From AK to young G

Do you need a translator to understand popular music these days? The Entertainment Monitor magazine thinks you do. And they’ve graciously offered to be your guide through the “hybrid labyrinth” of slang words like “weed,” “boom box,” and “D.J.”

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The Entertainment Monitor is a bimonthly magazine which covers film, music, television, and the Internet in an attempt to inform concerned parents about “the content of popular entertainment today.”

As part of this mission, they have compiled a growing slang dictionary called “Pop Talk,” which begins with a warning to parents:

“Beware, those of you who think you’re hip to what your kids are saying, you may have a false sense of security. I was familiar with slang in the 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s, but the language of the 90’s is changing at lightening [sic] speed.”

Entertainment Monitor, May/June ’96

Are you down* with the latest 90’s-speak? See if you can guess the meaning of the following slang terms (according to the Entertainment Monitor definitions, of course):

  • Or skip the quiz and take a look right now at some excerpts from the Entertainment Monitor‘s slang dictionary.

*be down – in compliance or in synch with


1. tootsee roll

A dance rolling a person’s buttocks
Candy
Having sex

2. hit me on the hip

Have sex with me
Loan me some money
Page me

3. rub-a-dub

Kill someone (“rub” them out)
Have sex
A massage

4. locs

Locals
Imitation Docs (Doc Martens)
Sunglasses

5. flossin’

Being attentive to oral hygiene
Hanging out
Wearing a thong bikini

6. wasted

Exhausted
Someone who has been killed (i.e. “He got wasted”)
Being intoxicated on drugs or alcohol

7. sister stone

Marijuana
The crack pipe
The bench a homeless person sleeps on

8. props

Drug paraphrenalia
Dramatic accessories
Proper respect

9. four deep

Four people in a car
Four people having sex
Dead and buried (the cheap way)

10. buckle bunnies

The replacement for Hush Puppies
A particular breed of rabbit
Country slang for groupies

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Owned by no one—except you.

We just keep seeing it happen: Newsrooms owned by billionaires and corporations are spinning their own narratives, overwriting the truth, following only stories that keep them in the pocket of those with even more power.

Not here. We’re not owned by anyone. We’re not part of any cult that demands our allegiance to a bottom line. We’ve spoken up and spoken out while other newsrooms changed their stories—or cut them altogether—to keep the C suite happy.

Our mission is to find the truth and amplify it. That’s why we’re independent, nonprofit, and, crucially, funded by readers. The investigations on our website will always be free to read, watch, and listen to, but our newsroom is powered by readers who pitch in what they can so we can keep asking the hard questions.

Can you chip in today?

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