Dictionary of Contemporary Slang (125 page)

push
vb

to sell illegal drugs, especially when the sale involves coercion

pusher
n

a supplier of illicit drugs, especially addictive drugs. The word implies that the seller uses coercion or tries to lead people into addiction in order to profit from them (if this is not the case,
dealer
is the alternative). The term is now used by police, jour-nalists,
parents, etc. and only rarely by drug users or sellers.

push the envelope
vb American

to test or extend limits, go too far. The term, used in fiction by Tom Wolfe and John Grisham, derives from the jargon of test pilots: the envelope is the ultimate technical capability as expressed on a graph.

puss
n

1.
American
the face, mouth. A word often used in compounds such as ‘sour puss' and ‘glamour-puss', puss was a favourite word of pugilists and ‘tough guys' in the earlier 20th century. It derives from the Irish Gaelic
pus
, meaning mouth.

He told her if she didn't shut up he'd give her a sock in the puss.

2.
a variant form of
pussy
(in all its senses)

puss boots
n Caribbean

soft-soled shoes

puss-weed
n American

a variant form of
pussy
in the sense of
wimp
, heard among US adolescents since the late 1980s

pussy
¹
n

1.
the female genitals. A cause of many double entendres and minor embarrassments, this usage of the word derives from the resemblance of pubic hair to fur, perhaps reinforced by male notions of affection. (The French equivalent is
chatte
, virtually a literal translation.) Pussy or
puss
was first recorded in the sexual sense in the 16th century.

2.
women viewed as sex objects. An unromantic male term used in the same indiscriminate manner as
tail
,
ass
, etc. In this generic sense, the term may be expressed as pussy, ‘some pussy' or, occasionally, ‘a piece of pussy'.

‘I hate to say it but I understand in London there's a lot of pussy over there.'
(US police officer,
Sunday Times
colour supplement, 1 January 1967)

3.
a weak, harmless male, a timid person. A word which probably originated in the boxers' lexicon to describe the feeble, patting punches of a loser.

‘“He's a pussy, Frank.” “Yeah, but he's our pussy.”'
(
Blue Velvet
, US film, 1986)

4.
furs, in the jargon of criminals and the police. This example of the jargon of cat burglars was recorded in
FHM
magazine in April 1996.

5.
a coquettish or ‘kittenish' female, in lesbian parlance

pussy
²
adj British

unpleasant, execrable. This use of the word in the late 1990s was probably inspired by the noun sense of the female pudenda, rather than that of a weak, ineffectual person and reflects a distaste for female sexuality on the part of male adolescent gang members, its first users.

pussyflex
n Jamaican and British

a worthless and/or weak effeminate person, in the slang of gang members and their imitators. It comprises the slang senses of
pussy
; vagina and weakling, and
flex
in the sense of display.

pussy-whipped
adj
‘hen-pecked'. An American vulgarism probably inspired by the western cliché ‘pistol-whipped'.
Pussy
is a long-established term for the female genitals or women in general.

put (someone) down
vb
to snub, humiliate or belittle. A vogue term among British
beatniks
in the early 1960s, adopted from American street slang.

‘Evil hearted you, you always try to put me down, with the things you do and the words you spread around …'
(Lyrics to
Evil-hearted You
, the Yardbirds, 1965)

putdown
n

a snub or humiliation. A back-formation from the verb to
put (someone) down
.

Being left off the guest list was the ultimate putdown.

put in the fix, put the fix in
vb American
to bribe, suborn, or corrupt (in order to resolve a problem)

put-on
n

a deception, fraud, cheat. A back-formation (with slightly changed emphasis) from the verb to
put someone on
(although Partridge cites instances of the expression in Victorian use).

put one on someone
vb

to hit, punch someone. An aggressive euphemism which is also rendered by
lay/hang one on someone
.

‘One of my colleagues said that he felt like “putting one on” the attendant for the way he treated the child.'
(
Inside the British Police
, Simon Holdaway, 1983)

put one's hands up
vb

to surrender, give in, confess. A euphemism popular among the British police and underworld.

‘It was brilliant. He couldn't believe it. He had to put his hands up. Yes I did that one by subterfuge.'
(Police officer quoted in
Inside the British Police
, Simon Holdaway, 1983)

put someone away
vb British

to kill. A euphemism employed by underworld or would-be underworld figures.

When I told him he went spare – he threatened to put the guy away.

put the acid on
n Australian

to demand money or information (from someone)
put the bite on
vb
to pressurise someone, especially for a loan or repayment of money owed, or as part of a campaign of intimidation. This expression seems to have originated in North American usage early in the 20th century.

put the boot in
vb British

a.
to kick (someone). An expression used by
skinheads
of the late 1960s as part of their repertoire (along with
aggro
,
bother
and
put the nut on
).

b.
to attack someone figuratively, particularly when they are already under attack, vulnerable or incapacitated

put the frighteners on (someone)
vb British

to menace, threaten or intimidate (someone). An underworld and police expression employing a familiar form of words (as in
put the bite/kybosh/mockers on
).

put the hammer on (someone)
vb
to bully, oppress, extort (someone). This phrase is heard throughout the English-speaking world, particularly in Scotland, meaning to pressurise someone for a loan, gift, etc., and in the US, where it commonly denotes bullying or menacing.

Every time we go near a pub one of you guys puts the hammer on me.
As soon as he starts to put the hammer on, let me know.

put the kybosh/kibosh on
vb

to frustrate, ruin, prevent, jeopardise. Many conflicting and often far-fetched etymologies have been suggested for this phrase, first recorded in the 1830s meaning to defeat. Its ultimate origin remains obscure.

put the mockers on
vb British

to frustrate or jeopardise (someone's plans), to curse with bad luck. This old phrase was last popular in the 1960s, but is still heard occasionally. It almost certainly originates in the Yiddish
mockers
, meaning a curse or bad luck, from the Hebrew
maches
, meaning plague.

put the moves on (someone)
vb American

to menace, oppress, cheat (someone). An item of street slang also heard among adolescents and featured in the US film,
The Sandlot Kids
, 1994.

putz
n American

a foolish, clumsy or unfortunate person. The word is the Yiddish for ‘ornament' used as a synonym for the male member, hence
prick
. Despite its (little-known) origin, putz is a relatively mild term of abuse in English; in Yiddish it still carries more pejorative overtones.

p.w.t.
n American

an abbreviation of ‘poor
white trash
'

Q.T., q.t.
n See
on the q.t.

quack
n

a doctor. This usually lightheartedly pejorative term originated in the 17th century when it referred to a peddler of spurious cures. It is a shortening of ‘quacksalver' which is composed of ‘quack' (give one's verbal ‘patter') and ‘salve' (save, soothe or cure), and is a pun on ‘quicksilver'.

quad, quod
n American

a clumsy or unfortunate person, misfit. The word, used by high school and college students from the 1990s, is probably a shortening of ‘quadriplegic' (disabled in all four limbs), although some users derive it from ‘quadrilateral' as a version of
square
.

quail
n

a girl, young woman, or females viewed as sex objects. This equating of the female with the game bird is approximately three hundred years old, surviving in the language of American high-school and college students, where predatory males also talk of going out ‘loaded for quail' (ready or equipped for seduction).

quakin'
adj American

excellent, impressive, exciting and/or excessive. A synonym, heard since 2000, for
slamming
,
jamming
, etc.

quality
adj

good. As an appreciative description or exclamation of approval the word is used by British schoolchildren among others.

quandong
n Australian

a woman. The quandong fruit (
santalum acuminatus
) is fleshy with a hard seed centre; the word has thus been appropriated to refer to women with supposedly similar qualities – either prostitutes or friendly females who refuse to be seduced.

quean
n British

the earlier spelling of
queen
, meaning an effeminate homosexual. This spelling coexisted with queen until the early 1960s when it virtually disappeared. Quean was a descendant of Old and Middle English words related to (but not derived from) ‘queen', stemming ultimately from an Indo-European ancestor,
gwena
, meaning woman. Over 1,000 years the senses of quean shifted from ‘woman' to ‘wanton', before being transferred to a male context.

queef
n American

an alternative spelling of
kweef

queen
n

an effeminate homosexual. The word
quean
signified a
whore
in early 19th-century slang. This appellation was transferred to male prostitutes (often transvestite) and thence to male homosexuals in general. The use of the word is obviously reinforced by its colloquial use to mean an imperious or ostentatious (older) woman. In the
gay
environment of the 1970s and 1980s queen was used to refer specifically to individuals who are affected in manner, elderly and/or consciously effeminate.

‘And he's just a go-getting queen. He's interested in you purely because of your plays.'
(Kenneth Halliwell, quoted in Joe Orton's Diary, 2 May 1967, 1986)

queer
n
,
adj

(a person who is) homosexual. Until the 19th century queer denoted odd or curious, as it still does in standard English. Its use as first a euphemism, then a slang synonym for homosexual arose between the world wars, probably first in the USA. Queer ultimately derives from
quer
, a German word meaning crooked or awry. In the mid-1980s
gay
activists began to use the term to refer to themselves, in keeping with the trend among ‘transgressive' minorities to appropriate the language of their oppressors (as in the earlier case of
nigger
).

‘You can't expect to pick up a young post-office worker and his middle-aged keeper, and burst into tears because the keeper is queer.'
(Joe Orton's Diary, 2 May 1967)

queer-bashing
n British

the attacking, intimidation or mugging of male homosexuals. A practice indulged in by
teddy boys
, and later
skinheads
, among others. The term has been extended to denote verbal aggression or prejudice against
gays
.

quickie
n

a hurried or short-lived sex act

quid
n

a pound sterling. The word was first used to refer to a guinea, then a sovereign, later to the sum of one pound. The origin of the word (it arose in the 17th century) is obscure. Partridge suggests ‘what' (
quid
in Latin) as a synonym for ‘wherewithal'. An equally plausible derivation is from
quid pro quo
, alluding to the words on older banknotes, ‘I promise to pay the bearer the sum of…'.

quidlets
n pl British

money, pounds sterling. A humorous version of
quid
using the diminutive suffix ‘-let'.