What it means
A dead-friendly, everyday greeting that’s basically hi with a bit more warmth and familiarity. You chuck it at mates, neighbours, the postie, your nan, whoever. Depending on your tone it can be bright and cheery, or a cautious hiya when you’ve bumped into someone you’d rather not. Not formal, but not rude either. Works in person, texts, and phone calls.
Usage examples
"Hiya, you alright? Saw you in the chippy earlier but the queue was chaos. You still grafting loads, or fancy a quick brew?"
"Hiya, mate, fancy a brew at the new café on Cross Street in Manchester at half past four this afternoon, the bakery next door has just put fresh sausage rolls on the counter and the table by the window with the view of the cathedral is usually free at that hour."
"Hiya, Auntie Maureen, just calling to confirm that we are bringing the trifle for the family Christmas at your house in Hull on Boxing Day, mum is making the bottom layer of sponge with the recipe of the wartime cookbook she found in the attic last spring."
"Hiya, love, you made it then. Come in, kettle's just boiled."
"Hiya... didn't expect to see you here. You alright anyway?"
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Where it comes from
Hiya emerged in the nineteen-forties as a colloquial coalescence of hi you, traceable to American servicemen stationed in Britain during the Second World War, who used the cheerful contraction as a casual greeting on the streets of London and Liverpool. The form transmuted into pure British English by the nineteen-fifties through dance halls and youth clubs, and the radio comedy The Goon Show with Peter Sellers in the early fifties helped consolidate hiya as a warm and unpretentious greeting available to all classes. The Yorkshire and Lancashire industrial towns adopted hiya with particular enthusiasm, and the BBC TV drama Coronation Street has used it as a marker of Northern friendliness since nineteen-sixty.
Other ways to say it
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