Tuesday, July 30, 2019

Boris Booster

Blimey, etymology. Boosterism is usually associated with the puffy promotion of American and Canadian towns from the 1880s onwards.  Some argue that the activity, if not the name, go back to the competition between Greek city states, which maybe where Boris Johnson came across it.  The simple verb 'boost' seems to have started in the States around 1815, "to lift or raise be pushing from behind". Compare the Scottish use :"to move, to drive off, to shoo away". 

Historians also point to the Anti-Corn Law League, working out of Manchester in the 1830s and 1840s, led by free-trader Richard Cobden and promoted by the 'boosterist' writings of the Manchester Guardian and the Manchester Times.

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