Slang dictionary
swalla
[swol-uh]
What does听swalla听mean?
Swalla is a dialectical or slang pronunciation of swallow, prominently appearing in hip-hop lyrics with respect to drinking alcohol or performing oral sex on men.
Where does swalla come from?
Swalla is a colloquial pronunciation of swallow, a verb found in Old English and with deeper Germanic roots. By the late 1500s,听swallow听had become a metaphor for “accepting something undesirable,” a sense which continues today in swalla.
In the 1990s, hip-hop artists began widely using听swalla to rhyme with words like holla and dolla, dialectical pronunciations of听holler and听dollar in Black English which reduce a final R to a schwa (uh) sound鈥攐r, here, the long O of swallow.
8Ball and MJG鈥檚 1993 song 鈥淧imps鈥� uses swalla as 鈥渁ccept鈥� in a rhyming couplet with dolla: “But I just a young nigga, trying to make a dolla / And the way I live, to some it鈥檚 hard to swalla.鈥�
In Missy Elliot鈥檚 1997 song 鈥淕ettaway,鈥� swalla refers to drinking alcohol (a bottle of 鈥渞emmy,鈥� or R茅my Martin cognac): 鈥淎untie, Papa, Smoke lala / Hallah, fala, don鈥檛 bother to swalla / This bottle of remmy, got plenty / Of weed.鈥�
In his 2001 “That Bitch is Bad,” rapper Mack 10 notably used swalla in reference to the sexual slang swallow, or “to perform fellatio,” especially in reference to ingesting the ejaculate:听鈥淏ig girls swalla, little girls spit.鈥� Mack 10’s lyrics imply that women who swalla are superior to their counterparts. Rapper Max B reiterated this implication in his 2008 鈥淟ip Sing”:听鈥溾� bet she liked to swalla / that shit makes me wanna holla…鈥�
The hip-hop swalla听spread on social media in 2009 and was popularized in the mainstream by singer Jason Derulo鈥檚 2017 hit “Swalla,” featuring听Nicki Minaj and Ty Dolla $ign. The song draws on swalla‘s sense of “drinking” (鈥淪walla-la-la [drank]”) to suggest fellatio (鈥�…if you鈥檙e feeling thirsty / Come on take a sip 鈥榗ause you know what I鈥檓 servin鈥�…鈥澨齆icki Minaj notably offers a self-empowered women’s response: “Bad gyal no swalla nuttin.”
“Swalla” reached #29 on the Billboard Hot 100, corresponding with spikes in searches for the term.
Examples of swalla
Who uses swalla?
Swalla is used in dialectical speech and colloquial writing, especially in Black English and notably appearing in hip-hop lyrics and commonly referring to drinking or fellatio. Both men and women may positively use swalla to describe sexual preferences.
Swalla听can also negatively characterize having to put up with something unpleasant, alluding both to historic metaphor of swallow and its sexual slang. On social media, a (cock) swallaer听can be used as an insult.
The term widely appears online in reference to Derulo’s “Swalla.”
Due to its adult content, many may find swalla vulgar and offensive, especially if the sex act is forced on or expected of a woman.
Note
This is not meant to be a formal definition of swalla like most terms we define on 亚洲网紅露点, but is rather an informal word summary that hopefully touches upon the key aspects of the meaning and usage of swalla that will help our users expand their word mastery.