Sashay

To sashay is to move with a confident, gliding, hip-swaying walk that draws attention. The word predates queer culture and appears in Merriam-Webster as strutting or moving in a conspicuous, showy manner, but it found a signature home in ballroom and drag performance, where crossing a floor with theatrical grace is part of the art. The term reached a huge audience through RuPaul's Drag Race, where an eliminated queen is told to "sashay away" while the one who survives hears "shantay, you stay." Both phrases trace back to the Black and Latino drag ball scene of New York. Today sashay is widely used to describe a graceful, self-assured strut.