Radio was playin', Desmond Dekker was singin'

[venta]

A quick question:



[Poll #1344729]

Edit: I don't mean "give me a list of names", I mean "which term would you naturally use in conversation if talking about such a thing".

If you're going to fill in an answer, please do so before reading on.

I would habitually refer to that sort of stereo (ie portable, speaker at either end, tape deck in the middle) as a ghetto-blaster. I seem to remember that that's what everyone was calling them in the 80s when I first started interacting with such things.

Problem is, I've no idea of the origin of the term. Which ghettos were being blasted exactly ? Is it possible that someone somewhere might find it an offensive term ?[*] Is it even in common enough usage now that I could expect someone to be sure what I meant - or am I just hopelessly outdated in my choice of name ?

What other words are there ? Apart from radio-cassette player, of course. I'm not very clear on what exactly a boombox might be - could it be one of those, or is it subtly different ? Can I still call it a ghetto blaster if it's got a CD player in it ? Does the choice of name depend on the kind of music player - could one still blast ghettos with Wagner, for example ?

[*] According to Wikipedia, yes. But it's a particularly shoddily written piece, plus I'm interested in what other people think.


_{That image is just quickly grabbed from google image search, so if you're in The Future, it's probably red-exed by now.}

Comments

[addedentry.livejournal.com]

People rarely ascribe to sterotypes about their own culture

While I agree with the rest of your comment, even the Torygraph would be happy to claim that the English like to talk about the weather while standing in queues, not grumbling. And drinking buckets and buckets of tea.

[secretrebel.livejournal.com]

Yeah, that's why I went for rarely rather than never. I think the English (not so much the British) may be particularly given to sterotyping themselves. Both the Paxman and Fox books about Englishness were positivity enthusiastic about certain stereotypes of their own culture.

Me, I don't drink tea. ;)