Entry · catalog no. 1003

hip

/ hɪp /HIP

adjective · Harlem / national · 1900s

✓ Verified

Aware, in the know — carrying the kind of knowledge no school issues. Later: ahead of the crowd in taste and style.

“Stay close to your uncle — he'll get you hip to how this city works.”

Origin & Attribution

Black urban vernacular, in print as "hep" by the early 1900s and defined by Cab Calloway in his 1938 Hepster's Dictionary as wise and sophisticated. A proposed root in Wolof "hepi" (to open one's eyes) remains debated. Every later "hipster" borrowed the word from Black jazz culture.

1900s

In print as "hep"

1938

Defined by Calloway as wise, sophisticated

1940s

"Hipster" coined from it

Region of origin

West

Midwest

N.East

South

Nationwide

Harlem / national · 1900s

Spoken by

Black jazz and urban speakers

$HIPThe Record · cultural traction

▲ Steady

124 yrs

ahead of the mainstream

85/100

peak cultural energy

Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.

Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest

First used

1902

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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Citations & Sources

■

Cab Calloway's Hepster's Dictionary — glossary · 1938

submitted

■

Juba to Jive, Clarence Major (discussion of the Wolof theory) — reference · 1994

submitted

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