Home » Segments » South African “Shot” Slang

South African “Shot” Slang

Cory in Newark, Ohio, says that while in South Africa, he heard the exclamation shot! used in an empathetic way to mean “that’s so sweet!” or “bless your heart!” In South Africa, the word can be used to express agreement, and in Australia, the expression “That’s the shot!” expresses approval. In boxing, a skillful punch might be commended with “Oh, shot!” This is part of a complete episode.

Leave a comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

1 comment
  • There might be some confusion between a few similar words. I am an American living in South Africa, and I had a similar confusion when I first arrived. There is “shot” which is indeed used to express agreement or thanks (e.g. “shot, bru!”) But there’s also “sjoe” (pronounced show) that is used to express sympathy or surprise (e.g. “sjoe, I had no idea she was so sick”). Lastly there is “sharp” (pronounced shahp) that is like a quick thanks, and often doubled (e.g. “sharp sharp;” seems less common among white South Africans). Anyway, it took me a while to realize that they were three distinct words when I first arrived, since the pronunciation is similar.

More from this show

Unparalleled Misalignments

Unparalleled misalignments are pairs of phrases in which the words in one phrase are each synonyms of the words in the other, but the phrases themselves mean different things. For example, the phrase blanket statement can be paired with cover story...

Recent posts