Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to exploit, to take advantage of.

1977

in K. Gilbert Living Black 300: A pack of bludgin’, drunken, loud-mouthed mongrels hoonin’ on the misery of their own people.

2. to behave in a loutish manner; often as hooning around/about.

1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 58/1: hooning wild or raucous behaviour, often phr. hooning around; eg ‘After losing the match, the visiting team got drunk and started hooning around town.’.
1990		T. Winton Human Torpedo 94: He wouldn’t have thought Vicki’d be impressed by all that bogan crap, or even the thrill of hooning around in a Chevy-powered panel van.
1990		Tupper & Wortley Aus. Prison Sl. Gloss. 🌐 Hoon. Technically a pimp, but now a general expression of insult denoting a loutish person or yahoo. May also be used as a verb, as in ‘to hoon about’.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 105: Hoonery, hooning around and hooning it up usually mean wild or irresponsible behaviour, such as driving with squealing tyres and loud revving in a hoonmobile, the group so behaving occupying hoondom Post-WWII of unknown origin.
2005		P. Temple Broken Shore (2007) [ebook] Hoons wouldn’t limit themslves to throwing sand around, they’d trash the whole place [...] Not hoons, no. This wasn’t hooning.

3. (Aus.) to drive in a dangerous, ostentatious manner.

1995		in Senate Hansard 9 Mar. n.p.: They are sick to death of all the trucks hooning through their towns.
2005		Birding-Aus 20 Apr. 🌐 Sign didn’t prevent two utes hooning down track as I walked it, neither bearing any ‘authorized’ insignia.
2007		L. Redhead Cherry Pie [ebook] I used to hoon around on a two-fifty [i.e. a motorcycle].
2016		N. Cummins Adventures of the Honey Badger [ebook] [W]e were hooning down the Nymboida River in two rafts at a rate of knots.
2020		G. Disher Consolation 169: [of a cyclist] Katie was hooning across the deserted bitumen.

4. (Aus.) to work as a pimp.

1996

(con. 1964-65) B. Thorpe Sex and Thugs and Rock ’n’ Roll 66: ‘She’s been hawking it upstairs all week and this young mug’s hooning for her’.