COOL

Hip

With-It

Interjections proclaiming coolness (See also under: “Wicked Cool”)

WHEN WORLDS COOLIDE

Sometimes I imagine other civilizations watching us, observing our language, and borrowing the word cool to describe the myriad things that tickle their antennae. That’s how adaptable and irresistible cool is, a 1,500-year-old term that means somewhat less than cold and, since about 1950, somewhat more than “hot.”

As early as 1930, African Americans were acclaiming hot stuff as cool, but in the ’50s the word acquired a nuance beyond the merely stylish and exciting. Among jazz musicians and finger-popping followers, it came to signify an understated soulfulness, a mellow quality calling for a restrained, discriminating style of acclaim. Lexicographers Harold Wentworth and Stuart Berg Flexner said it implied “intellectual, psychological, and/or spiritual excitement and satisfaction, negation of mere obvious, physical, sensual excitement.”

To be cool was a special thing, earned like flight wings, unlike the facile kull or way cool. Cool people decreed what was cool, whether bop, beat poetry, or a tie so narrow it was almost invisible. But like other punchy utterances, the word caught fire and in the next decades became a colloquial term of general approbation. A secretary of state called foreign policy cool. Cornflakes, or dad wearing a dress, or the neighbor’s house exploding were now cool, according to television spawn of Beavis and Butthead.

It was hardly the first time a superlative lost its specificity : Grand once meant preeminent; swell, a fashionable dresser. But rarely does a popular slang term go general and then hang on to its popularity for what might be—in cool’s case—indefinitely.

Even as universal and enduring a term as cool, however, needs its synonyms, if only for novelty of expression. And since novelty is brief, especially in the digisphere, trendconscious acclaimers (including me) wait like chicks with open beaks for the next stylish or funky candidate.

For this category I’ve selected current synonyms, recent ones, plus some still-spry retro items. Of course, by the time you read this, current may be retro and retro current; so it goes. I’ve also intensified terms (including cool) in a number of ways and suggested various new phrase formations to trigger your own inventiveness.

As you go down the list, you may be as puzzled as I am by how certain words have earned their street cred. Single-syllable length seems to help (dope, tight, phat, fly, def, etc.), as does being introduced by a rap or teen-movie star (fetcb). Clever shortenings (leet for elite) and touches of rebelliousness (gangsta, ill) count for something, though not as much as in our next category, “Wicked Cool.” But meaning? It doesn’t always figure. Don’t try to make more of the superlative book, for example, than that a certain numerical texting code pops it up before the intended cool.

You can say book and I’ll say bangin’. But I believe that those other civilizations out there, the ones eyeing us, still favor cool—perhaps even call us Planet Cool, our hotheadedness notwithstanding.

TERMS

active

all that

alpha pup, an (—WS, marketing term for coolest kid in school)

alvo

Ambassador of Cool, the

amped

audaciously cool

bangin’

beast/beastly

beyond rad

Blu-ray cool

blunt

bomb diggity

bomb, da

bonged

bonza

boogies down

book

boom (CAN)

boss

bubba! (as in “dude!”)

Buddhistically cool

buff

bumpin’

burger

butter

buzzed

Camp Cool

cannonade of cool, a

capo di tutti cool (I.: boss of all)

card-carrying cool

casual

catch of the day

cheeky

cheese-on!

chill

chilled out

chilly most

chron

citizen of the coolocracy, a

clean

clued-in

cohabitates with cool

cold-cockingly cool

Commonweal of Cool, the

compact cool

compendium of cool, a

concentrated cool

convoy of coolness, a

coo

cookin’

cool as froze collards

Cool Breeze (form of address for cool person)

cool embodied

cool from clew to masthead (ref., bottom tie of sail to top of mast)

cool in high-def

cool on a bender

cool to his/her chromosomes

cool to the core

cool to the marrow

cool up the smokeshaft

cool with a vengeance

cool with attitude

cool with wings

coola-boola

coolio

coolsville

copiously cool

Countess Cool

cracking

crisp

critical

Crown Prince of Cool, the

crucible of cool, a (where cool is tested)

crump

crunk/krunk

cwazy (var. of “crazy”)

cyrogenically cool (extremely low temperature)

dece (short for “decent”)

deep

def

deft

dialed

Doctor of Cool, a

dope

dopified (made dope)

down

downtown

drained!

drippin’

dude/girl is collected!, the

dude/girl is ensemble !, the (Fr.: together)

dude/girl is meshed-in!, the

dude/girl is mortised!, the (tightly joined together)

duggy (cooly dressed or fitted out)

École de Cool (school)

El Camino Cool (Cool Way)

encamped in cool

extra cool

fetch (ref., from film Mean Girls: cool, fetching, trendy)

fierce

finger-popping cool

fire

flagship of cool, the

flash

flinty

flip

fly

freezing cool

Freon cool (ref., refrigerant component)

fresh

fridge cool

frigorifically cool (producing cold)

from-here-to-the-back-of-beyond cool

frosty

funky cool

funneled

game

gangsta/gangster

gar (manly cool)

geared

gelid (exceedingly cold)

genial (Sp.: cool, excellent)

génial (Fr.: cool, excellent)

gets down

ghetto

gleaming

godly

Googleliciously cool

googolplex of cool, a

got burn

got her/his/its cool on

got street cred

got the patent on cool

hangin’ in space

hard

heavy water

hecka cool

hefty

hella cool

hip to the haps (happenings)

hip to his/her hormones

hittin’

honed

hosed-down cool

hype

Hyperborean (ref., mythical denizens of extreme north)

hyperkinetically cool

icing!

ill

incalculably cool

inherently cool

innately cool

jammin’

jelly

jelly tight

just!

justful

keel-over cool

kewl

kickin’

killer

king (AUSTRAL)

King Cool

knows how to roll

koshah

laid-back

languorously cool

leet (elite shortened)

live

Lord of Cool, the

lunar cool, a

lush

manifestly cool

massive

master/mistress of mellowosity, the

master/mistress of the cooliverse, the

mellow to the marrow

member of the coolarchy

meta-cool

mint

minty

money

monsta

monster

nang/proper nang (UK)

narcotic

nervous

nimble!

nonch (Par., UK, nonchalant)

nonchalant

non-heinous

notch

off da hook

off the chain

on

on time

oozing cool

oudish (UK)

ownage! (as in “rules!”)

parties down

phat 2 death

phatty

Platonic Form of cool, the (perfect abstract idea of)

plays the chill (is calm and cool)

polycool

prime

profusely cool

proper

proper lush (UK)

quintessentially cool

radical

rapid

slammin’

slick

“I think it looks cool, looks tight, those scars and everything.”

—Wells Tower, “Wild America,” Everything Ravaged, Everything Burned, 2009

raw

recklessly cool

revved

ringside

rocks no ass (Par., Guyana use of “no ass” meaning “extremely” after verbs)

rolls

royally cool

rude

rugged

ruley

savvy and saucy (—Shaun White)

scary cool

schway/shway

screams (cool and fast)

serious cool

shibby

sick/sic

sly

smokin’

so cool he’s/she’s evaporating

spiked

sprezzatura cool (I.: makes it look easy)

spunky

spunky cool

squeaky cool

standup

starkers cool (nakedly)

staunch

stoopid

straight-line cool

straight-up cool

street-smart

suave

superabundantly cool

superconductively cool

sweet

swift

take-charge cool

tang-gay!

tangy

thermal

thick

tight

togetha

totality of cool, a

tough

trick

unflippable

unlame

uptown

ur-cool (earliest, original cool)

valedictorian of cool, the

vato! (Sp.: as in “dude!”)

wahey!

wavy

waxa/whacker (UK)

well

wet

wholly cool

“Them joints is wet!”

—“The Wire,” 3rd season, 9th episode, 2004 (said of plasma televisions)

trippy

trop/trop bien (Fr.)

tuff

twitchin’

über cool (extremely)

ultra

wiggy

wily

wired

wix (UK)

zonal

zoned

VINTAGE GOLD

bitchin’
bonus
core
crazy
far out
gone
groovy
hep
key
mean
outta sight
right on
sent
slammin’
smoove
solid
stompin’
swingin’
torrible
wild