Abstract
The term “Cry Wolof” is a disparaging catchphrase first introduced by U.S. linguist Laurence Horn as a dismissal of Wolof etymologies in African American language. The cogency of this catchphrase is largely dependent on the circa-1970s argument that the African American term hip meaning (among other things) “in fashion” or “to inform” is derived from the Wolof term xippi meaning, “to open the eyes.” This study aims to demonstrate that while the Wolof term xippi is not the proper etymology of hip, the etymology of hip is indeed Wolof. More broadly, this study aims to demonstrate the Wolof presence in African American language.
Background
In 1970, the celebrated poet, painter, and novelist Clarence Major released A Dictionary of African-American Slang, later republished under the title Juba to Jive: A Dictionary of African-American Slang (Major, 1994). It was not the first time such a work had been published; many lexicons had been previously compiled by various authors, such as the renowned anthropologist and novelist Zora Neale Hurston, Harlem journalist Dan Burley, and the incomparable Cab Calloway. But Major’s work differed from these previous efforts in its extensiveness and its interest in connecting the speech of the African American population with the languages of the African continent.
To be clear, extraordinary (and very successful) attempts to do so had already been carried out—most notably by the preeminent linguist Lorenzo Dow Turner with his 1949 seminal work, Africanisms in the Gullah Dialect, which focused squarely on the southeast coastal populations of the United States (Turner, 1949). However, Major was the first to draw such comparisons in an extensive lexicon that covered the language of the original African-descended population of the United States mainland (outside of the south seacoast and Louisiana), who are referred to in this article as the Malí-Kóngó.
Major asserted that the origin of the Malí-Kóngó term hip, meaning (among other things) “in fashion” or “all-knowing” was the Wolof xippi, meaning “to open one’s eyes” (spelled hipi in Major’s Juba to Jive) (Major, 1994). He also provided other examples of Wolof etymologies; Major asserted (1994) that the Malí-Kóngó term honkí, meaning “a Caucasian” was derived from the Wolof xonq, meaning “pink” (as well as “red”) in the Wolof language (spelled honq in Major’s Juba to Jive).
Major’s assertions of Africanisms were largely based on research published by British linguist David Dalby, who in 1969, in a London Times article, and again in 1972 in Rappin’ and Stylin’ Out, asserted that much of the language of the original African-descended population of the United States was derived from Wolof and Mandinka (Kochman, 1972). Dalby provided further examples such as the Malí-Kóngó term dig, meaning (among other things) “to understand,” asserting that it was ultimately from the Wolof dégg, also meaning “to understand” (spelled dega in Dalby’s article) (Kochman, 1972).
Reactions from Eurocentrists and linguists were swift and unrelenting, with Major’s and Dalby’s claims being met with mockery and derision. Both groups scoffed at the idea that the Malí-Kóngó population could retain African vocabulary. These were privileges afforded only to the southeast coastal populations of Georgia and South Carolina and perhaps to the waning Louisiana Creole language—which, ironically, features very few words of African origin.
Resistance to the idea of African-derived etymologies among the Malí-Kóngó was and remains largely influenced by several factors, including:
Cultural Exceptionalism: With the publishing of Africanisms in the Gullah Dialect by Lorenzo Dow Turner (1949), linguists (who previously denied the presence of African linguistic retentions on the southeast seacoast) reasoned that the explanation for African vocabulary among the coastal population of the southeast (most specifically, Georgia) was the region’s penchant for human trafficking. Human trafficking from Africa continued covertly in the region following the 1808 U.S. ban on the transatlantic human trafficking of African children, women, and men. Linguists reasoned that the continued infusion of trafficked Africans to the region would explain the retention of African vocabulary there. If, however, human trafficking did not continue from Africa, into New York, Maryland, or Texas (for example) after the 1808 ban, then linguists reasoned that naturally, African vocabulary could not be present in those environs.
Anglophone Caribbean Preference: The term refers to the practice of using the English-speaking Caribbean as the gauge by which to measure or recognize African retentions in Malí-Kóngó culture. Few examples illustrate this phenomenon more overtly than “Jive Etymologies,” an online posting authored by linguist John McWhorter (2005) for Language Log, a linguistics website operated by the University of Pennsylvania.
In the post, McWhorter reasons that if Wolof vocabulary is alleged to be present in the language of the Malí-Kóngó, but is not present in Caribbean Creole English, then what was thought to be Wolof in Malí-Kóngó language cannot possibly have come from Wolof. For example, when speaking of the Africans first trafficked to Charleston, South Carolina, McWhorter (2005) states,
They spoke the Barbadian variety of Caribbean Creole English, such that Gullah is one more variation on that pattern. But Caribbean Creole English, again, exhibits no especial Wolof contribution. Its grammar, for example, reflects languages of Ghana, Togo, Benin and Nigeria—but there is not a hint of Wolof’s very different structure.
According to McWhorter’s reasoning, if Wolof is largely present in the language of the Malí-Kóngó, then Wolof terms or syntax should also be largely present in the language of the English-speaking Caribbean—an argument that is obviously unsound, as it implicitly demands that the reader suspend his/her disbelief, and imagine that the ethnicities of African populations enslaved in the anglophone Caribbean (or francophone, etc.) were identical to that of those enslaved in the United States. This he implies, in spite of the fact that (a) enslavers in each colony exercised ethnic and skill set preferences when choosing their victims, and (b) no other country in the Americas trafficked and enslaved as many Senegambians as did the United States. McWhorter’s analysis takes place in a vacuum that ignores actual historical facts and the realities of the Transatlantic Holocaust.
On the other hand, if the languages of Ghana, Togo, Benin, and Nigeria are what most influenced the speech of the English-speaking Caribbean, then—according to McWhorter’s logic—those very same languages and regions must also be what most influenced the language of the Malí-Kóngó. If retentions from those regions (Ghana, Togo, etc.) are not present among the Malí-Kóngó, then McWhorter views this as an indicator of the absence of African linguistic retentions in Malí-Kóngó language. As McWhorter (2005) himself states,
Most Black English slang clearly traces to words that started out in Merrie England. No one proposes that a word like PHAT—roughly equivalent to the once-celebrated use of BAD to mean GOOD—just sounds like FAT but actually traces to Igbo.
In Anglophone Caribbean Preference, as demonstrated by McWhorter, the Caribbean (or a suitable surrogate) becomes the gauge by which one measures and determines what is African among the Malí-Kóngó, and what is not.
Opposition to Malí-Kóngó Resistance Narratives: The position of the Malí-Kóngó is that African retentions constitute resistance—an argument first formally proposed by anthropologist Zora Neale Hurston. This was in direct opposition to the preferred image of the Negro as docile, submissive, and eager to assimilate. The idea that the Malí-Kóngó had retained anything from the African languages was, and remains in the United States, unfathomable due to the strength and reach of the country’s creation myth and antiresistance propaganda. Furthermore, there is the matter of assimilation. The domination that comes with assimilation was intended to be unidirectional. The idea that the Negro had, in fact, assimilated the enslaver was and continues to be met with horror and hostility in the United States. African-derived vocabulary among the original African-descended population of the United States is routinely dismissed as being of “dialectal English” origin or, even more absurd, of Irish origin. When those options fail, Black surrogates are immediately turned to, with “West Indian,” Caribbean, or even Gullah theories proposed as the explanation for African retentions among the Malí-Kóngó. Irish, “West Indian” . . . anything will do, as long as it subverts or undermines the narrative of African retentions and resistance among the Malí-Kóngó.
As a result of their assertions of Wolof etymologies, both Major and Dalby would endure decades of direct and indirect mockery and derision at the hands of linguists—with Wolof being invoked as a general tool of dismissal against etymologies of all ilks. For instance, in a 2004 exchange on Linguistlist.org , the American Dialect Society’s Grant Barrett (2004) scoffed, “Maybe we could compromise and also pin this one on Wolof”—in response to a debate on Irish etymologies for English words.
Soon afterward, in the same exchange, linguist Laurence Horn (2004) of Yale University coined the term “Cry Wolof”—a term of disparagement that implicitly dismisses the idea of Wolof etymologies in the United States: “ . . . that inspires me to suggest that we begin to refer to the relevant practice as that of the amateur etymologist who cries Wolof.”
In a 2005 post, linguist John McWhorter (2005) of Columbia University asserted, “Major’s etymologies, piquant though they were, must be gently consigned to the realm of history.” More publicly, in 2004, linguist and former president of the American Dialect Society Jesse Sheidlower (2004) published a post with the online publication,
Slate.com
, titled “Crying Wolof,” which again aimed to dismiss the idea of Wolof etymologies in the United States, specifically for the Malí-Kóngó term hip. Sheidlower’s argument was faulty, based primarily on orthography. Sheidlower (2004) wrote,
Over time, Dalby’s proposal was taken as fact by many people, particularly those who wanted to find African origins for English words. Even obvious problems with the etymology—such as the fact that Wolof does not generally use the letter “h”—were ignored. (The word in question is actually spelled xippi.).
Sheidlower appears to be unaware that the Wolof “x,” the voiceless back-velar fricative, is often transcribed as “h” by anglophone and francophone writers. If he is aware, he certainly does not make it known in his article.
His commentary also demonstrates western cultural bias. Wolof is a primarily oral language spoken in three different countries. Historically, the Arabic script was used among the Wolof, especially for religio-specific and academic purposes, but the Roman script was only recently adopted as the standard system of writing in the Wolof language. It is quite common to find the term spelled with an “x” or an “h,” the latter of which is demonstrated in the 1923 Dictionnaire Volof-Français which features the spellings hipi and hépi (Kobès, 1923). As the Wolof language is spoken in not only Senegal (a francophone country), but in The Gambia (an anglophone country), and in Mauritania (a francophone country)—with pronunciation varying from region to region and country to country—its spelling varies and there is no rigid standard spelling as in European-derived culture. Furthermore, the expectation of a rigid spelling for an African language that is spoken, pronounced, and written differently across vast regions of an enormous continent is absurd, as it ignores the realities of culture and colonialism in Africa. After all, it is the Berlin Conference and its breaking up of Africa among the European powers that cemented the creation of an anglophone and francophone Wolof population.
As such, while a standardized orthography has indeed been devised for the Wolof language, it is very common for French or English orthographies to be used in Wolof instead—as can readily be witnessed on Wolof television channels such as 2sTV and RTS (Radiodiffusion Télévision Sénégalaise). As a case in point, the Senegalese rice and fish dish pronounced cεːbu ɟen / cεːbu ɟən is more often than not spelled using a French orthography by Senegalese citizens, media outlets, and television channels as Thiéboudiène—despite the fact that the spelling in Wolof orthography is ceebu jén / ceebu jën, and despite the fact that the “j” as American English speakers know it does
As it pertains to the Wolof “x” (the voiceless back-velar fricative), the same phenomenon of consonant mutation occurred. The Wolof “x” does not exist in SAE. Thus, the Malí-Kóngó simply replaced the Wolof “x” with the closest equivalent that was actively reinforced in their environment in the United States: the English “h.”
As a francophone and anglophone orthography is often employed among the Wolof, the Wolof “x,” as in the Wolof xibaar, for example, is often rendered with its closest English equivalent, “h”—resulting in hibaar. This spelling,
Finally, in colonial-era documents and dictionaries, the Wolof “x” is often rendered with an “h,” or even “kh” by anglophone and francophone writers (Rambaud, 1903)—a phenomenon that can readily be witnessed among the Wolof themselves today. Should one assume that these writers (both, Wolof and non-Wolof) are somehow mistaken because the English “h” does not exist in Wolof?
This critical analysis is absent from Sheidlower’s article. Considering Sheidlower’s role as a linguist and former president of the American Dialect Society, his failure to provide such essential information—or at least understand consonant mutation of the voiceless back-velar fricative among anglophones—is both questionable and inexplicable.
Nevertheless, Sheidlower’s (2004) article is frequently quoted as the authority when attempting to research the etymology of hip and especially when attempting to dismiss its Wolof origin, even making its way onto social media. In a 2012 Twitter “tweet,” linguist and lexicographer Ben Zimmer advised a fellow Twitter user: “‘Hep’ + ‘hip’ both came on the scene c1904 (‘hept’ 1903), unclear which came first. Just don’t cry Wolof” (Zimmer, 2012). Zimmer then proceeded to post a link to the very same faulty Slate.com post written by Sheidlower (2004) himself.
Furthermore, such rhetoric has also become a tool frequently used by both linguists and laypersons to dismiss Wolof etymologies as a whole within the United States. The tragedy is that Wolof was indeed a major linguistic force in the United States and has remained so, with its imprint on the tongues of the entire Malí-Kóngó population, a fact that is now obscured by the cultural smudging carried out by Sheidlower and his peers.
Hip may not be from xippi, but hip is very much indeed from Wolof—and its etymology is even more complex, as this is the case of three homophones/homographs that are in fact, three different Malí-Kóngó words with very different etymologies.
Method
Compiling Lexical Items
An abbreviated list of lexical items was compiled over a period of months. Loanwords such as dashiki and Kwanzaa were not included in an effort to maintain authenticity. What remained was a list of several words with unknown or insufficiently explained origins, including hip, dig, and shuck—words that many Malí-Kóngó see as symbolic of their own cultural and linguistic heritage. Only these words will be addressed in this study. In the case of shuck, attempts were made to retain essential vocabulary of the Malí-Kóngó population so that “the man” appears in place of “the Caucasian ruling class,” “Caucasians,” and so on. This is especially useful for terminology with historical importance and implications.
This work does not spend time debating whether “others” use any of the lexical items in this study—unless it is relevant, that is, for the purpose of tracing etymology or understanding influence. Afro-Brazilians have retained a great number of African words in their speech. When researching their African etyma, linguists do not typically engage in debates over whether those African-derived terms are also used by the Portuguese-descended population of Brazil. The same can be said for Cuba, Jamaica, and more. Even when discussing the English language and its German etyma, one does not descend into a debate over whether others use the English language, as well. It is irrelevant. However, these debates appear in scholarship with tremendous frequency when attempting to discuss or “study” the original African-descended population of the United States—a practice that distracts whether intentionally or unintentionally. This study deliberately aims to avoid such practices.
Orthography
It was decided early on that an English orthography was insufficient for researching the language of a people of African descent. English orthography made Malí-Kóngó words appear infantile and unrecognizable, especially when paired with their African counterparts. As such, an orthography was quickly devised to more accurately reflect Malí-Kóngó pronunciation, resulting in hip, dig, and shuk. While pronunciation will naturally vary according to region, for the purposes of this study, the orthography is quite sufficient. The orthography is not meant to represent a rigid standard of pronunciation, nor is it meant to be permanent; as is the case with Wolof, the Malí-Kóngó language is widespread varying across regions and even across countries due to the migration of the Malí-Kóngó. There are bound to be variations, and the orthography allows for this flexibility.
Wolof-Derived Lexical Items in Malí-Kóngó Language
This x ↔ k/g consonant mutation typically happens when the IPA “x” is at the
In Robert C. Stade’s translation of Al-Ghazāli’s Al-Maqṣad Al-Asnā, Stade translates Al-Ghazāli’s explanation of “al-Khabīr” as follows: “He is the one from whose mind no hidden information escapes. Nothing occurs in either (His) physical or spiritual domain . . . without His knowledge of it. This term is equivalent to al-
As “al-Khabīr” is one of the 99 names of the supreme being of Muslims, and since Africans of the Mali Empire were often Muslim and learned in Koranic studies, Islam, and Arabic, then the word “khabīr” and the name “al-Khabīr” are terms many Africans of the Mali Empire would have known and used regularly in religious studies and religio-specific contexts—just as they do today. (The same must be said of the southeast African countries of Mozambique and Madagascar, countries whose populations were also enslaved in large number in the United States during the Transatlantic Holocaust. Both Mozambique and Madagascar have significant historically Muslim populations due to Arab contact, and African Muslims enslaved in the United States from both countries would undoubtedly have known “khabīr” and “al-Khabīr”).
Examples of XEW usage in Wolof from native Wolof texts. (Diouf, 2003).
Understanding the w → p mutation in linguistics.
Conclusion
Linguists were wrong for assuming that the various Malí-Kóngó words spelled hip and dig were the same exact words. They are homophones/homographs, but they are not the same word—their meanings are quite different. Just as it is unfathomable to assume that gait (a way of walking) and gate (a barrier), or lead (the metal), lead (to command), and led (the past participle of “lead”) are the same words, simply because they sound the same or are often spelled the same, it must also be deemed unfathomable and overly simplistic to assume that hip meaning “in fashion”, “happening” is the same word as hip meaning “to tell or inform” or hip meaning “all-knowing”—simply because the words sound the same or are often spelled the same. Still, linguists made the mistake of treating the various homophones/homographs of hip (and even dig) as if they were the same word when, in fact, they are not.
They then attempted to trace the origin of these words, claiming that it changed in meaning in a given year (Sheidlower, 2004)—that is, the year in which hip meaning “stylish” first came to the attention of Caucasians and/or Caucasian media. However, the Malí-Kóngó population has historically been insular (as well as marginalized); the result is that songs, books, magazines (or more recently, websites) are the usual Caucasian-preferred conduits for information on the Malí-Kóngó (whether that information is accurate or inaccurate). Thus, as it pertains to the historically marginalized and insular Malí-Kóngó population, the year in which a word is first recorded or used by Caucasian Americans is irrelevant and tells very little. It does not give an idea of when the word was first used in the United States by the Malí-Kóngó; it simply demonstrates when that term finally reached the awareness of the Caucasian American population’s media. As linguist David Dalby says of this phenomenon, “ . . . the first appearance in print of an originally black expression may not necessarily mark the time of its birth” (Kochman, 1972).
If the first known publication of the terms hip1, hip2, and/or hip3 occurred in 1903-1904 —nearly a century after the U.S. ban on the transatlantic trafficking of African children, women, and men—then those terms would have to have been in use among the original African-descended population of the United States for (at least) nearly a century before coming to the mass attention of the Caucasian population. As the Malí-Kóngó have historically lived under chattel-slavery, sharecropper-slavery, and apartheid in the United States, it is unsurprising that such aspects of Malí-Kóngó culture exist insulated, away from the prying eyes of Caucasian Americans.
However, Sheidlower seems to not realize that a word can exist for centuries among the Malí-Kóngó before it is known to Caucasians. He does not appear to imagine that the term is one that was appropriated by the Caucasian speaker; instead, he seems to assume that naturally, the origin of the term must rest outside of the Black world. With so many flaws in logic and reasoning, it is no wonder Sheidlower, McWhorter, and their peers were unable to uncover the true etymologies of hip1, hip2, and hip3.
At first blush, a typical Malí-Kóngó term like “hapinin shoes,” or a “hapinin suit” does not appear to make much sense to anyone not already familiar with the Malí-Kóngó calque, hapinin. However, once we study its Wolof counterpart, xew, it then becomes clear why “to happen” also means “stylish” or hip in Malí-Kóngó language. The raison d’être for typical Malí-Kóngó expressions like, “what’s hip, what’s hapinin?” then make absolute sense. They are quite simply Wolofisms.
It should be noted that when Malí-Kóngó informants are consulted on the meaning of their own terminology, we find the greatest depth of meaning, understanding, and complexity—something not found among Caucasian informants. This is to be expected, as the population that is the source of a language will often possess the most complexity and depth of understanding.
While the Wolof term xippi is not the origin of the Malí-Kóngó term hip, the Malí-Kóngó term hip is indeed of Wolof origin and remains most frequently and authentically used among the Malí-Kóngó, both young and old—without any concern for “sounding cool” or hip.
In closing, this study demonstrates that the Wolof, and certainly speakers of the Wolof language, were indeed present in great number in the United States to form what would become the Malí-Kóngó people. The fact that a myth such as “Cry Wolof” actually exists is a testament to why independent research is so necessary. The innovation in research will never come from the “Cry Wolof” proponents, nor should it be expected to come from them. Instead, it will come from the descendants of the Wolof and Wolof speakers who were enslaved in the United States—more specifically, the ones who truly love, respect, and value their ancestors—as they are the only ones who can accurately speak for the language, culture, humanity, and dignity of the Malí-Kóngó and the Great Ancestors.
Footnotes
Author’s Note
A preliminary version of this study and specific etymologies from this study were posted by the author to the American Dialect Society’s Mailing List, including the Wolof etymologies of hip, dig, shuk, bag, and bun.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.