ping-pongn.1
/ˈpɪŋpɒŋ/, U.S. /ˈpɪŋˌpɔŋ/, /ˈpɪŋˌpɑŋ/ 1. The game of table tennis.A proprietary name in the United States.In quot. 1904, on the ping-pong (Scottish humorous): = on (also upon) the spree at spree n. 1c.
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > sport > types of sport or game > ball game > table tennis or ping-pong > [noun]
table tennis1891
ping-pong1900
pong1968
1900 Daily Chron. 8 May 6/6 Our correspondent seems to hope that the unclean, playing Ping-Pong with the clean, will become unpleasantly conscious of his uncleanness and reform.
1904 ‘H. Foulis’ Erchie xiv. 90 The grocer in there wad be thinkin' I was awa' on the ping-pong if he didna ken I was a beadle.
1938 Amer. Home Jan. 54/3 The screened porch..may be used as an additional living room, for out-of-door meals, for ping pong or cards.
1958 R. Liddell Morea ii. i. 47 Nick..had been playing ping-pong outside the hotel.
1992 R. Graef Living Dangerously v. 137 They sent him to an attendance centre..—it only meant playing ping pong and football for two hours every Saturday.
2. figurative. A series of rapid (esp. verbal) exchanges between two things or parties.
ΘΚΠ
the mind > language > speech > conversation > [noun] > exchange of words
give and take1837
pat-ball1927
ping-pong1934
exchange1939
back-and-forth1941
1909 Jrnl. Philos., Psychol. & Sci. Methods 6 424 To be conscious is to be subject to just such a ping-pong of recurring nervous activities that effect muscle tone on one side and brain discharge on the other.
1934 L. B. Lyon White Hare 50 After him came two high~brows playing a wordy ping-pong.
1966 J. Cleary High Commissioner iii. 51 Two hours of diplomatic ping-pong hadn't touched her; she looked..poised and unmarked.
1992 Ebony May 40/2 When I'm on stage. I can't perform if I don't have that kind of ping pong with the crowd.
Compounds
C1.
a. General attributive.
ping-pong ball n.
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1904 F. Rolfe Hadrian VII 7 The yellow cat..proceeded to carry out a wonderful scheme of feints and ambuscades in regard to a ping-pong ball.
1992 Physical Rev. A. 45 8204/1 A rotating ping-pong ball falling through the air.
ping-pong bat n.
ΚΠ
1902 Times 15 May 6/1 In shape they resemble the familiar and painfully modern ping-pong bat.
1994 Independent on Sunday 11 Dec. (Review Suppl.) 94/2 A numbered ping-pong bat used to signal bids to the auctioneer.
ping-pong game n.
ΚΠ
1946 Amer. Jrnl. Sociol. 52 186/1 To be a success in the dorms one must date, to date one must not win too many ping-pong games.
1992 New Republic 30 Nov. 2/1 (advt.) To emphasize the give-and-take in the relationship, Bronfenbrenner compares it to a continuing ‘psychological Ping-Pong game between two people who are crazy about each other’.
ping-pong materials n.
ΚΠ
1907 Westm. Gaz. 12 Oct. 3/2 A set of ‘ping-pong’ materials.
ping-pong paddle n.
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1938 Hammond (Indiana) Times 16 Jan. 10/4 A sand papered ping pong paddle.
1986 New Yorker 20 Jan. 21/3 Each potential bidder had been issued a bidding board—a device, somewhat larger than a Ping-Pong paddle.
ping-pong player n.
ΚΠ
1902 Mansfield (Ohio) News 16 Aug. 4/3 The chief need of the ping-pong player—some way of picking up, without stooping, the balls that drop from the table.
2003 Washington Post (Nexis) 10 Sept. a8 Teller had been an avid ping-pong player.
ping-pong table n.
ΚΠ
1902 Harper's Weekly 7 June 739 To have your squash-court this summer, if you have any pretensions to style, is as necessary as to have your ping-pong table or your automobile.
1992 Vanity Fair (N.Y.) Feb. 102/2 A..room whose peculiarly tawdry flavor derives largely from its décor: billiard and Ping-Pong tables, and on the wall Holiday Inn-style paintings.
ping-pong tournament n.
ΚΠ
1901 Daily Chron. 16 Dec. 8/2 The table tennis or ‘ping-pong’ tournament..concluded on Saturday night at the Royal Aquarium.
1989 M. Norman These Good Men vi. 152 They weren't much interested in his chatter about baseball and Ping-Pong tournaments in Griffith Park.
b.
ping-pong match n. a game of ping-pong; also figurative.
ΚΠ
1917 E. Pound Let. 11 Apr. in T. S. Eliot Waste Land Drafts (1971) p. xii I want to boom Eliot and one cant have too obvious a ping-pong match at that sort of thing.
2004 Salt Lake Tribune (Nexis) 29 June b1 A broken wrist sustained during a ping-pong match.
c. figurative. With reference to things consisting of or involving rapid back-and-forth responses or impulses.
ΚΠ
1902 Amer. Jrnl. Philol. 23 107 The chief trouble about ‘potential’, as about many terms that are bandied about in the ‘ping-pong’ sport of grammarians, lies in the want of clear definition.
1969 High Fidelity Sept. 63/1 The four channels might be used for double ping-pong effects—perhaps a quadriphonic version of ‘Switched on Bach’.
1986 V. Hearne Adam's Task (1987) v. 124 The outlaw, like some schizophrenics, usually has a Ping-Pong mechanism composed of fear and rage in response to people.
1991 New Yorker 11 Mar. 23/1 He even manages to sabotage the Ping-Pong rhythms of Rosencrantz and Guildenstern's comic set pieces.
C2.
ping-pong diplomacy n. historical the establishment of trade and other relations between two countries (originally between China and the United States in the 1970s, initiated as a result of an American table-tennis team travelling to China).
ΚΠ
1971 N.Y. Times 10 Apr. 22L/2 Ping-Pong Diplomacy... Mao Tse-tung is demonstrating that table tennis can be used as a subtle and effective instrument of diplomacy.
1982 Papers Dict. Soc. N. Amer. 1979 2 In an era of Ping-Pong diplomacy, Band-Aid economics, and Scotch-Tape solutions..the maker of dictionaries is too often driven to ingesting Aspirins.
1994 Chicago Tribune 21 July iii. 1/3 Sino-U.S. rapprochement was known in the 1970s as ping-pong diplomacy.
ping-pong diplomat n. a person who attempts to normalize trade and other relations between two countries, initially through sporting contact.
ΚΠ
1973 Washington Post 24 June k8/2 The donors will be happy if the Ping-Pong diplomats take the table along with them.
1981 Xinhua Gen. Overseas News Service (Nexis) 22 June Tim Boggan [is] one of the original ‘ping pong diplomats’ and an editor of a table tennis magazine in the United States.
1994 N.Y. Rev. Bks. 6 Oct. 47/1 Basically, [Kuhn] wanted to be the ‘ping-pong diplomat’ of Cuba.
Derivatives
ˈping-ˈpongist n. now rare = ping-ponger n. at ping-pong v. Derivatives.
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society > leisure > sport > types of sport or game > ball game > table tennis or ping-pong > [noun] > player
ping-pongist1901
ping-ponger1903
1901 Daily Chron. 27 Dec. 6/3 The competitors were presumably the pick of ‘Ping-Pongists’ in London.
1935 Chron.-Telegram (Elyria, Ohio) 8 Apr. 2/2 Warren Williams is a crack ping pongist.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2006; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
ping-pongn.2
/ˈpɪŋpɒŋ/, U.S. /ˈpɪŋˌpɔŋ/, /ˈpɪŋˌpɑŋ/ Also more fully ping-pong drum. A drum which supplies the melody in a Caribbean steel band; a tenor pan.
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > the arts > music > musical instrument > percussion instrument > drum > [noun] > metal drum
ping-pong1948
pan1955
1948 E. Leaf Isles of Rhythm viii. 196 This transformation has occurred through the invention of the ping-pong, a percussion steel drum.
1955 I. McDonald in K. Ramchand & C. Gray West Indian Poetry (1972) 19 Even when he was small he made many-coloured ping-pong drums.
1955 New Commonw. 28 Nov. (Suppl.) p. xix/1 In the orchestra the pans are grouped into Ping Pongs, Alto Pans, Tenor Kittles, Kittle Booms, Tune Booms and Bass Booms.
2000 Wasafiri Autumn 64/2 Experimentation ‘produced a plethora of instruments’, all with different names such as ping pong..and good pans became prizes worth fighting over.
This is a new entry (OED Third Edition, June 2006; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
ping-pongv.
/ˈpɪŋpɒŋ/, U.S. /ˈpɪŋˌpɔŋ/, /ˈpɪŋˌpɑŋ/ 1. intransitive. To play ping-pong (table tennis).
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > sport > types of sport or game > ball game > table tennis or ping-pong > play ping-pong [verb (intransitive)]
ping-pong1901
1901 Times 1 June 8/5 [He] is only required to be agreeable and to ping-pong.
1923 R. Macaulay Told by Idiot iii. v. 213 Everywhere people ping-ponged. One would have thought there was no war on.
1997 Observer (Nexis) 21 Dec. 11 A 13-year-old girl who has ping-ponged for England.
2.
a. transitive. To send or pass back and forth in the manner of a ping-pong ball. Also: to pass around aimlessly or unnecessarily; (North American) to pass (a patient) to a succession of doctors for superfluous examinations in order to maximize fees.
ΚΠ
1902 G. Ade Girl Proposition 110 She and The Genius would sit at opposite ends of the Table and ping-pong a line of inspired conversation.
1970 Washington Post 22 Nov. b6 The administration ‘ping-ponged’ the proposal back and forth.
1976 Times 31 Aug. 5/2 The report [of a Senate committee] states that ‘investigators were repeatedly “ping-ponged” to neurologists, gynaecologists, internists, [etc.]’.
1995 Guardian 1 Mar. ii. 13/1 For nearly six years, he had been ping-ponged between various social services departments in London.
b. intransitive. To move or go back and forth in the manner of a ping-pong ball; to move or be passed back and forth aimlessly or unnecessarily; to alternate.
ΘΚΠ
the world > movement > motion in specific manner > alternating or reciprocating motion > move to and fro or up and down [verb (transitive)] > move like a shuttlecock or tennis-ball
shuttle1550
tennis1565
bandya1599
racket1599
shuttlecock1687
battledore1858
ping-pong1909
1909 Atlanta (Georgia) Constit. 10 Feb. 1/1 The paper [sc. a council ordinance]..has been ping ponging back and forth in this way for more than a year.
1936 Times 23 Apr. 6/1 At the 14th he was bunkered near the green, ping-ponged right over it down a slope, but laid a gorgeous pitch dead and got a five again.
1952 Jackson (Tennessee) Sun 1/1 (heading) Question of Margaret's guards ping-pongs across Atlantic.
1972 Daily Tel. 11 Mar. 11/2 He can time funny lines so that they ping-pong back and forth in long sustained volleys with the audience's laughter.
1987 P. Whitmer & B. van Wyngarden Aquarius Revisited ii. 18 For someone who has Ping-Ponged between episodic extremes, Leary has woven a lifelong tapestry of achievement.
Derivatives
ˈping-ponger n. a ping-pong player or enthusiast.
ΘΚΠ
society > leisure > sport > types of sport or game > ball game > table tennis or ping-pong > [noun] > player
ping-pongist1901
ping-ponger1903
1903 Daily Northwestern (Wisconsin) 3 Oct. 13/1 He's the most powerful ping-ponger I know.
1962 G. Compton Too Many Murderers xvii. 144 She sidled round the ping~pongers.
2003 Observer (Nexis) 4 May (Sports Mag.) 63 China boasts the best ping-pongers in the world.
This entry has been updated (OED Third Edition, June 2006; most recently modified version published online March 2022).
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