If you grew up in the Tidewater area in the 80s-mid-90s, do you know what a Grit is?

[Anonymous]

Grew up in Hampton, was in high school in the mid to late 90s. Never heard this term.

[Anonymous]

I heard the term grit and even gritsy used when growing up in Baltimore in the 1980s-1990s. As far as I knew it, the term referred to kids from lower middle to working class families, particularly from the old farming stock that now eked out blue collar occupations and still survived in the older neighborhoods interspaced between the newer suburbs. The term didn't refer to the entire demographics but to a subset of the kids who you knew would end up losers in life. It was a demographic that seemed to have its own fashions and fads and habits and attitudes. I had a classmate who referred to her older sister as gritsy, and the girl was running around with guys who drove beat up old Camaros, partying throughout high school, have sex too early and did get herself pregnant. But she did marry the baby's father (at 19!) and last I heard, settled down to a life as a supermarket cashier while the husband became a low level mechanic. The younger sister won full scholarships to college and is doing very well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I heard the term grit and even gritsy used when growing up in Baltimore in the 1980s-1990s. As far as I knew it, the term referred to kids from lower middle to working class families, particularly from the old farming stock that now eked out blue collar occupations and still survived in the older neighborhoods interspaced between the newer suburbs. The term didn't refer to the entire demographics but to a subset of the kids who you knew would end up losers in life. It was a demographic that seemed to have its own fashions and fads and habits and attitudes. I had a classmate who referred to her older sister as gritsy, and the girl was running around with guys who drove beat up old Camaros, partying throughout high school, have sex too early and did get herself pregnant. But she did marry the baby's father (at 19!) and last I heard, settled down to a life as a supermarket cashier while the husband became a low level mechanic. The younger sister won full scholarships to college and is doing very well.

Agreed that it is a lifestyle choice rather than a fate of geography, race, or social class.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in Cincinnati, Ohio and we definitely referred to a certain group of kids as grits. They wore black leather jackets, listened to Poison and Def Leppard, smoked cigarettes, and the girls used lots of hairspray on their bangs.

The bangs were vertical and nearly straight with a little curl at the end?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grew up in Hampton, was in high school in the mid to late 90s. Never heard this term.

Same, Portsmouth, AA.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I grew up in the Baltimore are during that time and I know the term.

Me too. Anyone I grew up with would know what this means.

[Anonymous]

My DH grew up in VA Beach and he used the term grit. I grew up the Midwest and we said redneck (or Hoosier to mean the same thing, LOL). It's pretty easy to understand what grit means by context clues.

[Anonymous]

The term "grit" was made popular by The Outsiders by S E Hinton. That book was really popular for a while, hence the term "grit" was used. It's not a regional thing.