agita
Agita is anxiety, stress or aggravation, the kind you feel in your stomach. It started out meaning heartburn, and it’s strongly tied to Italian-American speech in and around New York.
What agita means
You get agita from a long line at the DMV, a group chat full of drama, or watching your team blow a three-goal lead. It’s agitation with a physical edge, as if the stress went straight to your gut.
It still means actual heartburn too, and the two overlap nicely: a heavy dinner and a family argument can both give you agita, often on the same night.
Examples
- “Don’t tell your mother yet. She’ll get agita.”
- “That meeting gave me agita for the whole afternoon.”
- “Watching the market this week? Pure agita.”
Where it came from
Agita comes from a southern Italian dialect pronunciation of acido, Italian for “acid” or heartburn. The meaning drifted from an upset stomach to an upset mind, helped along by the English word “agitation.” Dictionary.com dates it in English to the early 1980s. For decades it was mostly heard among New Yorkers of Italian descent, and it spread much more widely by the 1990s.
Today it turns up well beyond the family dinner table. Business papers now use it for nervous investors, and it has spread well past New York.
How to say it
AJ-ih-tuh, with the stress on the first syllable.
Related terms
More throwback and old-school words are in our 90s slang guide.
Example sentence
Every time the group chat lights up, I get agita.
Similar words
stress, aggravation, heartburn
Notes
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