saditty

English

Alternative forms

• hasadity
• sadity, saddity, sadiddy
• seditty, seddity
• siditty, siddity

Etymology

Uncertain. Perhaps an alteration of sedate (see quotation below) or another word. Attested from the 20th century.

Pronunciation

• enPR: sə-dĭ′-tē, IPA^(key): /səˈdɪ.ti/

Adjective

saditty (comparative more saditty, superlative most saditty)

1. (US, slang, chiefly African-American Vernacular) Acting snobbish, arrogant, or superior; uppity; perceived to be trying to associate with a higher social class.
   • 1948, Grace Longwell Coyle, Group Work with American Youth: A Guide to the Practice of Leadership, page 39:

     This desire for the group was voiced by its president in her attempts to get the girls to be “ladies and cultivated”—or, as frequently stated by them, to be more “seditty” (sedate), a colloquialism referring to the respectable and controlled behavior associated with middle-class standards.

   • 1969, Maya Angelou, chapter 30, in I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings‎^[1], New York: Bantam, page 202:

     I would stop the car when we reached the kiosk and put on my siddity air. I would speak to him like the peasant he was. I would order him to start the car and then tip him a quarter or even a dollar from Dad’s pocket before driving on.

   • 1970, Al Young, “Snakes”, in Ishmael Reed, editor, 19 Necromancers from Now, page 355:

     You know who I mean – them saditty splibs, them e-lites that's so hung up on bein white that they cant even pronounce stuff right. They be talkin bout marking bird insteada mockin bird.

   • For more quotations using this term, see Citations:saditty.

References

• John A. Simpson and Edmund S. C. Weiner, editors (1989), “saditty, a.”, in The Oxford English Dictionary, 2nd edition, Oxford: Clarendon Press, →ISBN.
• Grant Barrett (actor) (2020), “Tiger Tail” (42:20 from the start), in A Way with Words‎^[2], episode 1540

Anagrams

• dittays