Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US black, also rah-rah drapes) clothes fashionable among students.

1944

D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 145: Rah-rah drapes—Collegiate-styled clothing.

2. (US campus) saddle oxford shoes.

1969

Current Sl. III:4 9: Rah-rahs, n. Saddle oxfords.

3. (US campus) college spirit, or one who is imbued with college (esp. sporting) spirit.

1956		‘James Updyke’ [W.R. Burnett] It’s Always Four O’Clock 9: [H]e never talked about college—no rah, rah—and [...] he never talked about the Army.
1967		Banchero & Flinn ‘Sociology and College Sl.’ in AS XLII:1 57: rah-rah ‘one who is not blasé, one overly affected by school spirit’ (also used adjectively).
1979		H. Feldman et al. Angel Dust 76: Straights are the high scholastic or sports achievers, the ‘brains,’ and jocks,’ ‘rahs,’ and ‘rah-rahs’.

4. (Aus.) a fan of Rugby Union; thus the game itself; also attrib. [implying the educated, middle-class image of rugby union, i.e. the rah-rah accents of the fans].

1980		Sun. Mail (Brisbane) 29 Jun. 3: The ‘rah rah’ rugger boys of Ballymore really turned it on at yesterday’s Test [GAW4].
1983		M. MacCallum in Sun-Herald (Sydney) 5 Jun. 72: Your basic Rugby Rah Rah in his tweed jacket with the leather patches on the elbows and the red setter as his constant companion may snort into his hip flask in disgust, but in this world all things change. Even Rugger [GAW4].
1990		Sydney Morning Herald 6 Sept. 55: Alan Jones becomes the latest of the rah-rahs to cross the rugby Rubicon [GAW4].
1998		Bug (Aus.) 7 Jan. 🌐 As one who has played both league and rah rah at the top level [...] I was amazed how easily Willie Carne jogged into the Queensland rah rah side.
2001		Sydney Morning Herald 8 Nov. 🌐 A rah-rah to his roots, he seemed to try to go out of his way to prove his league pedigree, and was soon tub-thumping about the great game he was administering and how union had better watch out.
2002		B.M. Doyle ‘Mark Fisher ’o Broken Hill’ at policepoems.com 🌐 First met Mark back in eighty three, / Starting out at the Redfern Academy, / Came from the South Coast not that far, / He didn’t mind the game they call ‘rah rah’.
2002		Guardian 8 Nov. 🌐 Despite England’s recent attempts to move the ball wider than No 10, and the fact that New Zealand have left all their best forwards at home, this promises to be a reversion to the grim attritional spectacle that rah-rah used to be before they started learning from rugby league.
2003		Bug (Aus.) Nov–Dec. 🌐 The Poms invented whingeing and still guard the secrets of the craft closely. Just ask Pommy rah rah Clive Woodward.

5. (US) enthusiastic speech; a pep-talk.

1991

B. Hamper Rivethead (1992) 121: After the rah-rah was completed, the general Foreman [...] escorted us to our new departments.

6. (US prison) a female inmate who fraternizes with the authorities.

1992

Bentley & Corbett Prison Sl. 33: Rah Rah A female inmate who eagerly fraternizes with guards, and prison officials.