Entry · catalog no. 5920
son
/ — /pending
noun · New York City · 2026
✓ Verified
1.
A term of address for a friend or peer, said in place of a name — "what's good, son?" Not about age or family; a way of claiming someone as close.
“Nah son, it wasn't even like that.”
Origin & Attribution
New York City address term that spread out of the b-boy and rap scenes of the 1970s and '80s — closely tied to Queens — into the city's everyday speech and then, through hip-hop, far beyond it.
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The Northeast
New York City · 2026
Spoken by
New York City
$SONThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Rising0 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
@bxgriot
The Bronx, NY
@phillyanne
Philadelphia, PA
Contribute your pronunciation
Citations & Sources
■
Human Care NY, "Common Slang Terms from New York" — reference
submitted
■
+ Cite a sourceNew York hip-hop usage, 1980s–1990s — documented
submitted
See also