Low five

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Hand gesture

title: "Low five" type: doc version: 1 created: 2026-02-28 author: "Wikipedia contributors" status: active scope: public tags: ["1920s-introductions", "5-(number)", "american-cultural-conventions", "hand-gestures", "hipsters-(1940s-subculture)"] description: "Hand gesture" topic_path: "geography/united-states" source: "https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low_five" license: "CC BY-SA 4.0" wikipedia_page_id: 0 wikipedia_revision_id: 0

::summary Hand gesture ::

| align = right | direction = vertical | width = 200 | image1 = HFE_Too_Slow_2.JPG | alt1 = One person lowering their hand and the other raising theirs | image2 = HFE Down Low.JPG | alt2 = The second person moving their raised hand towards the other's lowered hand | footer = A low five palm slap gesture in motion

The low five is a hand gesture when two people slap palms together. One party extends an open palm, face upward at about waist level, the other party strikes the palm in a downward swing with their open palm. It is sometimes known as "slapping five", "give me five", or "giving/slapping skin". Archaic terms for it include "slip-slapping", "slapping the plank" and "soul shake".

The gesture is an antecedent of the high five which appeared in the 1970s.

History

The low five had been known since at least the 1920s when it was used as a symbol of unity among African-Americans, In African-American English this was known as "giving skin" or "slapping skin".

In the 1927 film The Jazz Singer, actor Al Jolson performs the low five, in celebration of the news of a Broadway audition. Written evidence can be found in Cab Calloway's 1938 Hepster's Dictionary. Soon after in the high-profile 1943 all-star Black film Stormy Weather, Cab Calloway receives a double low five from The Nicholas Brothers as they begin their dance number to Calloway's song "Jumpin' Jive". Fred Astaire later told the Nicholas Brothers that the "Jumpin' Jive" dance sequence was "the greatest movie musical number he had ever seen".

Variations

Variations that evolved in the black community include five on the black hand side (giving skin on the darker outer hand side) and five on the sly (a low five behind the back).

References

References

  1. Jonathon Green. (1985). "The Dictionary of Contemporary Slang". Stein and Day.
  2. Zachary Crockett. "The Inventor of the High Five". Priceonomics.com.
  3. Geneva Smitherman. ''Word From The Mother: Language and African Americans'', Taylor & Francis, Apr 19, 2006. [https://books.google.com/books?id=mvj9iZ10XbIC&pg=PA113 Pg. 113].
  4. "USATODAY.com - Dancer Fayard Nicholas dies at 91".

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1920s-introductions5-(number)american-cultural-conventionshand-gestureshipsters-(1940s-subculture)