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I was watching a movie 21, and I saw this interesting expression. Check this out,please.

Mike and Tom, two best buddies, are playing basketball when a gorgeous girl passes by. Mike takes quite a shine to her, and his heart keeps pumping.

Tom suggests Mike ask her out but he's hesitant 'cause Mike believes she's out of his league.

Trying to encourage his friend, Tom says to Mike, with his finger pointing at the girl,

'You know, you say you want a life experience, right? Well, I'd say getting down with that would definitely qualify.'

Not knowing what 'get down' with something means, I checked the dictionary and found out in Wiktionary that it means to become good friends with somebody.

So, let me rephrase what Tom said:

'You know, you say you want a life experience, right? Well, I'd say if you become one of her good friends, it will surely meet the requirement of a life experience.'

I guess Tom was saying, like,

'You want a life experience, and asking her out is the very experience that you've been looking for. Go for it!'

Especially I wonder if he meant 'getting down with that girl' when he mentioned 'getting down with that'.

Hoping that I could find an idiom 'get down with someone', I tried to look up all the dictionaries, which was fruitless.

I'd appreciate any comment. Thank you.

Sven Yargs
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Jongeun Ha
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    There are at least two questions on this site that address "get down with" or "down with" - hope they help! http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/105215/what-does-get-down-with-the-kids-or-be-down-with-the-kids-mean http://english.stackexchange.com/questions/71491/whats-the-origin-of-im-down-with-it – Kristina Lopez Nov 09 '15 at 21:53
  • I don't think that this question is a duplicate of the second question that Kristina Lopez identifies in her comment above, and to the extent that it duplicates anything in the first question she cites, that question was wrongly closed as a duplicate of the second question. I think that we should leave this question open. – Sven Yargs Nov 10 '15 at 09:01

3 Answers3

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"Get down" has about two dozen definitions, some closely related and some not even in the same ballpark. In the above interchange there was an unstated sexual innuendo -- "getting down" with a girl can imply physically laying down with her in a sexual context.

This definition from Urban Dictionary and this one are probably better at explaining the meanings (in this general area of the range of definitions) than anything in a more formal dictionary, but basically the meaning is to get together and party.

Hot Licks
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When Kool and the Gang sang "Get down! Get down!" at the beginning of "Jungle Boogie" back in 1973, the phrase did not have the sense of "to be in agreement with or be hip to [something]," which is the basic meaning of "I'm down with X" as that phrase is currently used.

Rather it meant "get into the groove"—in the sense of dancing or (by innuendo) of something more sexual. The root phrase, in fact, isn't "down with" (as in "I'm down with [something]") but "get down" (as in "Do a little dance, make a little love, get down tonight," from "Get Down Tonight" by KC and the Sunshine Band (1976). I think Tom's suggestion to Mike in the OP's dialogue about "getting down with that [girl]" is clearly in the tradition of "get down" as it was used in the 1970s.

Among the multitude of definitions of the word down in J.E. Lighter, Random House Historical Dictionary of American Slang (1994) cites three in which "down" is sometimes or usually followed by "with" or "with it"—and not one of those meanings seems especially relevant to the OP's quoted phrase: "ready and eager for action; (also) formidable in a fight; tough" (from 1944); "knowledgeable or conversant, esp. thoroughly.—constr. with with; (hence) smart; canny; sophisticated; HIP" (also from 1944); and "eliciting a strong emotional response; most enjoyable; excellent.—also constr. with with it" (from 1946).

Separately, Lighter lists seven meaning for the phrase "get down," ranging from "place a bet; wager" (from 1901) to "go down [on]" (from 1930) to "take an addictive or psychotropic drug, esp. heroin" (from 1952) to "engage in copulation" (from 1966) to "get down to business; apply oneself in earnest; get busy" (from 1967) to "fight" (from 1970) to "be uninhibited, esp. in dancing or performing music; enjoy oneself intensely" (from 1971).

The last of these definitions seems to me to convey the essential meaning of "getting down with that [girl]"—in this case, "enjoying oneself intensely with that [girl]." There is undoubtedly considerable sexual innuendo in the rather vague allusion to enjoyment, but I think it would be a mistake to interpret "getting down" as necessarily implying anything more explicit and specific than "intimacy" or (again) "intense enjoyment."

Sven Yargs
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I agree with Hit Licks interpretation. I think the wiktionary entry is conflating two separate idioms, get down and down with. Hot Licks has correctly identified this as having a sexual connotation. Thus, this is using the get down idiom and the word with is not really part of the idiom.

The wiktionary definition "become friends with" is defining the separate idiom, down with and the word get is not part of the idiom.

TomMcW
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