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

[Anonymous]

And I'm not talking about the food, but a type of person. It's a word that was ubiquitous when I was growing up, but I've never met anyone outside of SE Virginia that knew the phrase.

[Anonymous]

Yeah. I grew up in Va Beach. Graduated high school in the 80’s. A grit was a pothead, kind of heavy metal person. Never heard the phrase outside of VB either!

[Anonymous]

I am in my 50s and it was used around here. Not a lot though. But enough to know who people were talking about.

[Anonymous]

Grew up in rural, central Ohio and grits were rednecks or country bumpkins. My cousins in Dayton used the term "briar" instead of grits.

[Anonymous]

Central VA native here...I heard "grit" used in place of "redneck" sometimes when I was growing up.

[Anonymous]

Grit was used here in school in the mid-80’s.
Referred to the kids wearing jean jackets and into metal, smoking, etc.
First heard it in 1983, Springfield here.

[Anonymous]

Newport News, and yes, we said “grits.”

I cringe now - they were typically from working class to lower middle class families, and I think there was a bit of classicism to the use of the word (which I completely admit to using at the time in high school).

[Anonymous]

Virginia Beach. No.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grit was used here in school in the mid-80’s.
Referred to the kids wearing jean jackets and into metal, smoking, etc.
First heard it in 1983, Springfield here.

Another Springfielder and we would have used the term "druggies" or "burnouts" to describe the guys and girls wearing jean jackets, metal concert tees, wallet chains, bootie or calf high suede moccasins and often, mullets! Druggie girls added feather earrings, heavy black eyeliner and they hung out at Time Out and the school smoking lounge. Good times, circa 1984. Ever seen the documentary Heavy Metal Parking Lot? I recognize a druggie girl from my high school...

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Grit was used here in school in the mid-80’s.
Referred to the kids wearing jean jackets and into metal, smoking, etc.
First heard it in 1983, Springfield here.

OP here. This is how it was used where I lived in Chesapeake. It was basically the group that was opposite of the punk/new wave/surfer/skater kids. It was the heavy metal, classic rock listening kids. The ones that were into Def Leppard vs The Clash. They weren't necessarily Rednecks though, like a PP said. But I remember when I went to college in the late 80's the kids from Northern Virginia, weren't familiar with the term, which I thought was surprising.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Newport News, and yes, we said “grits.”

I cringe now - they were typically from working class to lower middle class families, and I think there was a bit of classicism to the use of the word (which I completely admit to using at the time in high school).

I agree they were generally lower middle class, but it wasn't total classicism, because they were the bitter enemies of the alternative/punk kids, and many of those kids were from lower middle class backgrounds as well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Virginia Beach. No.

Seriously, you grew up in VA Beach and never heard the term Grit? When did you graduate?

[Anonymous]

Went to Pitt in the early 90s. Yes, my freshman year roommate was a Grit. It was a fascinating anthropological experiment for us both. I’m inner-city AA in origin.

[Anonymous]

Yes. I grew up in Chesapeake and this was a big thing when I was in middle school in the early nineties. The grits then were the kids wearing flannel shirts, combat boots, black eyeliner, etc. There were two main groups then - the grits and the preps.

[Anonymous]

I'm a grit.