Ballroom & Drag

10s

In ballroom culture, "10s" are the top marks judges award, and "tens across the board" means every judge scored a performance perfect.

Ballroom Culture

Ballroom culture is a Black and Latino LGBTQ+ underground scene built around competitive balls and chosen-family houses that began in Harlem in the 1960s and 1970s.

Bianca Del Rio

Bianca Del Rio is the comedy drag persona of Roy Haylock, winner of season 6 of RuPaul's Drag Race.

Bloodline

In drag and ballroom culture, a bloodline is the chosen-family lineage that connects members through mentorship, such as drag mothers and their drag children.

Boots

"Boots" is a drag and ballroom intensifier tacked onto a word or phrase to crank its meaning up to the maximum.

Boots The House Down

"Boots the house down" is a drag and ballroom expression for a performance or look so flawless it counts as the highest possible compliment.

Butch Queen

Butch queen is a ballroom culture term for a gay or bisexual cisgender man, whose gender expression can range from masculine to feminine.

Carrying

In drag and ballroom slang, "carrying" means acting in an exaggerated, over-the-top, or dramatically excessive way.

Chop

In ballroom culture, to be chopped means to be cut from a category by the judges so you do not advance to the next round.

Clack / Clacking

In drag and ballroom culture, a clack is the sharp percussive snap, from a folding fan or a heel striking the floor, used to punctuate a moment and signal approval.

Coins

In drag and ballroom culture, "coins" refers to money, either literal cash tossed to a performer or earnings and admiration won through a standout performance.

Cunty

Cunty is a drag and ballroom compliment meaning boldly feminine, confident, and striking.

Darcelle XV Showpiece

Darcelle XV Showplace is a historic Portland, Oregon drag cabaret opened in 1967 by Walter Cole, who performed as Darcelle XV and was certified by Guinness World Records as the world's oldest working drag queen.

Death Drop

A death drop, more accurately called a dip, is a dramatic voguing move in which a performer falls backward to the floor, landing on their back with one leg bent and one extended.

Dip

A dip, popularly called a death drop, is a dramatic dance move in which a performer falls backward to the floor with one leg extended, often as the climax of a vogue or drag performance.

Drag

Drag is a performance art in which someone uses clothing, makeup, and character to play with and exaggerate gender for entertainment and self-expression.

Drag Daughter

A drag daughter is a newer drag performer who has been mentored and taken under the wing of a more experienced performer known as their drag mother.

Drag King

A drag king is a performer who dresses and acts in exaggerated masculine drag, playing up male styles and stereotypes for the stage.

Drag Queen

A drag queen is a performer, usually a gay man, who uses costume, makeup, and an exaggerated feminine persona to entertain and play with gender.

Drag Queen Story Hour

Drag Queen Story Hour is a children's literacy program, now often called Drag Story Hour, in which drag performers read books to kids in libraries, schools, and bookstores.

Duck-walk

The duck-walk is a signature vogue and ballroom dance move in which a performer squats low and travels forward on the balls of the feet, often bouncing to the beat.

Eat / Eating / Ate

In Black and Latinx ballroom and drag slang, to say someone "ate" means they performed or looked flawless, with "ate and left no crumbs" as the highest form of that praise.

Face Card

Face card is slang for someone's facial attractiveness, often used in the phrase "face card never declines" to mean a person always looks good no matter the situation.

Fish / FIshy (Drag)

Fish, or fishy, is drag slang for a queen who presents very convincingly as a cisgender woman.

Function

In ballroom culture, a function is a ball or ballroom event where houses and performers compete across categories.

Gagged

In drag and ballroom slang, being gagged means being so stunned or amazed by something spectacular that you are left speechless.

Gagging

In ballroom and drag culture, gagging is the act of stunning or astonishing an audience, causing a jaw-dropping reaction of awe.

Gender Illusionist

Gender illusionist is a term for a drag or stage performer who creates a convincing impression of a different gender through makeup, costume, and performance.

Grand Marshal

A Grand Marshal is a person chosen to lead and be honored at a Pride parade for their contributions to the LGBTQ+ community.

House

In ballroom culture, a House is a chosen-family group, led by a Mother and/or Father, that competes together at balls and offers members mentorship and belonging.

House Father

A House Father is the male or masculine-identified head of a House in ballroom culture, offering guidance, protection, and fatherly support to the House's members.

House Mother

A House Mother is the matriarch and leader of a House in ballroom culture, guiding and supporting its members as a chosen-family parent.

I Live

"I live" (or "living") is drag and ballroom slang for intense delight, meaning something brings you overwhelming joy.

In Face / Outta Face

"In face" and "outta face" are drag terms describing whether a performer is in full drag makeup and persona or in their everyday, out-of-drag appearance.

Invasion, The

The Invasion is a ballroom scene event held in Atlanta, one of the balls that expanded ballroom culture into the American South.

Lady Bunny

Lady Bunny is a legendary American drag queen, DJ, comedian, and founder of the Wigstock festival who has shaped New York City queer nightlife since the 1980s.

Legendary Children

Legendary children is a term of high honor in ballroom culture for house members and performers whose achievements and influence have earned lasting, iconic status.

Lip Sync

A performance in which someone mouths the words to a recorded song, a signature art form in drag culture.

LipSync

The drag art of mouthing a recorded song's words with full theatrical expression and commitment.

Mopping

In ballroom and drag culture, mopping means stealing or shoplifting, often to obtain the clothing and materials needed to compete at a ball.

New Way

In ballroom and vogue culture, New Way is a style of voguing built on rigid arm and hand precision, extreme flexibility, and illusions like arm and leg contortions.

Old Way

Old Way is the original style of vogue, built on hard angles, straight lines, symmetry, and precise, model-inspired poses.

Ovah

Ballroom and Black queer slang meaning something is so spectacular and flawless that it is over the top, or simply the best.

Ovahness

Ovahness is ballroom and drag slang for something so excellent, fierce, or showstopping that it surpasses everyone else, drawn from the word "over."

Read

To read someone is to call out their flaws or pretensions with sharp, precise, witty criticism, a verbal art form rooted in Black and Latino queer ballroom culture.

Realness

In ballroom culture, realness is the ability to embody a particular identity or type so convincingly that it reads as completely authentic.

Sashay

Sashay means to walk in a confident, gliding way with the hips swaying, a movement rooted in dance and celebrated in drag culture.

Serve

To serve is to present a look, performance, or attitude with striking flair, confidence, and skill.

Serving

Serving is drag and ballroom slang for presenting or delivering something (a look, an attitude, a performance) with striking precision and confidence.

Serving Cunt

Serving cunt is drag and ballroom slang, meant as high praise, for radiating bold, fierce, confident femininity and looking undeniably good.

Shade

Shade is a subtle, deniable form of insult or disrespect, delivered with an air of innocence so the criticism lands without being said outright.

Sickening

Sickening is a high compliment in drag and ballroom culture describing a look or performance so stunning that it is almost overwhelming.

Sissy That Walk

"Sissy that walk" is a ballroom-rooted phrase, popularized by RuPaul, that means to strut the runway with confident, exaggerated femininity and flair.

Slay

Slay is a term of praise meaning to do something with outstanding skill, style, and confidence, rooted in Black and Latino LGBTQ+ ballroom culture.

Snatch Game

Snatch Game is the recurring celebrity-impersonation comedy challenge on RuPaul's Drag Race, modeled on the classic game show Match Game.

Snatched

Snatched is a slang compliment, rooted in Black drag and ballroom culture, meaning someone looks flawless or a body or waist looks perfectly toned.

Throwing Shade

Throwing shade means making a subtle, indirect, or cleverly disguised insult toward someone, often with enough deniability to avoid open confrontation.

Tired

In drag and queer slang, calling something tired means it is unoriginal, overdone, or dull, the opposite of fresh or exciting.

Tongue Pop

A tongue pop is a sharp clicking sound made by snapping the tongue off the roof of the mouth, used in drag and queer culture as a flourish of attitude and emphasis.

Trixie Mattel

Trixie Mattel is the drag persona of Brian Firkus, a RuPaul's Drag Race star who won All Stars season 3 and built a music and cosmetics empire.

Turn It

Turn It is a drag and ballroom phrase meaning to perform with exceptional skill, presence, and flair, delivering a look or performance flawlessly.

Untucked

Untucked describes releasing the genitals from a tuck, and it is also the name of the backstage RuPaul's Drag Race spin-off where queens relax and let their emotions out between challenges.

Vogue

Vogue, or voguing, is a stylized dance built on model-like poses that emerged from New York's Black and Latino LGBTQ+ ballroom scene.

Vogue Femme

Vogue Femme is a dramatic, hyper-feminine style of voguing built around five signature elements: hands, catwalk, duckwalk, floor performance, and spins and dips.

Waacking / Whacking

Waacking is a disco-era street dance of rapid arm movements and dramatic poses that emerged in the gay clubs of 1970s Los Angeles.

Walk (Ballroom culture)

In ballroom culture, to walk is to compete in a category at a ball, presenting your look, energy, and command of that category before the judges and crowd.

Weave

Weave is a hair extension sewn or attached into natural hair, and in Black queer and ballroom slang it fuels expressions like 'snatched my weave' meaning to be stunned or impressed.

Werk / Werq

Werk (also spelled werq) is a slang term of praise and encouragement, an emphatic spelling of "work" used to celebrate someone delivering a fierce look or performance.

Wig

In queer and drag slang, "wig" is an exclamation of shock or delight at something amazing, drawn from the image of a look so good it knocks your wig off.

Wigstock

Wigstock was an annual outdoor drag festival in New York City's East Village, founded by Lady Bunny in 1984 as a playful homage to Woodstock.

Yas Queen

Yas queen is an emphatic expression of admiration and hype, born in Black and Latino ballroom and drag culture, where queen honors a fierce or powerful performer.