Jive
adj, noun, verb, slang ·Common ·High school level
Definitions
- 1 A dance style popular in the 1940–50s. uncountable
- 2 a style of jazz played by big bands popular in the 1930s; flowing rhythms but less complex than later styles of jazz wordnet
- 3 Swing, a style of jazz music. uncountable
- 4 A slang associated with jazz musicians; hepcat patois or hipster jargon. uncountable
"Then the loud sound did seem to fade / Came back like a slow voice on a wave of phase / That weren't no DJ, that was hazy cosmic jive"
- 5 Synonym of bullshit: patent nonsense, transparently deceptive talk. US, colloquial, countable, uncountable
"Don’t give me that jive. I know where you were last night."
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- 6 African-American Vernacular English. US, colloquial, countable, derogatory, often, uncountable
"Although speaking Western Japanese to your friends in Ōsaka, Kyōto, or Kōbe will allow you to get closer to them, speaking Western Japanese in Tōkyō might seem as outlandish as hearing a Japanese exchange student back home speaking jive or cockney."
- 1 To deceive; to be deceptive. US, colloquial, intransitive, transitive
"Don’t try to jive me! I know where you were last night!"
- 2 To jibe, in the sense of to accord, to agree US
- 3 dance to jive music; dance the jive wordnet
- 4 To dance, originally to jive or swing music; later, to jazz, rock and roll, rhythm and blues, disco, etc. colloquial, intransitive
"You can dance, you can jive, having the time of your life; ooh, see that girl, watch that scene, diggin' the dancing queen!"
- 1 (dated, Black slang) dated, empty-gloss, no-gloss
"In the DuPont plantation state they even passed a law that said if building codes aren't lived up to you can deposit your money in one of the company banks and leave it then 'til the cat comes round. Ain't that the jivest crap you ever heard of? I mean, paternalism with a capital WHITE."
Example
More examples"Funky music, fellas! Let's jive!"
Etymology
Unknown. Slang attested in African-American and rural American culture. Frequently used to imply lying, verbal deception or trickery. Has a possible historical antecedent in gyve (“shackle”). Alternatively, of African origin, compare Wolof jev, jeu (“to talk about someone absent, especially in a disparaging manner”).
Related phrases
More for "jive"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.