Entry · catalog no. 6215
the bump
/ /ðə bʌmp/ /thuh-BUHMP
noun · nationwide · 1970s
✓ Verified
1.
A 1970s dance done by knocking hips with a partner on the beat.
“They were out there doing the bump till the lights came up.”
Origin & Attribution
A Black social dance that swept the mid-1970s, its one essential move a hip-to-hip bump on every other beat. It rode the funk and disco floors of 1974 to 1976 and threw off a run of records — The Bump, Lady Bump — built to name it.
1974
The bump spreads on funk and disco floors
1975
Peak of the craze; Lady Bump and other records name it
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
Nationwide / diaspora
nationwide · 1970s
Spoken by
nationwide
$THEBUMThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Dormant52 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
40/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
First used
1974
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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See also