gumba-gumba, noun

/ˌɡʊmba ˈɡʊmba/
Origin:
Etymology unknown: perhaps echoic.
slang
Also in shortened form gumba.
In urban (especially township) English:
1. A prolonged music and drinking session at which liquor is sold for profit. Also attributive.
1974 K.M.C. Motsisi in Drum 22 Dec. 44He tells me that Kid Bles is admitted to the Repair House (Bara Hospital) after he gets himself knifed at a gumba-gumba session way out in Naledi.
1979 N. Motana in Staffrider Vol.2 No.2, 47Lesiba:..Congrats man! Are you throwing a gumba? Fred: (Mimics Lesiba) ‘Gumba, gumba,’ that’s what you know best. When we go uptown you think we go for wine...‘Gumba, gumba,’ that’s what you are after, bloody sucker!
1981 Voice 25 Mar. 4All-night parties at which ear-deafening disco-music is played have been banned. Commenting.., Major Mazibuko said he was referring to ‘gumba-gumbas’, and had asked the people of Soweto to immediately report to the police if these parties inconvenienced them.
1982 Reader Dec. 7Crime is worse when there are gumba-gumba parties...These gumba-gumbas..go on for the whole weekend...The trouble is started by the strangers...People say they need the money from the gumba-gumbas.
1982 ‘D.M.’ in M.O. Mtshali Give Us a Break (1988) 40Down across our street there was a gumbagumba — a wild party. Drunkards were going up and down shouting and making funny things.
1988 [see sense 2].
2. transferred sense. High-fidelity sound equipment; an amplifier. Also attributive.
1988 J. Matlou in Staffrider Vol.7 No.3, 49People from the mines were playing records with their gumba-gumba. Bleskop was very quiet but gumba-gumba men were blasting records the whole night until 2.30 in the morning, when they boarded the Pretoria train.
1990 R. Stengel January Sun 82During the 1940’s, Oukasie was considered a smart address. Parties were frequent. Someone would get a gramophone and some Gumba-Gumbas, as amplifiers were called. The music was jazz.
1991 E. Koch in Weekly Mail 28 Mar. 8One Monday a furniture truck arrived at Joseph X—’s village to take back the gumba (hi-fi set) he bought on hire purchase from a shop in Umtata during one of his trips back home.
A prolonged music and drinking session at which liquor is sold for profit. Also attributive.
High-fidelity sound equipment; an amplifier. Also attributive.
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19741991

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