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Confidence game
- short′ con′, [ Slang.] Slang Terms any simple confidence game involving a relatively small amount of money.
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Con artists are the magicians of film - we suspect the double-cross is coming yet we get duped while admiring the illusion. Like spies, cons come in disguise, seducing us with diabolical promises and secret, coded language. If you’re in the game, you need to speak the lingo.
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Paul Newman and Jackie Gleason in The Hustler (1961). Bet -...
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short con n. also short coin, short con game, short con racket, short money racket. [abbr. SE short ( time) + con n.1 (8)] 1. ( US Und.) any variety of confidence trick that can be performed spontaneously and on the spot, with no elaborate props, preparation etc.
SHORT CON definition: any simple confidence game involving a relatively small amount of money | Meaning, pronunciation, translations and examples.
Aug 9, 2023 · Meaning of the Slang Term: GOAT. The British Isles have a rich linguistic history with colloquial expressions like 'bloke', 'cheeky', 'mate', and 'blimey'. Navigate the myriad of British slang terms and idioms that offer a unique window into UK culture.
- On The Grift
- On The Square
- Playback
- The Rackets
- Mark
- Frammis
- The Tat
- And 9. The Short Con and The Long End
- Roper
- Inside Man
“You're on the grift,” Lilly says to her son Roy. “I know you are.” According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the U.S. criminal slang term grift originated in the early 1900s. It may be an alteration of graft, which is from 1865 and refers to obtaining profit in a shady way. So where does this meaning of graft come from? There are a couple ...
The opposite of on the grift is on the square. For example, Roy is pretending to be on the square by working as a salesman. Square, meaning “old-fashioned,” is from 1940s American jazz slang, and might come from the shape a band conductor’s hands make in a four-beat rhythm. The 18th-century word square-toeshas a similar meaning; it refers to what w...
“You’re one to talk,” Roy says to Lilly. “Still running playbackmoney for the mob.” The Routledge Dictionary of Modern American Slang and Unconventional English defines playback as “a scheme by which the odds on a particular horse race are engineered lower by heavy betting on that horse.” However, its reference is the novel The Grifters—so whether ...
On the other hand, the rackets—which Lilly tells Roy he was never cut out for—has been in documented use since at least 1819. At that time, the phrase was used in British English to mean a scam, and came into American English with the same meaning around 1869. It was in the 1920s that the racketswas used to refer to organized crime in general. So h...
“You send me $10,000,” says angry boss Bobo to Lilly, “like I'm some markyou can blow off!” Markmeaning someone targeted for robbery or easily duped is older than you might think. In the late 16th century, the word had gained the meaning among criminals as someone or something targeted for burglary. By the mid-1700s, a mark was someone specifically...
While the film seems to use frammis to mean a unscrupulous scheme (specifically, an insurance frammis involving a towel full of oranges), the word originated around 1940 in comic strips as a generic surname or company name. From a 1944 New Republic article: “[The comic strip ‘Silly Milly’] has its pet vocabulary—all names are Frammis, laughter is Y...
Myra realizes her boyfriend Roy is on the grift when she witnesses him “working the tat” on some sailors. Tat, meaning loaded or false dice, is quite old—it dates from the 1680s. Tat-monger, a con man who uses such dice, is from around the same time. However, where the word tat comes from is unclear. Tattoo, meaning permanent ink on the skin, didn'...
Working the tat is a short con, or a one-time scam that takes the mark for the money they happen to have on hand. Con here is a shortening of confidence trick, in which a dupe hands over valuables as a token of confidence or trust in a con man (or woman, as the case may be). Opposed to the short con is the long end, also known as the big con, the l...
“I'm the roper,” Myra tells Roy. “I go out and find them and bring them in.” According to the OED, this sense of roperoriginated around 1840 and referred to someone charged with bringing customers into a gambling establishment and later into any scam. This probably came from the earlier meaning of someone who catches an animal with a lasso, especia...
Since, as Roy astutely points out, nobody does a long con single-o, Myra needs a partner—an inside man. While the roper brings in the mark, the inside man stays near the “big store,” or sham operation. This 1930s term could also mean a spy posing as an employee within a company.
short′ con′, [Slang.] Slang Terms any simple confidence game involving a relatively small amount of money.
What Is “Slang”? Slang is an informal type of vocabulary used in casual conversations and recognized and understood by certain groups of people. For example, there can be teenage slang, business slang, sport-specific slang, and many other types. Slang varies based on location and demographic.
