2839  Milonga meanings

Date: Thu, 30 Sep 2004 11:32:04 -0700
From: Lima <amilsolrac@YAHOO.COM>
Subject: Milonga meanings

Milonga == a dance get together
Milonga == the music
Milonga == (rarely) the venue
Milonguero/a (adj) == castizo in a tango sense when applied to music, dance,
etc
Milonguero == night life character
Milonguero == social tango dancer with status, an icon

I warn that the part about what begot what is all speculation, folk
etymology. I offer it as merely plausible. I know no reasonable or
unreasonable source that takes the whole thing by the horns.

Considering the (correct) etymology of the word, "milonga" was used first
probably for the get together, the party: first through a generalization
(from a meeting to discuss something to any get together), then a
specialization (from any get together, to a party, to a dancing party).

The old milonga music & dance is probably very much a local creacio'n
portenna from multiple European sources and the rural folklore. It became
very popular for dancing some 10 yrs, or more, before the baile con corte
(which may very well have been danced to milongas at first) came into being
(early 1880's for the baile con corte, 1870's for the milonga in the
arrabales, probably). The most probable thing by far is that the new dance
fashion got its name from milonga, the dance party, the vacilo'n (elsewhere).
Maybe as the genre cristallized it had no name, so it became the music and
dance of the milongas, or a milonga.

The use of milonga for the place may have been related to times when milongas
and perigundines had fixed locations in the night-life scene. So the place
takes the name of the function. Though possible, this is as speculative as it
gets, since this usage is not frequent in lyrics, even in the 20's or
earlier.

Milonguero as a regular night life character who spends his nights hanging
around, dances in the milongas, and sleeps by day is probably older than
anyone can document: it figures prominently in 20's lirics, so it was there
almost for sure in the 19-teens, probably much, much, earlier; and it was
used in the late 50's early 60's with the same (generally derrogatory)
meaning. The derivation is obvious: from milonga, the dance party, to the
dancer.

Parallel considerations apply to the adjective. It seems that it was used
much more before the forties than certainly today. It figures in lyrics a
lot, but not in contemporary real life much at all. It is always a VERY
positive qualifier when applied to music, places, dancing, etc, but NOT when
applied to men and, even more so, women.

There is also milonguera as the fem of milonguero (in the night life). That
would indicate probably a mistress or something in that general area -- at
least a dancer in a perigundine. No "good" meaning was current, as far as I
know, at any time before the late 1980's.

Finally, we all know how recently (since 1984 or so) milonguero went from
meaning a night life character, usually an idler, to meaning a revered
cultural icon, and milonguera (to a much lesser extent) went from being a
woman who is not exactly a modest burgeois housewife to meaning a very good
dancer ... or an icon herself; so

Cheers,