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Give it up for...

Posted by ESC on October 11, 2007

In Reply to: Give it up for... posted by Baceseras on October 11, 2007

: : : : : When introducing an act or singer or other form of entertainment the person introducing them will say "Give it up for" and the entertainment commences as the audience claps. Where did this phrase come from and does it have a particular meaning?

: : : :
: : : : It means clap your hands. Obviously what's given is a round of applause. But "giving it up," as in surrendering, yielding? I'll leave that to someone more knowledgeable than I.

: : : FWIW, I have never heard that used in the UK. (VSD)

: : First use I remember was by Arsenio Hall, who made it into a bit of a catch phrase on his television show that began in January 1987. There may (of course) be earlier usages.

: To my knowledge Arsenio was the first to use the catchphrase in a widely seen television show; but a great many people would have heard him use it before then, as I did, about 1980 I think, when he was on tour with Gladys Knight. It simply means "Don't hold anything back," and he showed by gesture that he meant applause.

Give it up -- let yourself go. Mainstream 1960s. "Flappers 2 Rappers: American Youth Slang" by Tom Dalzell (Merriam-Webster Inc., Springfield, Md., 1996)

Marvin Gaye, 1977, Got to Give it Up. Lyrics at marvin-gaye.guidechart.com/ got-to-give-it-up.php

Flappers 2 Rappers says in mid-1970s it became a Hip-Hop and Rap term meaning "to express greeting, to applaud."

Three meanings -- to agree to sex, to show gang hand signals and to relate something in a rap -- are given in "A 2 Z: The Book of Rap & Hip-Hop Slang" by Lois Stavsky, I.E. Mozeson, and Dani Reyes Mozeson, (Boulevard books, New York, 1995).

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