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juju

Medicine -- legal, illicit (usually pot), traditional or otherwise. This word appears in many Nigerian languages and means variously, an amulet, a treatment, and yes -- medicine. Juju is also the name of Nigeria's most popular musical genre.
"I need some strong juju for this cold" or "That's some nasty looking juju in that bag, bro."
by Bill Peters August 10, 2006
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panty

Hawaiian pidgeon noun denoting a wimp, sissy or a chump.
Hey panty; how come you get fat lip and black eye?
by Bill Peters October 7, 2006
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brown paper bag test

An actual test, along with the so-called ruler test in common use in the the early 1900s among upper class Black American societies and families to determine if a Black person was sufficiently white to gain admittance or acceptance. If your skin was darker than a brown paper bag, you did not merit inclusion. Thousands of Black institutions including the nation's most eminent Black fraternity -- Phi Alpha Phi, Howard Univiersity, and numerous church and civic groups all practiced this discriminiation. The practice has 19th Century antecedants with the Blue Blood Society and has not totally died out.

Zora Neal Hurston was the first well known writer to air this strange practice in a public. The practice is now nearly universally condemned (at least in public) as being an example of "colorism". Particularly cogent modern day critiques can be found in Kathy Russell's "The Color Complex", Tony Morrion's "The Bluest Eye" (an Ophrey Book Club choice) and Marita Golden's "Don't Play in the Sun." The best known send-up of the pactice, however, is Spike Lee's scathing and hilarious 1988 movie, "School Daze."
"Though the brown paper bag test is antiquated and frowned upon as a shameful moment in African-American history, the ideals behind the practice still lingers in the African-American community" -- Rivea Ruff, BlackCollegeView.Com
by Bill Peters August 19, 2006
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slam

(1) To one-up someone in an argument or in a put down
(2) To illegally scam by adding charges to a person’s phone bill without their permission (Slamming senior citizens is a big business in Florida)
(3) Poetry slams are highly charged get-togethers or contests in which poets and rappers exchange their works with inspired verbal presentations.
(4) Slam dancing involves wild dancing (slamming bodies and thrashing limbs) among a large group of tightly packed participants
(1) Every night John Stewart manages to slam someone in the White House
(2) Dan Snyder, owner of the Washington Redskins, made millions of dollars slamming senior citizens on the East Coast.
(3) Poetry slams attended by young people, have been a boon for the petry market.
(4) My 14-year-old daughter has been forbidden to enter mosh pits at concerts for fear that either she will get hurt by all the slamming or even ber groped.
by Bill Peters October 11, 2006
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Doodly-squat

Of no significance, rank or importance. The word “doodle” was in wide slang usage throughout the 19th Century to mean a fool, a clueless soldier or a penis. The term was in wide use during the Great Depression and was joined by the updated version "diddly-shit" in the 1960s.
“My gal is red hot (Your gal ain't doodly-squat)”
-- from the oft-covered 1950s song "Red Hot"
by Bill Peters October 7, 2006
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zippo raid

Term used by Vietnam War GI's to describe the unfortunant and frequent practice of torching (via Zippo lighters) of straw huts (hooches) in villages (villes) suspected of harboring or abetting Vietcong soldiers. The term has since come to mean arson of any kind.
Numerous Zippo raids are recounted in the movie "Full Metal Jacket"
by Bill Peters October 7, 2006
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sound bite

(n) A short, catchy statement meeting the short attention requirements of TV news. Sound bites have the annoying habit of being play again and again ad nauseum. In fact, newscasts are increasingly built around sound bites instead of hard news and analysis. And public relations firms earn huge bucks cooking up sound bites for political spin and damage control.
One memorable sound bite (1984 Debate) from Vice Presidential candidate Lloyd Bensten countering Dan Quayle's comparision of himself to President John Kennedy.

Bensten: "I knew Jack Kennedy. He was a friend of mine. You are no Jack Kennedy."
by Bill Peters November 24, 2006
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