"keep it real"

[Bryan James Gordon]

People say "keep it real" - as Mary notes, originally and still primarily in
African American or African-American-influenced varieties of English - in
direct reference to what Polonius would call being true to thine own self.
It means being true to one's own nature, and in particular to one's role in
one's community. Keeping it real is opposed to behaviours such as fronting,
or putting up a front; and selling out, or abandoning one's community in
order to achieve the "American dream". It is also opposed to living an
exorbitant or overly showy lifestyle.

It is used, as Jason says, in saying goodbye as well, in the same way that
"take care" is used - as an admonition to actually follow through in keeping
it real.

It can also be used to connote standing up for oneself or being willing to
go to extraordinary measures to protect oneself or one's friends and loved
ones. In this sense, "keeping it real" is opposed to cowardice or silent
acceptance of things.

Someone who has much better experience than I do with this term would make a
much better source. I guess, having been exposed to this phrase my whole
life it never occurred to me there would be people who don't know what it
means or where it comes from. But it doesn't come from me, so don't cite me.

- Bryan James Gordon

2008/7/13 Siegel, Jason F. <siegeljf at indiana.edu>:

> I also have the impression that it is often used like "take care" or "see
> you around" as just something that people say when they are saying good-bye.
>
> --Jason
>
> --
> Jason F. Siegel
> Ph.D. Student, Linguistics & French Linguistics
> Department of French & Italian
> Ballantine Hall 642
> 1020 East Kirkwood Avenue
> Indiana University
> Bloomington, IN 47405-7103
> USA
> siegeljf at indiana.edu
>
>
>
> Quoting Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>:
>
>  At 10:04 PM -0700 7/12/08, Mary Bucholtz wrote:
>>
>>> It's an African American English expression that's widely used in
>>> hip hop culture. From there it's spread to a large number of speech
>>> communities around the world.
>>>
>>> Mary
>>>
>>
>> In support of this, another poster on ADS-L, Ben Zimmer of Oxford
>> University Press, notes:
>>
>> FWIW, "Keep It Real" is the title of a track on John Lee and Gerry
>> Brown's 1975 Blue Note album "Mango Sunrise".
>>
>> http://www.worldsoul.com/JOHN_LEE_&_GERRY_BROWN__1390_html
>>
>>
>>
>>> --On Friday, July 11, 2008 2:23 PM +0100 Sarah Colvin
>>> <sarah.colvin at ED.AC.UK> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>> Can anybody give me a reference or advise me re. the history, use, and
>>>> meaning of the phrase "keep it real"?
>>>> Thanks,
>>>> Sarah Colvin
>>>>
>>>> Professor Sarah Colvin
>>>> University of Edinburgh
>>>> David Hume Tower
>>>> George Square
>>>> Edinburgh EH8 9JX
>>>> Tel. ++ 131 650 3630
>>>> email: sarah.colvin at ed.ac.uk
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> --
>>>> The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
>>>> Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> **************************************************
>>> Mary Bucholtz, Professor
>>> Department of Linguistics
>>> 3607 South Hall
>>> University of California
>>> Santa Barbara, CA 93106-3100
>>> phone: (805) 893-5415
>>> fax: (805) 893-7769
>>> http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/faculty/bucholtz/
>>> **************************************************
>>>
>>
>>
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