Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to live, to make one’s home.

1811		Lex. Balatronicum n.p.: The traps scavey where we hang out; the officers know where we live.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1838		N.T.H. Bayly Spitalfields Weaver I ii: You must have engaged this man for the night to amuse us [...] where does he hang out?
1840		Comic Almanack Feb. 214: When did ye come to Doncaster? and where do ye hang out?
1841		Sydney Herald 26 Oct. 2/4: Mr Rennie gave an immense number of examples of similar slang [...] where does he hang out for where does he ‘reside;’ a long price, for a ‘great’ price; gammon, for ‘deception,’ music, for ‘fun;’ a good hand, for ‘dextrous’ or ‘expert;’ peckish, for ‘hungry;’ sticks, for ‘household furniture;’ seedy, for ‘poor;’ spliced, for ‘married’.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 5 Nov. n.p.: the whip wants to knowIf Professor W. knows the house where his students ‘hang up’ .
1850		‘Ned Buntline’ G’hals of N.Y. 78: I’ve got a message for somebody that hangs out here.
1856		H. Mayhew Great World of London I 5: Besides he want a more nobby crib, as the one he hangs out in now is only fit for some pleb or cad.
1858		Bell’s Life in Sydney 29 May 3/2: Mr Viera, a publican [...] in whose house he ‘hung out’ as a single young man lodger.
1863		Story of a Lancashire Thief 45: I’ve had more sharp struggles than you think since I hung out at them places in Manchester.
1867		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 7 Dec. 6/3: [H]e is now in Baltimore, where he is said to ‘hang out’.
1871		L.H. Bagg Four Years at Yale 45: Hang out, to occupy a room, to reside.
1871		Hamilton Spectator (Vic.) 7 Jan. 1/7: A young man lives nowhere now: he ‘hangs out’ or is ‘stowed away’ some where.
1877		Five Years’ Penal Servitude 245: Well, we started next day, after shutting up the crib where we hung out.
1888		‘Rolf Boldrewood’ Robbery Under Arms (1922) 198: They’re not to come here or know where I hang out neither.
1890		Bulletin (Sydney) 5 July 8/1: [M]an longs to go out in the woods, and clasp the hog to his bosom, [...] and pursue the cold, arrogant goat in the darksome haunts where that carnivorous animal habitually hangs out.
1892		E.J. Milliken ’Arry Ballads 14: I should like to go in for blue blood, and ’ang out near the clubs and the parks.
1900		J. Conrad Lord Jim 41: Mad Matherson they generally called him – the same who used to hang out in Haï-phong.
1907		C.E. Mulford Bar-20 xviii: If them rustlers hangs out on this sand range they’re better men than I reckons they are.
1910		N.Y. Tribune 20 Nov. 35/1: That’s why I was hangin’ up in a delicatessen doorway.
1913		E. Pound letter Nov. in Paige (1971) 26: You will come over in April; at least you will plan to be here for May and June. Once here you can hang out at Duchess St. quite as cheaply as you could at home.
1913		Wkly Times (Melbourne) 4 Jan. 5/2: The landlady where the Harum Scarums ‘hung out’ - their own phraseology - had given up her house and time (not without grave misgivings) to looking after them.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 562: Will I give him a lift home? Where does he hang out? Somewhere in Cabra, what?
1927		C. Sandburg letter 20 Aug. in Mitgang (1968) 250: I would want you to run out to where my family and I are hung up for this summer.
1934		Wodehouse Right Ho, Jeeves 135: Some stately-home owners of the name of Stretchley-Budd, hanging out in a joint called Kingham Manor.
1947		B. Schulberg Harder They Fall (1971) 111: The little office between the reception room and Nick’s sanctum [...] That’s where the Killer hung out.
1958		E. Gilbert Vice Trap 39: He had to [...] hang out at Muscle Beach.
1974		‘P.B. Yuill’ Hazell Plays Solomon (1976) 89: If you were to hear anything like where he’s hanging out maybe you could tip me the wink.
1983		A. Payne ‘Senior Citizen Caine’ Minder [TV script] 48: She knows where McCann hangs out.
1995		M. Dibdin Dark Spectre (1996) 60: There’s about twenty of us hanging out there.
2000		Indep. Rev. 13 Jan. 1: While Richards and Neville were hanging out at Redlands.

2. (UK/US campus) to treat.

1852		C.A. Bristed Five Years in an Eng. University 158: I had become [...] a man who knew and ‘hung out to’ clever and pleasant people, and introduced agreeable lions to one another.
1856		B.H. Hall College Words (rev. edn) 247: hang out. To treat, to live, to have or possess.

3. (Aus.) to endure, to survive.

1893–4		H. Lawson ‘Stiffner and Jim’ in Roderick (1972) 127: Just take my advice and leave things to me, and we’ll hang out all right.
1936		T. ‘O’Reilly Tiger of the Legion 138: I would hang out as a liberty-man [...] as long as possible. In other words I would keep away from punishment .
1941		Baker Popular Dict. Aus. Sl. 34: Hang out, to endure: to delay (a matter).
1999		P. Temple Black Tide (2012) [ebook] Pathetic creature, really, Hanging out for a hit [i.e. of heroin].

4. to meet, to collect together at a regular venue, to frequent.

1855		Yokel’s Preceptor 9: This is a Yarmouth mot. A very clean, sober, and honest piece. [...] She hangs out in Fleet-street.
1877		‘’Arry on His ’Oliday’ in Punch 13 Oct. 160/2: I looked sweet / On a tidy young parcel in pink as ’ung out in the very same street.
1887		Oakland Trib. (CA) 17 Sept. 10/1: The ‘Whyos’ [...] did not live in the street, but ‘hung out’.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 106: On de banks of de Bronx where me summer goil hangs out, / She’s a doisy, and just seventeen.
1910		H. Hapgood Types from City Streets 31: Tramps [...] ‘hang out’ there day and night.
1927		(con. 1918) J.W. Thomason Red Pants 159: Our gang hangs out here regular.
1934		H. Roth Call It Sleep (1977) 173: Wadda boob! [...] He neveh hengs oud wid nobody.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 6: When we hung out at The Corner, I’d keep working my fingers like I was playing the piano.
1952		Lait & Mortimer USA Confidential 116: Older girls hang out in the back room of Eddie Holman’s Saddle Bar.
1963		A. Baron Lowlife (2001) 41: The worst gang in London used to hang out there.
1972		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Whoreson 163: You have to be a man to hang out down here.
1980		M. Thelwell Harder They Come 200: Now he had a place to hang out.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 45: Not that you need them hangin out all day down in Cosimo’s gallery.
2000		W. Shaw Westsiders 79: He’s never hung out with gang-bangers.
2003		Simon & Burns ‘Hard Cases’ Wire ser. 2 ep. 4 [TV script] So you don’t know where he hangs, or who hes running with?

5. to idle away time with friends.

1831		Navy at Home II 180: What has he been about? — look no further than the next lane — the handiest gin shop; there, amidst fumes of tobacco, he hangs out — in a happy fuddle, if not quite drunk, all day.
1865		H. Kingsley Hillyars and Burtons (1870) 260: Nalder seemed determined to devote a considerable proportion of his handsome private income to what he called ‘hanging out.’.
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 29 May 5/2: My dear fellow, if I only had a bottle of salad oil to clear my throat I’d hang out till prorogation day.
1895		H. Lawson ‘Peter Anderson and Co.’ in Roderick (1967–9) I 281: Lazy, purposeless, and useless — knocking around and hanging out.
1967		L. Bruce Essential Lenny Bruce 91: Nixon [...] he hung out with Eisenhower too long.
1976		P. Theroux Family Arsenal 75: Murf said, ‘I’m sick of hanging out.’.
1989		M. Amis London Fields 60: I want to hang out at Keith’s. I long to be asked over.
1995		Eble Campus Sl. Apr.
2000		Observer Mag. 9 Jan. 11: Some of the boys Orlando hung out with [...] would throw up the ‘C’ handsigns.
2000		P. Temple Dead Point (2008) [ebook] That day, I was hanging out, didn’t have a cent..
2001		(con. 1990s) in J. Miller One of the Guys 50: ‘We started hanging out over there, at his house, and all his friends would come over and I just got into just hangin’ out’.
2010		A. Steinberg Running the Books 12: When we hang out [...] I feel like I’m visiting my great-grandfather.
2012		J. Fagan Panopticon (2013) 139: I’m going to meet them now. I just thought, you know, we could hang out.
2023		Rayman & Blau Riker’s 110: [H]e started to get in trouble around like thirteen, fourteen, just hanging out with his friends.

6. to exist, to be situated, to be available, to happen.

1901		Boy’s Own Paper 16 Feb. 312: Just the spot for a ghost to hang out.
1908		Magnet 22 Feb. 4: He has to hang out here to keep you fellows from getting drunk of a night.
1975		L. Rosten Dear ‘Herm’ 279: So it’s all hanging out with Al Klitcher.
1996		P. Cornwell Cause of Death (1997) 7: Like I said, I’m going to have to tell all the rescue and shipyard people to just hang out.
2000		Observer Mag. 9 Jan. 13: Bangers are the poor, usually teenage boys who hang out on corners, protecting the territory.

7. (US) to make a disclosure, to admit (the truth); thus the policy of so doing (note go the hang-out road ).

1973		White House tape 22 Mar. [discussion betw. Pres. Richad M. Nixon and senior advisers] Nixon: You think we want to, want to go this route now? And the—let it hang out so to speak? John Dean: Well it’s, it isn’t really that. H.R. Haldeman: Well it’s a limited hang out. Dean: It’s a limited hang out. Ehrlichman: It’s a modified limited hang out.
1977		Ben-Veniste & Frampton Stonewall 105: Dean was finally going the ‘hang-out route’.

8. to lie in wait.

1987

R. Campbell Alice in La-La Land (1999) 153: We don’t know where he’s going to be hanging out waiting for a chance to try again.

9. of a couple, to meet specifically for sex.

2005

R. Cea No Lights, No Sirens 119: ‘You are so fucking sexy. You know that? [...] When can we be alone?’ I found myself asking. Her left eyebrow lifted. ‘Ohhh, you wanna hang out’.

10. (US black) of an alcoholic, to spend time drinking.

2009

W.D. Myers Dope Sick 121: She started hitting the bottle hard. [...] Then she started hanging out half the night.