Entry · catalog no. 7009
gank
/ /ɡæŋk/ /GANK
verb · West Coast (California) · 1980s
✓ Verified
1.
To steal from or swindle someone; to rob, con, or forcibly take. Originally to cheat in a drug deal, later to steal generally.
“They tried to gank him at the door, so he stopped dealing with them.”
Origin & Attribution
West Coast Black vernacular, surfacing in hip-hop by the late 1980s. Among the earliest recorded uses is N.W.A's 1987 Dopeman, where the sense is to cheat in a drug sale; by King Tee's 1990 Ruff Rhyme (Back Again) it had broadened to plain stealing. Likely a clipped, altered form of gangster. It later drifted into gaming slang, far from its origins.
1987
N.W.A, Dopeman (con/cheat sense)
1990
King Tee, Ruff Rhyme (Back Again) (steal sense)
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The West
West Coast (California) · 1980s
Spoken by
West Coast Black and hip-hop speakers
$GANKThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Steady39 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
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
@bayarea
Oakland, CA
@ladi
Los Angeles, CA
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See also