WATCH: A Brief History of America’s Twerking Craze in 5 Videos

This summer, the media discovered twerking. But while you may have gotten used to hearing the word 20 times a day on cable news since Miley Cyrus’ fateful performance at the MTV Video Music Awards, do you actually know what twerking is?

“Twerking” was recently added to the Oxford Dictionaries Online with the following definition:

twerk
Pronunciation: /twəːk/
verb

dance to popular music in a sexually provocative manner involving thrusting hip movements and a low, squatting stance:

just wait till they catch their daughters twerking to this song
twerk it girl, work it girl

Origin: 1990s: probably an alteration of work

But that doesn’t tell the whole story. Here’s a look a 5 videos that should help you casually drop twerking references into casual conversation, if that’s something you’re so inclined to do. A recent survey found that Americans are 12 times more interesting in twerking than they are in Syria, so this knowledge might just come in handy.

Gallery unavailable

[photos via screengrab]

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