What it means
A shindig is a big lively party or celebration, the kind with music, dancing and a proper crowd. Possibly from an old word for a brawl or a kick on the shins, it now means good times rather than trouble. You throw a shindig for a birthday or a leaving do, anything worth making a fuss over. Warm, old fashioned and full of fun.
Usage examples
"They threw a massive shindig for their anniversary, marquee in the garden, live band, the lot, half the village turned up."
"Aunty Pauline is throwing a proper shindig for the fortieth wedding anniversary next Saturday at the Lakeside hotel in Cumbria, a live band, a free bar between seven and ten and a buffet that includes the secret family recipe for sausage rolls baked by my dad."
"The retirement shindig for Mister Bryson at the secondary school in Bristol on the last Friday of term ran from four in the afternoon until eleven at night, with three generations of former pupils turning up to swap stories and finish the cake."
"We’re having a little shindig at ours on Friday, nothing fancy, just tunes, crisps and whoever wanders in."
"It started as a quiet birthday drink and somehow turned into a full shindig with the neighbours in the kitchen singing along to ABBA."
Where it comes from
The word shows up first in Scots as shindy in the early 1800s, meaning a noisy quarrel or rough bit of carry-on. In the US it shifted into shindig by the mid 19th century and mellowed into the idea of a lively social gathering. That American party sense later stuck in wider English.
Other ways to say it
Editors of this term
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