Glossary of Harlem Slang, excerpted from Zora Neale Hurston's Spunk: A Collection of Short Stories

This is an abridged list of terms featured in "Story in Harlem Slang."

Air out: leave, flee, stroll
Astorperious: haughty, biggity

Bailing: having fun
Bam & down in Bam: down South
Beating up your gums: talking to no purpose
Beluthahatchie: next station beyond Hell
Big boy: stout fellow, in South it means fool
Blowing your top: getting very angry; occasionally used to mean, He's doing fine
Boogie-woogie: type of dancing and rhythm. For years, in South, it meant secondary syphilis
Bull-skating: bragging
Butt sprung: a suit or a skirt out of shape in the rear

Cold: exceeding, well, etc., as in "He was cold on that trumpet."
Collar a nod: sleep
Collor a hot: eat a meal
Conk buster: cheap liquor; also an intellectual Negro
Cruising: parading down the avenue. Variations include oozing, percolating, and free-wheeling.
Cut: doing something well


Diddy-Wah-Diddy: a far place, a measure of distance or a suburb of hell
Dig: understand as in "Do you get me? Do you collar the jiver?"
Draped down: dressed in the height of Harlem fashion
Dumb to the fact: you don't know what you are talking about
Dusty butt: cheap prostitute


First thing smoking: a train
Frail eel: a pretty girl


Getting on some stiff time: really doing well with your racket
Ginny Gall: a suburb of Helll
Go when the wagon comes: You may be acting biggity now, but you'll cool down when enough power gets behind you
Granny Grunt: a mythical character to whom most questions may be referred
Ground rations: sex, also under rations
Gum beater: a blowhard, a braggart
Gut-bucket: low dive, type of music

I'm cracking but I'm facking: I'm wisecracking, but I'm telling the truth
I shot him lightly and he died politely: I completely outdid him

Jelly: sex

Jook: a pleasure house, in the class of gut-bucket
Jooking: playing a musical instrument or dancing in the manner of the jooks (pronounced like tookl)
Juice: liquor
July jam: something very hot
Jump salty: get angry

Kitchen mechanic: a domestic
Knock yourself out: have a good time
Lightly, slightly, and politely: doing things perfectly
Little sister: measures of hotness


Miss Anne: a white woman
Mister Charlie: a white man
Monkey chaser: a West Indian
Mug Man: a small time thug

Nothing to the bear but his curly hair: I call your bluff


Palmer House: walking flat-footed
Peckerwood: poor and unloved class of Southern whites
Peeping through my likkers: carrying on even though drunk
Piano: spare ribs
Pig meat: young girl
Pilch: house or apartment
Pitch toes: yellow girl
Playing the dozens: low-rating the ancestors of your opponent


Righteous mass or grass: good hair
Righteous rags: the components of a Harlem-style suit
Rug-cutter: originally a person frequenting house-rent parties, became a good dancer
Russian: a Southern Negro up north, "Rushed up here"
Scrap iron: cheap liquor
Sell out: run in fear
Sender: he or she who can get you to go, i.e., has what it takes
Smoking: looking someone over
Sooner: anything cheap and mongrel
Stanch: to begin
Stomp: low dance
Stormbuzzard: shiftless, homeless character
Stroll: doing something well
Sugar Hill: northwest sector of Harlem, near Washington Heights, many professionals

The bear: confession of poverty
The man: the law or powerful boss
Thousand on a plate: beans

V and X: five-and-ten-cent store
West Hell: another suburb of Hell, worse than the original
What's on the rail for the lizard?: suggestion for moral turpitude
Whip it to the red: beat your head until it is bloody
Woofing: aimless talk

Young suit: ill-fitting, too small
Your likker told you: misguided behavior

Zoot suit with the reet pleat: Harlem style suit, padded shoulders, 43-inch trousers at the knee with small cuffs, high waistline