n.
Popular music originating in Jamaica in the 1960s, having elements of rhythm and blues, jazz, and calypso and marked by a fast tempo and a strongly accented offbeat.
[From the phrase (Love) Ska(voovie), greeting used by Jamaican bassist Cluet Johnson, one of the early creators of ska, or imitative of the sound of a guitar in tandem with a rim click on a snare drum.]
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition Copyright © 2007, 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. Updated in 2009. Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
