THE BIG CITY’S LITERARY LEGACY

If they can make it there, they’ll make it anywhere! Stony Brook University assistant professor E.J. White explores the history of New York City’s vernacular in her new book, “You Talkin’ to Me?” Here are a few common bon mots that you might not know got their start in the Big Apple.

Con man:

From an 1849 New York Herald article about a swindler named William Thompson, referred to in the piece as a “confidence man” due to his approaching strangers on the streets of Manhattan and asking, “Have you confidence in me to trust me with your watch until tomorrow?” People often did, and they never saw their watches again.

Flea market:

Takes its name from a public market that operated in lower Manhattan during the rural, swamp-like days of the city’s origins. Originally known as the Vly Market, “vly” being the Dutch word for “marsh” or “creek.”

Hooker:

Derived from Corlears Hook, a section of Manhattan near the FDR Drive just south of the Williamsburg Bridge that housed “the majority of the city’s brothels” in the early 1800s.

Phony:

Possibly originated here by Irish police officers in the 1800s. Derived from the Irish “fawney,” meaning “ring,” in reference to a common ring scam of the time.

Shade:

As in insult, the word evolved fromNewYork City’s drag queen culture.

Slumming:

Reportedly created by Charles Dickens after he toured New York’s horrifying, crime-infested Five Points neighborhood in 1842.

Speak-easy:

First heard in NYC during Prohibition to describe clandestine alcoholserving clubs, it evolved from the British and Irish phrase “speaksoftly shop,” the term for an illegal club where one spoke softly so as not to be discovered.

Window shopping:

This evolved around 1875, shortly after the mid-19th century invention of department stores in New York City.