Entry · catalog no. 9302
bum rush
/ /ˈbʌm ˈɹʌʃ/ /BUM RUSH
verb · New York City / Long Island · 1980s
✓ Verified
1.
To rush a door, a stage or a person as a group and take it by force.
“They tried to bum rush the door at the sold-out show.”
2.
To push someone out or off by force, from the older noun phrase 'the bum's rush'.
“The bouncer gave him the bum's rush at midnight.”
Origin & Attribution
'The bum's rush' is an older American phrase for forcible ejection, recorded by Merriam-Webster from 1904. The verb 'bum-rush' is credited to Public Enemy's Yo! Bum Rush the Show (Def Jam, 1987); Merriam-Webster dates the verb to 1987 and Green's Dictionary of Slang to 1986. Public Enemy, from Long Island, New York, made the verb a hip-hop staple, and it passed from there into general American English. Public Enemy are not credited with the older noun phrase, only with the verb's wide use.
1904
'Bum's rush' recorded as American slang for forcible ejection
1986
Public Enemy perform the title track; Green's dates the verb here
1987
Yo! Bum Rush the Show released
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The Northeast
New York City / Long Island · 1980s
Spoken by
Hip-hop communities, then general speakers
$BUMRUSThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Steady39 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
60/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1987
in the culture
Cultural energy indexed from documented usage, search interest, and citation frequency. The recorded date is the archive’s permanent point of record.
Hear it spoken
By region — how it actually sounds
@bxgriot
The Bronx, NY
@phillyanne
Philadelphia, PA
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Citations & Sources
■
Public Enemy, Yo! Bum Rush the Show, Def Jam, 1987
song
■
+ Cite a sourceGrammarphobia, 'Bum rush', 2012, citing Merriam-Webster, OED and Green's Dictionary of Slang
web
See also