What's the origin of "lit"?
Since June 2015, the use of the word lit has exploded on Twitter. Here are some recent examples.
Nena Marie:
My Year is starting off lit af👌🏼 ...but is gonna be TD by Monday morning
Nick:
Jason got lit last night. Was the show for at least half the snapchat stories this morning.
Summer Monae':
When you and bae both lit and give each other that look
The @lovihatibot Twitterbot routinely finds it in searches for "I love the word [X]" and "I hate the word [X]", in fact, it's the third most hated) and eighth most loved over 30 days, and fourth most hated and 10th most loved in all of 2015. That's a lot of love and hate for a little word, it can't be random babble to cause such a reaction.
Similarly, it regularly shows up in @favibot's searches for "[X] is my new favorite word" and came in as third favorite for all 2015.
What does lit mean here?
Where does it come from and when was it first used?
Was there a single person or event which popularised it, and when was it? Or if it's an older word, what accounts for its recent popularity?
Solution 1:
According to OED, lit (slang. Drunk Freq. const. up.) is from 1914:
Lit up, intoxicated.
‘High Jinks, Jr.’ Choice Slang 14
From 1933, it refers to someone under the influence of a drug:
When one has contracted the habit or is under the immediate influence of the drug, he is all lit up.
American speech (American Dialect Society)
In 1971, it also appears in Eugene E. Landy's The underground dictionary:
Lit up,..under the influence of a narcotic.
For the recent usage of lit meaning exciting, excellent, awesome; Merriam Webster has added an article since. It is mentioned that the new meaning comes from rap (which I've mentioned one year ago in the comment section also). Here is a relevant excerpt:
Rap has also given us a new meaning of lit. In the last ten or so years, lit has transitioned from being applied to the act of intoxicating ("gonna get lit") to the environment of those who are lit ("party's lit"). The wildness of such parties has led to lit gaining the meaning “exciting,” as well as a broader meaning along the lines of “excellent” (“Leslie Jones's commentary on the Olympics was lit"). We have evidence of the “exciting” and “excellent” meanings way back to 2004, and earlier use is likely—slang is often spoken long before it’s written down. This extended meaning of lit is a favorite on social media like Twitter.
There is also a discussion in a Sports, Hip Hop & Piff forum where they are trying to find the origin of the phrase "It's lit": http://www.thecoli.com/threads/the-term-its-lit-who-started-that.358480/page-2
Solution 2:
The word means different things in accordance to the context in which it was applied.
Answers:
My Year is starting off lit af👌🏼 ...but is gonna be TD by Monday morning
Meaning: my year, 2016, is starting off really well, but it will be even better by Monday Morning. Lit in this context means great, AF means as fuck. *Also, TD means Touch Down, which implies success or a great achievement.Jason got lit last night. Was the show for at least half the snapchat stories this morning. Meaning: Jason either got drunk, high, etc or had just had a really fun night, or a combination of all three.
When you and bae both lit and give each other that look
Meaning: You and your significant other (fling, gf, bg, etc) got drunk, high, last night, and looked at each other either playfully sexually etc... more description needed for a full answer
Origin: late 80's early 90's, use of word faded out in black culture but came back around 2011
Source: A young intelligent Black male.
Solution 3:
Checking with the slang usage of the term "lit", it appears that it used to mean inebriated and is now used with a stronger meaning close to intoxicated, stoned or any state of mind you may find yourself in after having taken one or more "intoxicating agents". In the short lines reported in your question it may have been used in a figurative sense:
Lit:
- The state of being so intoxicated (regardless of the intoxicating agent) that all the person can do is smile, so that they look lit up like a light. He's so lit he can't even talk. Pee.
(UD)
To get lit:
- to be lit must mean to be high. To be fair, that is certainly the most used definition of the word; in fact, the most popular Urban Dictionary definition of "lit" is, "The state of being so intoxicated (regardless of the intoxicating agent) that all the person can do is smile, so that they look lit up like a light." Whether you've actually recently lit a joint or are just super turnt on tequila shots, getting and being lit via intoxicant is certainly a common use of the word.
(www.bustle.com)
From moblile.twitter.com:,
- lit is the new lit. we used to get lit in the 80's. back then it just meant "inebriated"