African-American Slang Goes All-American

One of my favorite public linguists (don't we all have one?), Columbia University's John McWhorter appeared in a 2018 "Talks at Google" video to promote his book Talking Back, Talking Black. McWhorter mentions the mysterious emergence in the U.S., just within the last generation, of young white women and men peppering their behavior, accent, and slang with characteristics inspired by African-American culture. Towards the end of the 24th minute, the interviewer asks McWhorter about the cause of this strange phenomenon, seemingly ready to muse long-windedly, but as soon as she asks "Is it hip-hop music?" McWhorter utters a blunt, lightning-fast "yes." The audience titters warmly as McWhorter grins and clarifies that he means "the mainstreaming of rap in the late '90s," which the interviewer herself neatly encapsulates shortly thereafter: "Black culture becoming mainstream culture." Zooming in on just one dimension of this complex affair of cultural interweaving—words—is it true that some black vocabulary is seeping into English vocabulary at large? History, backed by a century of careful scholarship, gives us its own lightning-quick yes.

African-American Vernacular English

The topic of an African-American dialect in the United States is a nationwide taboo quickly met with irritation, worry, or skepticism. From the perspective of linguistic science, however, the existence of this precisely-used, grammar-rich dialect has been soundly confirmed for decades. John McWhorter straightforwardly calls this speech "Black English," though it's better known by various popular names like “Jive” (very outdated), “Ebonics” (somewhat outdated), and “Ghetto” (newer). Unfortunately, nearly all of these labels are steeped in judgment, ranging from the playfully disapproving to the outright insulting. Perhaps the safest label would be English "spoken most consistently by working-class African Americans, particularly in urban areas," plus "the vast majority of middle class African Americans" who regularly switch between this dialect and a more "Standard American English" (Edwards 383). Though not as much a mouthful as the previous description, the label that linguists have hesitantly settled upon is "African-American Vernacular English" (AAVE). Despite much public silence on AAVE, it is readily recognized by American ears: that special type of English that marvellously permits seemingly endless strings of negatives ("Ain't nobody never told her nohow"), nonchalantly deletes the word "is" while carefully preserving "was" ("She over there" or "He happy now"), and shows a wealth of semantic nuances even within a single tense ("We tryin," "We be tryin," "We been tryin," and "We BIN tryin" each having shades of meaning that are subtly distinct yet consistent).

African-American slang goes all-American

African-American Vernacular English was first probably stabilizing as a dialect in the late 1800s and early 1900s, largely founded as a racially-affiliated offshoot of Southern plantation speech. During that same time-frame, however, white Southern speech reacted by gradually shifting in new linguistic and identity-forming directions, in the wake of the Civil War and industrialization, away from black Southern speech. In some ways, then, this means that the modern white Southern dialect—the one we Americans associate with a drawl, twang, or "country" accent—actually has many newer features, while AAVE maintains older Southern dialect features that white Southerners have simply stopped using. (Think of the R-dropping accents associated with Victorian-era Southern gentility. AAVE speakers still commonly drop many of their R's, for instance pronouncing floor more like flaw or flow.)

Although McWhorter credits hip-hop culture with mainstreaming African-American body language, intonation, and vocabulary in the 2000s, the scholarship does undeniably show, at least with mere vocabulary, that AAVE has influenced the rest of English for many decades before the 1990s. In fact, three fateful moments in U.S. history perfectly correspond to waves of AAVE inspiration on the wider English vocabulary: (1) the jazz era, (2) the Black Power movement, and finally (3, yes indeed) the ongoing age of hip-hop. Notice below that AAVE flowerings in the American English lexicon primarily arrive not so much as altogether alien-looking new words but as fresh meanings added to already-existing English words, now revitalized or reinvented. Here's a host of the heartiest black slang-words to go mainstream and our best knowledge on where their meanings originated:

Jazz Age (1920s-1940s)

• bad = excellent. The ironic use of bad to mean "good" may well exist before the 1900s, but it was first attested in jazz-related writing in 1928. Presumably linked, many West African languages as well as English creoles—hybrid languages whose vocabulary mainly derives from English—also use bad, or a word with that original meaning, to evoke an additional ironic sense of "good" or to intensify a positive feeling (Sidnell). In the mainstream, the edgier variant badass has clearly arisen as the norm (Harper; hereafter [H]).
• badmouth = to disparage or criticize. Presumably from the early jazz age, badmouth as a verb is first clearly attested in 1941, derived from an 1800s AAVE or Gullah noun meaning a magical curse or hex (Dictionary.com; hereafter [D]). Gullah is an English creole spoken by the descendants of Africans slaves around coastal South Carolina, whose grammar, pronunciation, and other features show some influences from certain West African languages (OxfordDictionaries.com; hereafter [O]). Only a few hundred people still speak the Gullah language today.
• ball = an enjoyable or exciting time. From 1945 American English slang, this meaning of ball likely developed through 1930s AAVE, unsurprisingly coming from ball meaning "a party with dancing" that traces back to Old French baller "to dance" [D] [H], itself related of course to our ballerina. These words presumably have no relation to hip-hop culture's later baller/ballin, which derives from sports jargon.
• cat = guy. From 1920, this use of cat also narrowed to mean "jazz lover" as late as 1931 [D]. There is an interesting link, possibly more than coincidental, in the Wolof language of westernmost Africa, in which the ending -kat is used to designate a person, something like the English ending -er in words such as helper, runner, or teacher (Sidnell).
• cool = fashionable or stylish; excellent. First recorded from 1933, this use of cool became broadened to "excellent" in the late 1940s, probably in black bebop/jazz circles, who famously attributed it to musician Lester Young, a popularizer of many jazz-era slang terms (Vitale) [D]. It's not perfectly clear how a synonym for cold first came to mean stylish.
• dig = to understand or appreciate. The "understand" use of dig was first attested in 1934 and the "appreciate" use by 1939, probably derived from the original literal sense of excavating or uncovering [D]. Another theory, satisfying, if a bit more far-fetched, is it comes from the Wolof word deg/dega which also means "understand" or "appreciate" (Sidnell).
• hip = informed or aware; fashionable or stylish. The "informed" use of hip is surprising early: 1904. By 1915, this was taken up within and influenced by jazz. Along with the certainly related hep, its origin is unknown, though unverified popular etymologies commonly attribute it to a person's name [H]. There is some possibility it is related to Wolof hepi/hipi, meaning "to open one's eyes" or "be aware" (Sidnell).
• jive. This word is complicated by multiple meanings and an unclear, mixed-up history. The verb "to playfully deceive or tease" and the two nouns "deceptive or meaningless talk" and "swing/jazz" are all attributed to 1928 AAVE, perhaps ultimately derived from the West African language family. The resulting adjective "false or meaningless" is first documented in AAVE of the 1950s (Merriam-Webster; hereafter [M]) or 1960s [D]. Meanwhile, the verb "to align or agree," attested in 1943, might not have black roots, presumably deriving from jibe/gibe, which dates perhaps as far back as the 1810s before which its own history is lost. At least one definition of jibe/gibe, "to insult or jeer," might have entered English as far back as the 1500s from Middle French giber "to shake or handle roughly" [D].
• jukebox = a money-operated machine that plays recorded music. The juke/jook part is an old AAVE adjective meaning "bawdy" or "depraved" in the late 1930s, particularly from Gullah-derived AAVE in Florida, perhaps ultimately from a West African language [D] [H].
• with-it = fashionable or stylish. This meaning was first recorded by 1931 [D], of unknown origins.

Black Power Movement (1965-1970)

• doofus/dufus = foolish person. Attested in the early to mid-1960s, doofus could be related to goofus, which appears as early as 1920; however, neither is of any definite origin. If goofus comes from goof, itself attested in 1915 [M] [O], the derivation plausibly reaches back to 1500s Middle French goffe "awkward or stupid" [D].
• dude = guy. Originally, dude actually meant "a fop or dandy" (that is, a Victorian-era man overly concerned with appearances and fashion) as used in late 1800s New York City English. The word was next broadened to its modern meaning probably by AAVE, as first attested in 1966 [H]. The farther-back origin is unknown, perhaps from doodle meaning "fool" (as in the pre-Revolutionary song "Yankee Doodle Dandy"), itself ultimately from a German dialectal word, Dude, also meaning "fool" [O].
• right-on = an exclamation of agreement or enthusiasm. The Black Panthers popularized right-on in the mid-1960s, though it is also attested in a 1925 study of AAVE songs. It may have other non-AAVE origins as well, such as military ones (think "right on target" or the like) [D].
• rip-off = swindle. The meaning of rip-off as a verb "to rob" existed first, around 1967, then the noun "a fraud or theft" in 1969, and then the noun "a fraudulent imitation or copy" in 1971; these meanings developed through AAVE prisoner slang [D].
• skanky = promiscuous and/or unattractive. Being used by 1965 in AAVE, along with skank as the noun form for females of this description, skanky's origin is unknown [D]. Surprisingly, Merriam-Webster first attests the meaning of "filthy or squalid" much later: 1982.
• upside one's head = on the head (in a violent way). This prepositional phrase was first recorded in 1970, most famously of course in hitting someone upside the head [D].

Hip-Hop Culture (1980s-present)

Many of the following words are only known (though extremely widely in our Internet era) by younger Americans and so cannot be said to have fully mainstreamed. Perhaps that process is still in development? Non-black younger Americans generally know all these words and their senses, but some may only use the words in playful, light-hearted, or even ironic contexts.

• bae = a term of affection for a significant other. Pronounced "bay," bae appears in rap lyrics in 2005 before becoming youthful mainstream slang in the 2010s, almost certainly derived from baby.
• baller/ballin = excellent. In the early 1990s, baller/balla appeared in print as an adjective, from the noun baller in the late 1980s meaning "a successful person leading an exciting life," based on the lavish celebrity associations with basketballer. Baller/balla/ballin can also be used as standalone exclamations of enthusiasm ("All the Words"; hereafter [A]) [C].
• biddy/bitty = a young woman. In the 1980s and 1990s, hip-hop fused bitty, a spelling that perhaps adds meaning from bit or bitsy, with biddy, creating the definite sense of "a young woman" commonly used among younger Americans [A]. The word spelled biddy was used in both the sense of "a young woman" as far back as 1700s English and "an irritating old woman" by 1785, perhaps through the common thread of female servants, originally being a nickname for Bridget [M]. The old-woman sense has persisted until the present as well.
• boo = a term of affection for a significant other. First attested, twice, in 1990 with this meaning, boo comes from beau or possibly baby [A] [C].
• boo-yah = an exclamation of enthusiasm or victory (sometimes in a taunting manner). The expression was really at its peak back in the late 1990s, and other spellings or variants exist, including boo-yakka. It entered popular usage through black and (in the United Kingdom) West Indian influences, apparently in imitation of the sound of a gunshot (Dalzell 238). Sports commentator Stuart Scott certainly contributed to popularizing the phrase in the U.S. in the 1990s (Wulf), though few realized his catchphrase was actually pronounced subtly differently as boo-yow and he even spelled it as such.
• bougie = middle-class pretentious. From bourgeois, which also carries the same connotation of both "snobby" and "flashy," bougie came into mainstream English through 1960s AAVE [O], and it more precisely describes a person or their actions as "inauthentically aspiring to a flashy, lavish lifestyle." Several spellings variants exist, including boojee [A], boojie (Dalzell 230), and bouji (Dalzell 246). The full original word bourgeois is an Old French cognate with the rare English word burgher, both meaning "a townsperson" or, literally, "one who lives in a burg(h) or borough." This sense of "town-dweller" (as opposed "country-dweller") drifted to the adjective meaning "middle-class," a definition that dictionaries still preserve. However, another presumed influence on bougie was the narrower Marxist or communist use of bourgeois, with its definite negative connotation: "related to the materialistic ruling class" [A] [C] (Stevenson 203). The abbreviated version bougie may also be used as a noun for someone who fits this description. The noun is documented as far back as the early 1970s (Partridge 230).
• diss/dis = disrespect. Both a noun and a verb, diss comes through 1980s hip-hop presumably from disrespect [D], or at least through the negative associations of similar-sounding words like dismiss and disparage (Stevenson 497).
• dope = excellent. By the 1980s, dope was used in hip-hop to mean "excellent," coming from the still-relevant sense of "marijuana," probably through positive associations of partying and euphoria. In early 1900s general American English slang, dope referred to drugs generically and, strangely enough, originally opium in the 1880s [A]. The verb dope, "to drug," is from 1889 in reference to liquid opium. All these English meanings trace further back to Dutch from at least the first decade of the 1800s, Doop, with connotations of thick sauces, dips, and dipping. The meaning of dope as "foolish person" is first attested in 1851, probably from the sense of being intellectually as "thick" as a heavy dipping sauce.
• feel me/you = understand me/you [C].
• ghost = to abruptly end communication or depart without a trace [C]. The meaning of ghost as "to suddenly leave or vanish" is recorded in AAVE at least as early as 1969, and the synonymous phrase do a ghost is recorded in 1995 (Dalzell 862). In the modern world of online dating, the meaning has of course broadened to mean "to end a personal relationship by suddenly ending communication" [O].
• grill = face or mouth [C]. The sense of grill meaning "teeth" is from 2001 and meaning "jewel-encrusted tooth caps" is also from the early 2000s (Dalzell 367). It presumably comes from grille "a metal screen or grate."
• holler/holla = to contact someone; to express desire for; an exclamation of agreement or enthusiasm. The verb holler at, informally meaning "to contact someone," is from 1990s hip-hop, broadening to mean "to flirt or hit on someone." In the 2000s, holler at continued to broaden to mean "to express desire for someone or something" and the associated standalone shout of holla has become a simple exclamation of joy or approval [A].
• janky = of poor or degraded quality; messed-up; "crappy." The word janky is from AAVE slang of the 1990s and became youthful mainstream slang in the 2000s [A], with no known origin beyond that [O], though language blogs and the like sometimes suggest a connection with junky. At least one esteemed source gives the unusual definition of "impudent," tracing janky to the 1920s, possibly from jaunty and with no mention of any black origins (Beale 612).
• lit = exciting or excellent. In the 2010s, lit came to mean "exciting or excellent" through hip-hop and AAVE [A]. This comes from the non-AAVE earlier meaning of "intoxicated" [M]. The first use of "get lit" is attested as far back as 1918 American English slang [M]. This seems to indicate a similar semantic path of drift between lit and the synonymous word dope: a risqué word that came to have a positive generalized meaning.
• make it rain = to throw a shower of paper money [C]. White British popstar Ed Sheeran's song of this title speaks to the recent internationality of this particular AAVE-derived term.
• off the hook = wildly fun [C]. The AAVE slang term off the hook is recorded at least as far back as 1999 (Dalzell 1024) and the synonymous phrase off the chain as far back as 2001 (Dalzell 364). The variant off the heezie/heezy was apparently coined by rapper Snoop Dogg in the 1990s (Dalzell 1129). It's not at all clear that the fun meaning of off the hook is related to the older sense of "released from an obligation or difficult situation," which derives from the idea of catching and releasing fish.
• poppin = exciting or excellent, especially in a fresh or new way. 2007 saw the meteoric rise of poppin through three record-charting songs by different hip-hop artists that all used the word in their lyrics [A].
• trippin = behaving wildly or foolishly. The word trippin came into slang use by the late 1980s through AAVE and hip-hop. This clearly took one step away from the noun trip, a wild psychological experience, itself first attested in 1959 with no particular AAVE origins [A].
• woke = informed or aware, especially of social injustice. This use of woke was controversially absorbed into the mainstream in the mid-2010s and popularized by 2014, where it is sometimes used to simply mean "aware or conscious," even in a playful or faux-serious way. The more serious sense derived from the Black Lives Matter movement (and not primarily via hip-hop), particularly through consciousness-raising slogans in the immediate aftermath of the 2012 Trayvon Martin killing. A common slogan from then is stay woke, which hearkens to the phrase stay woke up used as early as 1940, if not earlier, to mean "stay alert or informed." An intermediate step is woke meaning simply "informed" as documented from the 1960s, with definite civil-rights connotations [A].

Works Cited:

"All the Words." Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, LLC, 2019. <https://www.dictionary.com/e/all-the-words/>.

Beale, Paul (ed.). Eric Patridge: A Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English. Routledge, 1984. Transferred to Digital Printing 2006. p. 612.

Chesley, Paul. "You Know What It Is: Learning Words through Listening to Hip-Hop." PLoS ONE 6(12): e28248. University of Alberta, 2011. <https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0028248&type=printable>

Dalzell, Tom, and Terry Victor, editors. The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English: A-I. Routledge, 2006.

Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, LLC, 2019. <https://www.dictionary.com/>.

Edwards, Walter F. "African American Vernacular English: phonology." A Handbook of Varieties of English 1: Phonology, edited by Bernd Kortmann and Edgar W. Schneider, Mouton de Gruyter, 2004, p. 383.

Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary. 2019. <https://www.etymonline.com/>

"John McWhorter: 'Talking Back, Talking Black: Truths about America's Lingua [...]' |Talks at Google." YouTube. YouTube, 4 Jan. 2018. <https://youtu.be/eoWGx060lyA>.

Merriam-Webster. Merriam-Webster, Inc., 2019. <https://www.merriam-webster.com/>.

OxfordDictionaries. Oxford University Press, 2019. <https://en.oxforddictionaries.com >.

Sidnell, Jack "African American Vernacular English (Ebonics)." Language Varieties. The Charlene Junko Sato Center for Pidgin, Creole, and Dialect Studies. University of Hawai'i. 2012. <https://www.hawaii.edu/satocenter/langnet/definitions/aave.html>.

Stevenson, Angus. Oxford Dictionary of English. 3rd ed., Oxford University Press, 2010. <https://books.google.com/books?id=anecAQAAQBAJ&d>.

Vitale, Tom. "Lester Young: 'The Prez' Still Rules At 100". NPR. npr, 2009. <https://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112255870>.

Wulf, Steve. "Stuart Scott dies at age of 49". ESPN. ESPN, 2015. <www.espn.com/espn/story/_/id/12118296/stuart-scott-espn-anchor-dies-age-49/>