watch/812856/eva_mendes_doing_sex/
Don’t get excited – it’s all talk. And mostly French at that. But the idea is there.
From a not so recent Answers.com page on ‘trying for a baby’ – I have italicised the relevant phrases but not changed the grammar or spelling.
• One should do sex only on these days (+/- 4days of ovulation) for a chance…
• DR said if u trying for a baby u should be having sex every day unless hes stupid.
• If you don’t know when your ovulating I would say track it and make love every other day.
• We are trying pregnancy so doing sex everyday with difference of 24 hour time period.
You may say that this reflects predominantly U.S. usage. I suggest it shows linguistic variability. And what happens there will most probably catch on here. I’m fairly sure it is already doing so. You can probably find many such examples. If I come up with any more I will present same.
jaqi said
Point made, my little linguist. Although Eva Mendes doing sex sounds like Eva ‘giving us the frank lowdown on’ sex, rather than ‘having’ it. But the other site definitely shows two examples of the usage you claim, and – I couldn’t help giggling; I can almost see those comment writers: the first is a health professional or someone else literate and well-informed about the female fertility cycle; the second is a young African American girl, the third – hm, knowledge of female rhythm, one small grammar error, one large euphemism – churchgoing mum, and the fourth, I’m guessing a young immigrant couple by the awkward syntax and the methodical vigour.
I do think it reflects predominantly US (and ESL) usage, but I equally agree it’s part of the intrinsic variability that makes living languages so fascinating. I shall allow you the point, in a qualified way, until further evidence comes before us. That is, I concede that ‘to do sex’ is used, but not that that makes ‘do’ the best verb to insert in the cleft of ‘to cunnilingus’.
Clare said
Sorry, but “execute” still sounds to me like spiders mating, where the ultimate example of eating your sex partner is…well…eating them!
I agree that “perform” sounds awfully pompous – other pomposities would probably include “render”, “produce” and “achieve”. After much thought, I think my preference is “to bring off cunnilingus”, which as well as implying you did it satisfactorily carries the suggestion that you brought off your partner as well as the act :-)
jaqi said
I have recently encountered another expert in the field ;) …I shall get his opinion to add to the mix. (Given his relative lack of linguistic – or rather, verbal – sophistication, the question will likely bemuse but entertain him.) For myself, I’m tending towards ‘give’ – as in the standard language for the reciprocal act: to give head, to give a blow job, etc. It points nicely to the fact (too often forgotten) that there’s actually a sentient entity on the receiving end of the act.
JR said
Ooh, how about ‘to render cunnilingus unto…’? I think it has a nice ring to it.
harry stevens said
But then as the actress almost screamed to the university professor, Ohh perlease professor, just fucking do it !!!!
harry stevens said
should have said, but then as the actress almost screamed to the university English professor, Ohh perleease professor, just fucking do it !!!!
harry stevens said
or even: as the actress almost screamed to the university English and Philosophy professor, Ohh perleease professor, just fucking do it !!!!
harry stevens said
that does it !
jaqi said
Oh, oh, oh – oh my god!!!
rountuit said
Clare speaks under John’s avatar: Dad desperately wanted to post something just so he could see his newly-formed avatar appear, and this was the topic which most interested him. He just couldn’t quite think of what to say, but he knew it was on the tip of his tongue :-)
jaqisdad said
I protest! It would be on all of my tongue.