boogaloo
Part of speech: noun
verb
Morphological type: simple
Topics: entertainment
government
lifestyle
music
politics
Etymology: Attested as a style of dance since at least January 1966 (and found in the titles of many songs around that time), perhaps from boogie (for the ending, compare crackaloo, hullabaloo). (Compare Spanish bugalú, the Spanish name for the style of music and dance.) Kent Harris used the stage name "Boogaloo" in the 1950s. The sense "sequel or repetition" refers to the title of Breakin' 2: Electric Boogaloo (1984), a sequel which was considered to be so bad it became a cult classic. Compare the sense "black person" to boogalee, a term for a Cajun, attested since 1960 or earlier.
Inflected forms:
form: boogaloos
pos: noun
tags: plural
form: boogaloos
pos: verb
tags: present
singular
third-person
form: boogalooing
pos: verb
tags: participle
present
form: boogalooed
pos: verb
tags: participle
past
form: boogalooed
pos: verb
tags: past
Senses:
gloss: A genre of music that blends rhythm and blues and soul music with Cuban-style rhythms, originating in the United States in the 1960s.
pos: noun
tags: uncountable
gloss: A style of dance to this music, popular in the 1960s.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
examples: Most hip Gothamites now trying to get rhythmic understanding between arms, legs and sacroiliac in order to get in on the Boogaloo dance craze.
Fania did not begin as a boogaloo label but it was also quick to sign new, previously unheralded talent, including Bobby Valentin, George Guzman, Monguito Santamaria, Joe Bataan and the teenage Willie Colon.
gloss: A piece of music, or an instance of dancing, in or of this style.
pos: noun
tags: countable
examples: Basie played boogie-woogie, and Ellington boleros and boogaloos. To see the Marsalis faction rap a standard or breakdance before the blues would bring them full-circle, in full embrace, […]
They enjoy a martini or a boogaloo in bachelorette apartments in unnamed cities. These album covers plant the seeds for my growing taste for camp and for my use of music as a space for dreaming up new selves.
gloss: A type of freestyle, improvisational street dance incorporating soulful steps and robotic movements, originally danced to funk and disco, but later more commonly to hip-hop.
pos: noun
tags: countable
uncountable
gloss: A sequel or repetition of events, etc. Often used to mock a lack of creativity.
pos: noun
tags: Internet
countable
humorous
uncountable
examples: “Felix, I—” “Kate, come on,” he begged. “We're a team, sleuth times two, boogaloo. We can do it.”
Electric boogaloo meme
gloss: A hypothetical second American Civil War, in which far-right or antigovernment activists rise up against the government.
pos: noun
tags: Internet
US
countable
uncountable
examples: Today, boogaloo has seeped out of the gaming community and found fertile ground in militant fringe movements. That includes anarchists and others on the far left. But it's especially popular among right-wing militias and self-described patriot groups.
This month, the party involved itself once again with the boogaloo movement, when Cohen spoke at a gun rights rally co-hosted by a self-described “boogaloo boy” in Richmond, Virginia. Cohen used his speech to argue relaxing gun laws could end police violence.
gloss: A black person.
pos: noun
tags: countable
dated
derogatory
possibly
uncountable
examples: A naked savage in one mud village quarrels with another savage, as naked and as black as himself, in the next mud village. They quarrel about Boo-Galoo's chickens scratching up Gaw-Balaw's melon seed, or about Gaw-Balaw's hogs rooting in Boo-Galoo's yam patch (1935).
I like the explanation of this war given by "Boogaloo", a happy-go-lucky Negro, as he talked with my husband.
gloss: To dance in this style.
pos: verb
tags: intransitive
examples: She would have screamed in the judge's face, getting her man ninety years and a day. "You two boogaloo like an old married couple," I tell them after they've danced stiffly for a few minutes.
Derived words: electric boogaloo
Electric Boogaloo
Translations: