Hustle

How to spell hustle

6 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce hustle

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does hustle mean?

1. verbTo move or work quickly and energetically, often pushing to get something done.
2. nounEnergetic activity, busy effort, or the lively bustle of a place.

Hustle in a sentence

• verb

  The staff had to hustle to clear the backlog before the deadline.

• noun

  The daily hustle of the trading floor leaves little time for lunch.

• verb

  Commuters hustle along the platform to catch the early train.

• noun

  Her side hustle selling handmade jewellery now earns more than her job.

Where does hustle come from?

Language of origin: Dutch

Hustle came into English in the late 1600s from the Dutch verb husselen or hutselen, which meant to shake, toss, or jumble together. Early English use kept that physical sense of shaking and jostling, and from there it slid easily into the idea of pushing or shoving someone roughly through a crowd. By the 1800s the word had picked up its modern energetic flavour: to move briskly and get things done with drive and urgency. American slang then sharpened it further, so that to hustle could mean to obtain money or advantage by bold, pushy, or even dishonest means. The silent first 't' that is so easy to slip in does not belong; the trap is the unstressed '-le' ending, which sounds like the more common '-el' and tempts writers to spell it 'hustel'.

How the word is built

• hustle (from Dutch husselen, to shake or toss)
• -le (frequentative ending suggesting repeated action)