Slang dictionary
get gully
[get guhl-ee]
What does get gully mean?
Get gully is a slang expression for “acting tough,” especially to defend your honor in a fight, or sometimes it just means “excited” more generally.
Where does get gully come from?
The word gully in English has referred to a “ravine” since the 17th century and a “ditch” or “gutter” since the 18th century. It’s this meaning of gully that’s apparently at work in the expression get gully.
Gully, in slang, refers to people or things that come “from the gutter” (i.e., the streets). If you’re a tough, rugged, or gangsta, you might be gully.
soft and delicate but i will get gully
— ❄️ (@JulyIssue) June 6, 2018
Gully as a slang term for “the hood” or “streets” dates back to at least 1993, where New York City hip-hop group Onyx rapped on their track “Bang 2 Dis” about acting “thugged out, grimey, go hard, gully.”
The phrase get gully, then, has come to mean being streetwise, always squared up for a fight. It was popularized by rapper 50 Cent on his 2011 “6 Out of 6 (Get Gully),” which was all about his street ways: “We get gully and we get money.”
By the 2000s, get gully started to mean “starting drama” more generally too, whether physical fights or online flame wars. Oh yea, and it also started to mean “being very excited” for something, like a sporting event.
Sweating me 😝. Is I gonna have to get gully!!! pic.twitter.com/SyTA3RW22k
— Sweet_Twi**er_Handle (@thefrappemafia) October 8, 2018
Examples of get gully
Who uses get gully?
Get gully is also used in black and hip-hop slang for “acting hood” (i.e., being tough, being ready for a fight, or going off on someone). Thanks to the popularity of hip-hop in popular culture, get gully has spread into the mainstream for “being excited” or “going wild.”
In 2018, Machine Gun Kelly notably taunted Eminem on his track “Rap Devil”: “Both of us single dads from the Midwest, we can talk about it / Or we could get gully, I’ll size up your body / And put some white chalk around it.”
Note that gully has other meanings, such as an “alley” in Indian English and various slang senses of “penis” or “vagina” …
Note
This is not meant to be a formal definition of get gully like most terms we define on Dictionary.com, but is rather an informal word summary that hopefully touches upon the key aspects of the meaning and usage of get gully that will help our users expand their word mastery.