[Ads-l] Trivia: heard _nut up_, HDAS "go crazy or go berserk"
Wilson Gray
hwgray at GMAIL.COM
Fri Aug 19 20:57:25 UTC 2016
Reality TV, white speaker:
"When she saw me with my new girl, she just _nutted up_!"
I haven't heard anyone say that in 65 years and never before anybody white
say it before nor have I heard it used with that meaning before.
Back in the The Lou in the '50's, to _nut up_ was to "burst into
uncontrolled laughter, turning and bending at the waist, slapping thigh,
guffawing," etc. More-mature readers may recall this as one of Sammy Davis,
Jr.'s shticks. Younger readers may have seen this parodied - as a general
black thing, as it it is: been there, done that; and not as anyone's
particular shtick- on Key & Peele.
My WAG, FWIW, is that both uses derive ultimately from _go nuts_. But...
Youneverknow.
--
-Wilson
-----
All say, "How hard it is that we have to die!"---a strange complaint to
come from the mouths of people who have had to live.
-Mark Twain
------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
More information about the Ads-l
mailing list