dibby-dibby

adj. worthless; especially of a woman, of low morals; generally, bad or of low quality. Subjects: English, Jamaica

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Citations: 1988 Howard McGowan The Daily Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica) (June 11) “Reggae Explosion” p. 8: Peter Metro…, Lady Mackerel, Sister Charmaine in tandem with Metro went over well doing their no. 1 song on the reggae chart in London “Dibby Dibby Man.” 1988 Eron Henry The Daily Gleaner (Kingston, Jamaica) (Nov. 16) “Profile of a Jamaican dejay” p. 8: One can go from there and decide if a woman is a dibby-dibby, mud-up or a dutty bungle. 1989 Economist (Jan. 21) “The Election Will Be Based On Personalities, Says The Economist” p. 76: An attack on the PNP’s rule during the 1970s, for example, is followed, to uproarious applause, by a description of Mr Manley’s team as a “dibby-dibby posse"—meaning something like “smart-arse.” 1989 Julia Preston Washington Post (Feb. 14) “Limbo Lingo Gives Politics a Lilt” p. A16: “Dibby-dibby” derives from a widely heard reggae tune about a girl with many boyfriends. It means fickle and indecisive. 1991 Joe Brown Washington Post (Feb. 8) “Reggae Culture Has Vibrations” p. N14: In Jamaica, life and system so hard that people can hardly find the time to listen culture music. Then they play the dibby-dibby music so long for so many years now that it becomes part of the people that they don’t want to hear nothin’ else but the dibby. And it’s some kind of wrong thing going on down there with the people. 1993 Gordon Dodson Metropolitan Toronto Business Journal (June 1) “Young Darrin O’Brien, late of North York and Metro East Detention Centre, is Toronto’s newest money-making export” vol. 83, no. 5, p. 14: He has a guy talking about dibby-dibby girls and in the patois dibby-dibby means nothing—like dibby-dibby money which is worthless. I’ve never heard anyone talk about a dibby-dibby woman. He’s trying very hard but he messes up in places. 1995 Peter Noel Village Voice (New York City) (Jan. 10) “Shanequa’s Baby: Portrait Of A Teenage Welfare Mother-To-Be” p. 14: She will always be drawn to some dibby-dibby don behind the punany curtain. 2000 Carla Freeman High Tech and High Heels in the Global Economy (May) p. 205: Admonitions against short skirts and flashy jewelry, or “dibby dibby” (sexually loose) styles are not merely prescriptions against casual or sloppy appearances. 2001 Gerald Hausman, Uton Hinds Jacob Ladder (Apr. 1) p. 86 @ (Apr. 1, 2003): That dibby-dibby zipper’s nothing but trouble. 2005 Jamaica Observer (Kingston) (Sept. 29) “Dibby-dibby Dibbs?”: The game, however, will not recapture its past glory if its leadership continues, in a Jamaican colloquialism, to be “dibby-dibby,” which is to say, lacking in character, worth and purposefulness.

Posted 26 Oct 05 | Permalink | Tell a Friend

Reader comments:

dibby should meen good because being desgraceful is good in todays society

by dave 31 Mar 06, 0730 GMT

dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby dibby that’s what I say crackers!

by Dibby 25 Sep 06, 1204 GMT