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What does "a whole mood" mean? I know the means of whole as well as mood, but I don't know when they are connected. I also looked both of them in the dictionaries and can't find this usage. It's from a comment under this YouTube video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HtTUsOKjWyQ

Lmao the dude who looked up then sat back down is a whole mood. He's like
"The hell-? Oh Ok"

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    That whole piece of speech is severely non-standard street-talk. A whole mood is probably an angry mood.
    – Michael Harvey
    Oct 3, 2020 at 8:29

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Within the past couple of years, a new slang meaning of the word “mood” has emerged. It’s used to say something is relatable. “A whole mood” is used to describe something that’s especially relatable (though it’s maybe not as strong as the things that are “mood AF”).

See also:

It is not the same as being “in a mood” or “moody”, which are negative. In fact, “mood” in the new slang sense can be used in response to positive or neutral things, where it would make no sense to be upset, such as this picture of a “smirking cheerleader”.

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    Gosh, you learn something every day… I guess anyone considering using this term should be aware that it's likely to confuse a lot of people!
    – gidds
    Oct 3, 2020 at 18:23
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    @gidds I don't think this is noticeably different from any other new slang. The youth aren't going to hold back from using it because oldsters don't know what it means. That's part of the fun of it, even.
    – amalloy
    Oct 3, 2020 at 18:30
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"Is a mood" (not "is in a mood", which is a more standard and older, more widespread expression) is modern American slang.

As an almost middle-aged British English speaker, this variety of slang isn't part of my native vocabulary and I can only try and work it out by the context.

The way I interpret "...is a mood" or "...is a whole mood" is that the particular person or action is engaging in an action or mode of behaviour that epitomises a particular mood and deserves to be classed as a whole mood of its own rather than subsumed within an existing mood-describing adjective such as "sad", "grumpy", "angry", etc.

TheMarySue recently had an article titled "Sebastian Stan Yelling About People Still Going Outside Is a Mood".

There was recently a similar question about what "...is a mood" means on Quora. One answer was "When something/someone does something so relatable that it is an entire mood". Another was that "If you say 'something is a mood' you attribute an atmosphere or an emotion to something physical".

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  • It's hilarious how many of those Quora answers are cluelessly wrong...
    – Lawnmower Man
    Oct 4, 2020 at 3:40
  • @LawnmowerMan That's Quora for you.
    – F1Krazy
    Oct 4, 2020 at 19:42

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