Learn English – Where did the phrase ‘Uh Oh’ come from

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Uh oh is defined as something you say when you made a mistake, or when something is going wrong or a bad thing is about to happen.

  • An example of a time when you would say "uh oh" is when you dropped and spilled your juice.
  • An example of a time when you would say "uh oh" is when you know you are about to get caught doing something wrong because you hear
    foot steps coming down the hall

. – YourDictionary.com

Why do we say 'Uh Oh' to mean 'Here's trouble? Even babies learn to say it and in the right context as well.

It's commonly known and said by all but where did it start? Is it just a natural sound that an English speaker subconsciously makes in a certain situation or did someone say it first and it caught on?

I've Googled the fun out of it now and I still can't find any information on the origin of the phrase;

'Uh Oh'

Best Answer

The intonation sequence High-Low is what carries the meaning.
With some glottal stoppage to punctuate the two syllables.
The actual syllables used are irrelevant.
One can do the job just by humming High-Low.

As for where it came from, nobody will ever know, because nobody was recording speech
that far back, and this came from speech. Not from writing. Nobody would write it down
until a long time after it became current, because one didn't write down such scurrilous
informal talk. Until recently, that is.

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