Talk:yippee ki-yay

Spelling

As this is from colloquial vernacular, I don't know if there's a standard spelling.

It's from Die Hard, so there should be a standard spelling. Unfortunately, since it was an ad lib, there might not be. There's a late draft of the script online with 'yipee-yi-yea', which is just... wrong. 'Yippe Ki Yay' is how Bruce Willis wrote it when he was hanging out at Aint It Cool; tagline for the 5th movie had 'yippee ki-yay'; AFI has 'yippie-ki-yay' as a submission to their list of great movie quotes; the novelization of DHw/V has "Yippee-Kye-Ay"; NY Times, citing an ad campaign for LF/DH on NY busses, has 'yippee kai yay', either of which is how the thing should be spelled based on its sound. — LlywelynII 20:56, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Etymology

I don't have time to research this, but this entry is pretty worthless, so far. Referring to a weakly-researched article on Wordnik is not going to help anyone who really wants to trace the origin of the term. It was in an old song "Ghost Riders in the Sky", as well as Bing Crosby's song. Roy Rogers sang "Git Along Little Dogies" in 1940. Surely it was taken from things cowboys would utter when attempting to drive cattle.

It was in Die Hard. That's the origin, though there were similar (not identical) expressions it derived from, particularly 'I'm an Old Cowhand from the Rio Grande' (2) and 'Git Along Little Dogies'. — LlywelynII 20:56, 18 June 2018 (UTC)

Some variant of the phrase may have existed before, as barely anything ever comes from nothing. But I agree that it was chiefly popularised by that film. The article given as a source doesn't give any substantial proof of use prior to Die Hard. 77.191.66.83 20:47, 9 December 2020 (UTC)