Entry · catalog no. 8635
square
/ /skwɛər/ /SKWAIR
noun · Harlem / nationwide · 1930s
✓ Verified
1.
A person out of step with the culture — uncool, conventional, not in the know. Also an adjective for anything stiff or mainstream.
“Don't invite him, he a square — he'll call the police over the music.”
Origin & Attribution
Harlem jazz slang of the 1930s. Calloway's Hepster's Dictionary (1938) defines a square as an unhep person. Passed into general American English through jazz and later beat culture, its Black origin mostly forgotten along the way.
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
Nationwide
Harlem / nationwide · 1930s
Spoken by
Jazz musicians and hep speakers from the 1930s; general Black and American speech since
$SQUAREThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Steady88 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
44/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1938
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
@auntiereg
Atlanta, GA
@deltasoul
Memphis, TN
Contribute your pronunciation
Citations & Sources
■
+ Cite a sourceCab Calloway's Cat-ologue: A Hepster's Dictionary — book · 1938
submitted
See also