shine, v.² — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

shine v.²

1. (US campus, also shine out) to play truant (from), to skip classes.

1884		(con. c.1840) ‘Mark Twain’ Huckleberry Finn 53: De yuther servants wouldn’ miss me, kase dey’d shin out en take holiday soon as de ole folks ’uz out’n de way.
1979		D. Gram Foxes (1980) 17: When I’m eighteen, I’m going to shine that place.
1989		P. Munro Sl. U. 168: She shined classes yesterday.
1992		D. Burke Street Talk 2 2: A few of us shined bio yesterday.

2. (US black, also shine on) to fool, to delude.

1969		D.L. Lee in H. Rap Brown Die Nigger Die! intro.: I don’t call you nigger ’cause you’re mine, / I call you nigger ’cause you shine.
1977		A. Hoffman Property Of (1978) 241: Don’t be shining on me [...] Because I will not have a junkie dealing for me.
2002		J. Ridley Conversation with the Mann 80: Some had talent, some were just shining themselves.
2006		J. Ridley What Fire Cannot Burn 239: I’m getting shined. Getting shined three-sixty.
2006		Burns & Price ‘Corner Boys’ Wire ser. 4 ep. 8 [TV script] He shinin’ us on about that big-ass 50-caliber hole because I know who put it there.
2012		D. Spivey ‘If You Were Only White’ 141: The Argentine story was, of course, a fabrication on Paige’s part, as he shined the media on.

3. to get rid of; to abandon; to ignore.

1972		E. Folb Urban Black Argot 145: Shine Someone On to ignore someone.
1973		J. Wambaugh Onion Field 128: I gotta cut this maniac loose. I gotta shine him on [...] I ain’t going to Frisco with him.
1979		D. Gram Foxes (1980) 62: For chrissake, just shine him and get off the phone.
2009		J. Stahl Pain Killers 169: Thought you was gonna shine us on [...] We was gonna have a riot or somethin’!
2023		(con. 1962) J. Ellroy Enchanters 257: It’s an oversight. The toss cops shined the knife on.

4. see shine up to

SE in slang uses

In phrases

shine-eye gal (n.)

(W.I./UK black) a materialistic young woman.

1995		Francis-Jackson Official Dancehall Dict. 47: Shine-eye gal a material girl.
1999		(con. 1979–80) A. Wheatle Brixton Rock (2004) 169: It seems you want a man for his corn. You’re not a shine eye gal are you?

shine (in) (v.)

(US) to appear.

1920		T. Thursday ‘Fall of the Wise’ in Top-Notch 1 Apr. 🌐 It was decided that I wasn’t to shine at all.
1955		‘Hal Ellson’ ‘Wrong Way Home’ in Tell Them Nothing (1956) 147: This boy is going to start a fight with anybody he can find in the Dragons. Thats where you shine in. Soon as he does, you step up and shoot the dragon.

shine like a diamond in a goat’s ass (v.) (also shine like a dime in a goat’s ass)

(US) to shine very brightly.

2001		Guardian 12 Dec. 🌐 On a second sheet of green metal casing nearby an American soldier named Gary had scribbled his own brief marking before loading the cluster bomb into the hold of one of the B-52s. ‘For those whose dreams were taken,’ he wrote, ‘here are a few nightmares. This is gonna shine like a diamond in a goat’s ass.’.
2002		S. Samples ‘Because They’re Not Like Us’ at BuzzFlash.com 27 Feb. 🌐 I wept with joy as they scrubbed down the streets so the whole city will shine like a dime in a goat’s ass.

shine like a shitten barn door (v.) [SE shitten, filthied with excrement; the image of wet ordure glistening on a barn door]

to shine brightly.

1738		Swift Polite Conversation 26: Why, Miss you shine this Morning, like a sh— Barn-Door.
1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (2nd, 3rd edn) n.p.: It shines like a shitten barn door.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1788].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

shine on (v.)

see sense 3 above.

shine one’s pole (v.) (also shine the helmet, shine the pole)

to masturbate.

2003

Number One Adult Sexual Health Terms Advisor 🌐 Masturbation Slang Male Terms: [...] shine the helmet/pole [...] shine your pole.

shine out (v.)

see sense 1 above.

shine someone on (v.) (also put someone on (the) shine, shine it on, shine on someone) [euph. shit n. (1)]

(US black) to ignore, to disdain.

1968		‘Sl. of Watts’ in Current Sl. III:2 41: Shine it on, v. Forget about it; don’t pay it any attention.
1969		Cressey & Ward Delinquency, Crime, and Social Process 808: If an initiate arrives on the scene and presents an image of being ‘rowdy,’ ‘lame,’ or ‘uncool,’ he is immediately ‘put on the shine’ (shunned).
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 179: shine somebody on (70, fr black & motorcycle sl) to give someone the cold shoulder.
1975		J. Wambaugh Choirboys (1976) 169: Shine it on, baby.
1980		E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 30: Use a get to me when I’z little bitty dude. Now, I just shine it on.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 146: If you cant shine him on, you gotta cut her loose.
1992		Bentley & Corbett Prison Sl. 40: Shine a Person On also Put Him on Shine To completely disassociate from or ignore someone.
2001		(con. 1964–8) J. Ellroy Cold Six Thousand 95: Hoffa cleaned his ears. Hoffa shined on Littell. He gouged. He went in deep.

shine up (v.)

(US black) to fellate.

2000

Ebonics Primer at www.dolemite.com 🌐 shine me up Definition: suck my dick Example: Damn Tyrone you need to tell that bitch to shine me up or she won’t get any money.

shine up to (v.) (also shine) [? to shine a fig. light on the object of one’s admiration]

(US) to flatter someone, to curry favour, to court.

1843		W.T. Thompson Major Jones’s Courtship (1872) 26: They was all comin’ to me about it, and cussin and shinin and disputin so I couldn’t hardly hear one from tother.
1844		‘Jonathan Slick’ High Life in N.Y. I 216: Insted of shinning up to ’em, and talking soft sodder [...] I feel sort of dashed.
1859		‘Timothy Titcomb’ Letters to Young People 141: If a young man should ‘kind o’ shine up to you,’ and you should ‘cotton to him,’ and he should hear you say ‘by the jumping Moses,’ or ‘by the living jingo,’ [...] he would pretty certainly ‘evaporate.’.
1882		Century Mag. (N.Y.) Oct. 827: It was then that David first set out to shine up to her [DA].
1887		E.Custer Tenting on the Plains (rev. edn 1895) 25: He needn’t think to shine up to me; he’s nothing but a black African.
1902		S.E. White Blazed Trail 136: By the way, you might shine up to Hilda Farrand and join the rest of the fortune-hunters.
1905		H. Green Actors’ Boarding House (1906) 72: I’ll shine up to her an’ marry her!
1920		S. Lewis Main Street (1921) 306: Be switched if sometimes I don’t feel tempted to shine up to some girl.
1930		C.R. Shaw Jack-Roller 130: The landlady had two daughters, and I sort of shined up to them.
1934		O. Strange Sudden 35: Who’d ’a’ thought o’ him shinin’ up to that Purdie gal? – not that she ain’t worth it.
1948		E.S. Gardner Case of the Lonely Heiress 190: It might be a good plan to shine up to Marilyn Marlow.
1954		B. Appel Sweet Money Girl 30: He had shined up to Hortense tonight.
1964		J. Thompson Pop. 1280 in Four Novels (1983) 472: God-dang if she didn’t look almost pretty the way he shined up to her.
1987		T. Wolfe Bonfire of the Vanities 4: Don’t you shine us up with no more your figures!

shine v.2

SE in slang uses

In phrases

shine v.²