Transcript of “Astorperious and Debubiate”
Hi, you have A Way with Words.
Hello, this is Tracy Hewley calling from Beaufort, North Carolina.
Hey, Tracy, we’re glad to have you. What’s up?
Well, I just wanted to know about, well, actually two words that were always used together when I was growing up, and I don’t know whether they’re just family words or whether they’re real words or whatever. And they were used when there was a group of people or just two people. And somebody was starting to get a little upset or bossy or whatever. And the other person would say, well, don’t get as capirious. You might debobiate. Wouldn’t want that. All right. Say that again for us.
Don’t get as tabirious. You might debobiate.
That’s outstanding. I love it. All right. Explain to us what you think that means.
Well, I think it was just calm down or you’re just going to blow up. I don’t know.
So, I mean, yes. And that definitely was the effect that it had because people would laugh after it, except for one of my relatives who was the one getting asked to period. And she would just have to leave and go for a walk.
Who would say this?
My grandmother, my other aunts or uncles. Of course, the kids would say to each other later when they were playing. So, yeah.
Nice. And what do you know? Have you ever heard anyone else use it? Seen it anywhere else?
Not really. Not really, no.
What’s the earliest that you remember hearing it?
Oh, gosh. Probably when I was, I don’t know, five, six, seven, eight, you know.
What decade would that be?
That would be in the 50s.
Okay, 50s. All right.
Yeah, definitely in the 50s, yeah.
Well, if you Googled this and you got the spelling right, Astor Perius is fairly Google-able, I think. A-S-T-O-R-P-E-R-I-O-U-S. And you’d come up with the, it shows up here and there, but in the writings of Zora Neale Hurston, the Harlem Renaissance writer. And it just basically means snobby or haughty or stuck up. And it shows up in Harlem Renaissance slang from as early as the 1920s. And a bunch of sources claim that it’s a combination of Aster, as in the rich family of Asters, A-S-T-O-R, and imperious. Like you’re acting like you’re rich and snobby and imperious like the Aster family. But I suspect that it may also or may completely be a humorous form of the word obstreperous, O-B-S-T-R-E-P-E-R-O-U-S, which means aggressive, loud, clamorous, stubbornly defiant is how one dictionary defines it. Aggressively boisterous is how another one defines it. So astreperous and obstreperous just sound too much alike. And there’s a long history in this country of humorously mispronouncing words just to be, you know, ornery.
Humorous.
Humorous, yeah. To be estropirious.
Dabubi, it’s the harder one. Because that one, I have looked high and low in every reference work that I have access to, online and often. I have a vast library in both places. And I have only found it in one other place. And I’ve looked in dozens of different spellings and combinations. And that other place is from another listener. A few years ago, Maria in Indiana called us to tell us that her grandfather from Puerto Rico, who spent time in Pennsylvania and then moved to Indiana, used to boobiate to mean to leave. As in, it’s time to boobiate. But that’s all I know about it. It’s the only other use of it I’ve ever found. But I suspect it, too, might be a humorous blend, perhaps, of debilitate and evacuate or debark and evacuate or depart and evacuate. I don’t know. It sounds like discombobulate, you know.
It does a bit, doesn’t it? Deboobiate.
Yeah.
Well, Tracy, are you carrying on this tradition or are you around a lot of astroparious people?
Oh, you are? Are you one yourself?
Every now and a long time, we will have a perfect time to use it.
Yes.
So, yeah. And do people understand what you mean?
Well, my children certainly do.
Tracy, that’s all we know. But if you find out anything further, you let us know, all right? And if we find out anything further, we’ll let everyone know.
Okay.
Thank you so much.
You take care now. I really appreciate it.
Bye-bye.
All right.
Bye-bye.
Bye-bye.
