Miley Cyrus may be getting all the credit for popularizing twerking in today’s day and age, but the dance move – and the term itself – has actually been around for almost 200 years.
The Oxford English Dictionary currently has the origins of twerking listed as first being in use in the 1990s, and it’s a verb used to describe dancing “in a sexually provocative manner, using thrusting movements of the bottom and hips while in a low, squatting stance.” But Katherine Connor Martin told CNN that the term has been around almost 200 years before then .
“The use of twerk to describe a type of dancing which emphasizes the performer’s posterior originated in the early 1990s in the New Orleans ‘bounce’ music scene, but the word itself seems to have its origins more than 170 years before.”
Martin adds the editors for the Oxford English Dictionary have discovered that twerking dates back as far as 1820, when it was then spelled “twirk.” That spelling of the term lists it as a noun that describes a “twisting or jerking movement” or “a twitch.”
Miley Cyrus ain’t as modern as you might think: twerking is nearly 200 years old! http://t.co/tsO7kqdJjX pic.twitter.com/B8qNLQ6upj
— InStyle UK (@instyle_UK) June 25, 2015
The Oxford English Dictionary first added twerking to its online edition in 2013. The definition that will be used in the printed edition lists twerking as: “To move (something) with a twitching, twisting, or jerking motion.”
Editors believe the verb portion of the term was first used in 1848, and the current spelling is believed to have originated in 1901. Oxford English Dictionary’s senior editor Fiona McPherson told the Daily Mirror that the years may not be exact, but she and other editors feel “confident” about twerking being almost 200 years old .
“There has been constant use up into the present day to mean that same thing. I think it’s quite spectacular, the early origins for it. We were quite surprised.”
Twerking is just one of 500 terms to be included in the latest version of the Oxford English Dictionary. Others include “meh,” “fo’ shizzle,” and “e-cigarette.”
Here is how some people reacted to the news that twerking is nearly 200 years old.
Twerking is 200 years older than you think http://t.co/wWAlrZRzVO via @freep that’s right! Your great g-ma was a #freak
— Florin (@flodiggity73) June 25, 2015
“It’s possible twerking has been breaking up marriages for some 200 years. #twerking ” – Thank you, @QueensLedger .
— Jaime Andrés Moncayo (@jaimeamonc) June 25, 2015
Do yall listen to anything black people say? RT @nypost : Twerking actually goes back 200 years http://t.co/SOEylwFZbh pic.twitter.com/GhOdy5iTb7
— Kar L. Stine (@karyewest) June 25, 2015
What is your reaction to twerking being older than initially thought?
[Photo by Gareth Cattermole/Getty Images for MTV]
