hustle n.
1. (UK Und.) a street robbery.
![[UK]](/static/img/flags/uk.png "United Kingdom") | London Guide 33: A more daring hustle is, where a person being run against violently, as if by accident, and his arms kept down forcibly, while the accomplice [...] draws either his watch, money or [pocket] book . |
2. (orig. US Und.) a swindle, a hoax, a get-rich-quick scheme.
| [ | | Sixteen-String Jack 128: This is a freak as well as a hustle. Dick, plant yourself up the lane, and keep watch]. |
![[US]](/static/img/flags/us.png "United States") | Never Come Morning (1988) 66: Don’t gimme that hustle, Bicek. | |
| Texas by the Tail (1994) 90: Did you think we could go on with the dice hustle? | |
| Black Players 251: Playing golf (which is also a good hustle like pool hustling if one is skilled). | |
![[WI]](/static/img/flags/wi.png "West Indies") | Harder They Come 305: It was a boss hustle that Jose had fixed him up with. | |
| Yardie 7: He’d put his life on the line for a hustle so many times. | |
| Shooting Dr. Jack (2002) 83: What if he’s some guy running a hustle, like those guys that [...] walk into a bank and rob the place? | |
| Straight Dope [ebook] [Y]ou don’t watch me when I work my hustle, and I won’t watch you when you work yours. | |
| Secret Hours 221: He didn’t care about the money; he just wanted to be on the right side of any hustle going. |
3. toughness, aggression (esp. in context of pursuing money).
| Hell Hounds of France 221: ‘Wait a minute, you big stiff! Who’s talking about escape? Your blinking American hustle is overstepping itself. I’m suggesting we get the crowd to mutiny against the rotten food’. | |
| Ball Four 18: There are times you have to show hustle, even if it’s false. | |
| Snitch Jacket 31: You showed some heart and hustle out there. | |
| Watergate 141: Rebozo had made himself into a wealthy [...] real estate investor through strong hustle amid the booming postwar Florida real estate market. |
4. (US) any means of survival, often providing little more than subsistence.
 | et seq. implied in get a hustle on | |
| ‘Jiver’s Bible’ in Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive. | |
| Corner Boy 87: A hustle here and there. | |
![[Aus]](/static/img/flags/aus.png "Australia") | Aus. Women’s Wkly 3 Nov. 10/4: School is the warehouse, if you’ve got a hustle (job) you receive green bark. | |
| Panic in Needle Park (1971) 4: Some of the older ones, finding the hustle at last too great to bear, give up the habit completely and never return to drugs. | |
| Ghetto Sketches 69: I fell short on my hustle one night, Jones was on me, so I came home and stole the baby’s milk money to get down with. | |
| Bk of Jargon 342: hustle: [...] As a noun, an illegal or other business enterprise put together to raise quick cash. | |
| Makes Me Wanna Holler (1995) 90: I tried every nickel-and-dime hustle I ran across. | |
| Fortress of Solitude 427: What’s your hustle to be? Watches? Faggots? Drugs? |
5. (US black) a job, a means of earning a living.
| Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 95: You, stud hoss, what is thy hustle? | |
| Corner Boy 83: He could get a part-time hustle somewhere. | |
| Strange Peaches 157: [H]e became serious about photography as a potential hustle. | |
| Guardian G2 26 Aug. 17: It’s just something I’ve never felt suited to, being in LA, living your life as ... a hustle. | |
| Source Aug. 131: What kind of hustle you’re trying to do. Are you on the street selling hot dogs from a cart? You collecting cans? | |
| Corruption Officer [ebk] cap. 2: Everyone had their own hustle. You had credit card scammers, pick pockets, and real live p[imps. |
6. (US black) working as a pimp, prostitute or tramp.
| ‘Jiver’s Bible’ in Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive. | |
| in Hellhole 127: If you hustle at a place like Miss Bee’s it’s a tough hustle and there ain’t nothing you don’t learn nor any hustle that can scare you once you learn that one. | |
| Dry Hustle 201: Don’t we have time for one more hustle tonight? |
7. (US) a criminal scheme or activity.
| ‘Time and cool people’ in Trans-action 4 6/2: When I asked the question, ‘When a dude needs bread, how does he get it?’ the universal response was ‘the hustle’ . | |
| Choirboys (1976) 307: Woulda got his throat cut in some fruit hustle sooner or later anyway. | |
| Dog Eat Dog 100: ‘He managed to get hooked in the joint. He had a run going before they locked him up’. | |
| ‘Roses at His Feet’ in Dirty Words [ebook] The five or six cats he'd pulled this hustle on shook a little, at least. |
8. (US) flattery, deception.
| (con. 1970s) King Suckerman (1998) 22: ‘Sky’s the limit, self starter’, bullshit hustle like that. |
9. (US) a means of seduction, a pass.
| Union Dues (1978) 290: And of course then there’s the hustle. | |
| Runnin’ Down Some Lines 243: hustle […] 2. Sexual overture toward a member of the opposite sex. |
In phrases
1. (US) to get moving, to get going, to get on with the job etc.
| ‘The Landlady’s Daughter’ in Stallman (1966) 9: Why don’t some of you smooth people get a hustle on you? | |
![[Scot]](/static/img/flags/sco.png "Scotland") | Edinburgh Eve. News 31 Dec. 8/5: They have to get a ‘Mighty Hustle On,’ as the Yankees say, to coper with the demand of a bargain-seeking public. | |
| Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 7 Dec. 1/2: The gallant Sub. [...] is getting a hustle on. and reaping in bags of boodle each week. | |
| Vanguard Library 31 Mar. 4: You Britishers can’t get a hustle on you for monkey nuts. | |
| Bulletin (Sydney) 17 Oct. 17: For Heaven’s sake get a hustle on! There’s another one gone! | |
| Skyways 107: There are other people in the world besides Americans who can get a hustle on. | |
| Bully Hayes 16: ‘Get a hustle on!’ roared John Anderson. | |
| Long Winter 18 : I’d better get a hustle on, for it won’t be long now till it’s too late to make hay. | |
| It’s Too Late to Leave Early 315: Wish time doc would get a hustle on. Gotta bust outta here ’fore I choke. |
2. to sustain one’s existence by whatever means available.
| Forbidden 88: She is out there trying to get a hustle on just like I’m trying to get mine on. |
(US) any form of complex and thus potentially highly lucrative confidence trick.
| Texas by the Tail (1994) 9: On the hard-hustle, uh-uh. No matter how much you had on the ball, there was still a limit to it. |
1. living as a confidence trickster, a swindler.
| et al. DAUL 105/1: Hustle, on the. Stealing; practicing prostitution; gambling; engaging in any criminal racket. | |
| Sweet La-La Land (1999) 37: After dark everybody went out on the hustle [...] ready to do what had to be done for the price of a meal, new Reeboks, a lid of smoke, a chunk of crack. |
2. working as a prostitute.
| Neon Wilderness (1986) 49: You’ll be back on the hustle in two weeks. | |
| Men of the Und. 322: Hustle, to go on the, To practice prostitution. | |
| Underdog 46: ‘I was working waitress. I was real green. Didn’t know what was going on, then I met this fellow—Paul. He seemed okay. Pretty soon he had me on the hustle’. |
3. working hard.
| Truth (Sydney) 27 May 6/7: He had been doing very well in S.A,. for some years, but has now gone to Freemantle on the hustle. | |
| On Broadway 13 Oct. [synd. col.] He had just been hired as new headwaiter at Reuben’s. To show Arnold, the boss, that he was on the hustle, he suggested how to improve things. | |
| Kings Road 216: Are you still on the hustle? |