Uganda Slang, Jargon, and New Words from Double-Tongued Dictionary

Associated with or special to Uganda or Uganda people, places, or things. You can also see entries assigned to this category.

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night commuter n. To avoid LRA abduction, every night as many as 40,000 children flee their homes in the countryside to sleep in the relative safety of towns. They seek refuge overnight at churches, hospitals, bus stations and temporary shelters before returning home again each morning. They are known as “night commuters.” [English Uganda] [full cite] (Apr. 30, 2006)

returning the butter n. For a man to marry, he had to have land to grow bananas. Even the gifts he took to the bride’s parents had to include matooke. After the marriage, when the bride did what came to be called ‘returning the butter’, she took to her parents’ home a number of gift items, including matooke. [English Uganda] [full cite] (Jul. 24, 2004)

seatbelt n. I went to drop my young cousin at one of these basket ball games and I found a group of teen-agers who were moving around looking for “seatbelts."…Do you know what seat belts are? Ha ha. They are boxes, or newspapers that are placed on the ground so that when you sit down, around the courts, your clothes don’t get dirty! [ Place Uganda] [full cite] (Dec. 25, 2005)

tot pack n. The government has allowed the continued packing of alcohol in small polythene bags commonly known as “tot packs” which are used by every alcohol producing company as a packaging material. [English Uganda Food & Drink] [full cite] (Aug. 10, 2006)

zero grazing n. Yet rarely seen among Botswana’s AIDS prevention messages is one that has worked in other African countries: Multiple sex partners kill. Dubbed “Zero Grazing” by Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni, this approach dominated in East Africa, where several countries curbed HIV rates. [English Uganda Sex & Sexuality] [full cite] (Mar. 4, 2007)

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Recent Catchwords

mill and fill n. (7/3)

snake run n. (7/2)

hurricane amnesia n. (7/2)

dollar-a-year man n. (7/2)

tranny n. (7/1)

secular adj. (6/30)

commuter trip n. (6/30)

wendy v. (6/30)

double-dekker n. (6/30)

gas-sipper n. (6/29)