DCHP-2

double-fisting double fisting DCHP-2 (October 2016)

• 1 adv. — slang, informal, usually Food & Drink

  qualifying the verb: holding two items, one in each hand, usually beverages or food.

  Type: 5. Frequency — As Chart 1 shows, the term and its construction - in this case, the common phrase double fisting it - are of comparatively high frequency in Canada. The term is often applied to foods (see the 1983 quotation below and the 2010 quotation under meaning 3) and beverages, usually alcoholic ones (see the 1992 and 2013 quotations under meaning 2). Its use, though, is not limited to these semantic domains (see, e.g., the 2105 quotation under meaning 2).

  • The adverb function appears as the earliest.

• 2 adj. — slang, informal, usually Food & Drink

  pertaining to holding an item in each hand.

  Type: 5. Frequency — The adjectival function may not have been the earliest, but is the most frequent use in current English.

  • Note that in the US (DARE, DAE), "double fist" means 'having two capable fists', which is rather different from the three meanings presented here.

• 3 v., verbal n. — slang, informal, usually Food & Drink

  holding two items, one in each hand, usually beverages or food.

  Type: 5. Frequency — While in principle it is possible that the general meaning of 'to fist' as 'to grasp' (see OED-3, s.v. "fist, v.1 (3)") was extended with double-fisting, the historical record, with its rather late attestation of verbs (the earliest, in a non-verbal noun part of speech, is from 2005), suggests an independent parallel development via the adverb-adjective route, with a rather late conversion to the verb. The phrase "double-fisting it", when aiming to eliminate the sexual meanings, occurs most frequently in Canada (see Chart 1).