Entry · catalog no. 1022
righteous
/ /
adjective · Harlem, New York City ·
✓ Verified
1.
Splendid, first-rate, the real thing. A word of high praise for something genuine and excellent, well before it narrowed in mainstream English to mean only morally upright.
“That was a righteous band last night.”
Origin & Attribution
Harlem jive of the 1930s. Cab Calloway's 1938 Hepster's Dictionary defines it plainly as "splendid, okay." Black musicians used it as everyday praise for quality; the moral sense the mainstream leans on today is only one branch of a broader vernacular meaning.
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
Nationwide / diaspora
Harlem, New York City ·
Spoken by
$RIGHTEThe Record · cultural traction
▲ 26 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
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
Contribute your pronunciation
See also