National ArchiveBlack’s Dictionary
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Entry · catalog no. 7961

jack

/ /pending
verb · West — Los Angeles, then nationwide · 2026
Verified
1.
To rob or take by force; to steal outright.
They tried to jack him for the chain outside the club.
Origin & Attribution
Black speech of the West Coast and Midwest, standard by the late 1980s. Ice Cube turned it into a manifesto on record in 1990, describing the theft of beats as a heist — the word carried the whole logic of the crime with it.
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The West
West — Los Angeles, then nationwide · 2026
Spoken by
West — Los Angeles, then nationwide
$JACKThe Record · cultural traction
Rising
0 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
12/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
2026
in the culture
Recorded here
2026
point of first record
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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Citations & Sources
"Jackin' for Beats," Ice Cube — single · 1990
submitted
"Boyz-n-the-Hood," N.W.A — single · 1987
submitted
Green's Dictionary of Slang, "jack" v. — reference · 1980s citations
submitted
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See also