shag

I remember the first beach trip I made when I was in graduate school in NC. I had been in the U.S. only about a month, and went with a group from the Newman Center. Everyone in the van on the way down kept talking about all the shagging they would be doing all weekend.

I was quite discombobulated.

A shag is not a cormorant and vice versa

See the 2-minute mark on the video.

(also, if you are interested, the last 3 minutes or so of the preceding segment, i.e. part 3b, where they discuss the Isherwood poem as well)

Was the film as long ago as 1989? Tempus indeed fugits. I remember it was a crap film, but popular for lines such as "I just want to shag all night". This was before Austin Powers and before the word entered US vernacular.

The common cormorant (or shag)
Lays eggs inside a paper bag,
You follow the idea, no doubt?
It's to keep the lightning out.

But what these unobservant birds
Have never thought of, is that herds
Of wandering bears might come with buns
And steal the bags to hold the crumbs.
-- Christopher Isherwood

In the cormorant sense... see otaries for a usage note.

The shag is a form of swing dancing that evolved from the jitterbug and jump blues of the big band jazz era and originated along the strands between Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, and Wilmington, North Carolina, during the 1940s. It is most often associated with beach music, a genre of rhythm and blues-based songs that lend themselves to this dance form. According to Bo Bryan, a noted shag historian and resident of Beaufort County, the term was coined at Carolina Beach, North Carolina. Today, the shag is a recognized dance in national and international dance competitions held across the United States.

In the dance the upper body and hips hardly move as the legs do convoluted kicks and fancy footwork. The man is the center of attention and the woman's steps are either mirror steps of the man's or a sort of marking time while he does spins and other gyrations.

The shag is the state dance of North Carolina and South Carolina, and is still popular amongst residents of both states.

The 1989 film Shag starring Bridget Fonda, Phoebe Cates, Annabeth Gish, and Page Hannah as four high school friends on their last road trip together before graduation, was filmed in Myrtle Beach and features the Carolina shag.

_Wikipedia

Eeeew! I remember that hairstyle! Yuck. And I remember shag pile. Thanks for the memories, guys. ;-)

In the 1970s or 80s it was a certain kind of haircut; one I never liked because it was too . . .shaggy. ;-)

Then, of course, there is shag pile (as in carpet).

No, no, I suppose you're right....It sounds more like a nature film that way. ;-)

"Austin Powers, the spy who gave me a small cormorant from a European coast" just doesn't have the same ring to it.

A small crested cormorant of Europe and North Africa.