Entry · catalog no. 7310
dog
/ /dɔːɡ/ /DAWG
verb · nationwide · 1930s
✓ Verified
1.
To mistreat or run somebody down — to disrespect, criticize, or talk about them badly, often in front of others. Also "dog out."
“She was hurt he dogged her in front of everybody. Quit dogging my cooking.”
Origin & Attribution
African American Vernacular English. To dog someone — treat them the way a stray dog gets treated — is long-standing Black usage recorded in Green's Dictionary of Slang; the intensified "dog out" is noted there as specifically AAVE.
1930s
"Dog" as a verb of mistreatment in Black speech
2010s
Recorded in Green's Dictionary of Slang
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
Nationwide / diaspora
nationwide · 1930s
Spoken by
Black American speakers nationwide
$DOGThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Steady91 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
55/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1935
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
@auntiereg
Atlanta, GA
@deltasoul
Memphis, TN
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See also