www.alphadictionary.com

I think this is an interesting phrase. I can't figure out how it ever came to mean "understand how to do something".

It's interesting because it doesn't necessarily indicate a high degree of skill, just adequate skill.

I looked at The Phrase Finder but didn't have much luck.

-Tim

I usually get knacked before I get the knack of things and my career may hang on getting the hang of it.

According to this website,

in the Craven Dialect of England is the word "hank," a habit; from which this word hang may perhaps be derived

According to people cited in Mencken, it is an Americanism that entered the language around 1850.

If Mr. Bartlett is correct, "to get the hang" of something, is to practice something to the point it can be done automatically, without conscious effort, like some habitual activity.

Cheers,

The Online Etymology Dictionary says:

To get the hang of (something) "understand" is from 1845.

but doesn't say how it was derived.

The original post was made Feb. 19th and have been hanging around for almost three weeks now without a proper reply. I'm not saying that I will furnish one but for a Swede it's easy to understand and use this idiom. We have an expression going hänga ihop -- you can see the resemblence between hänga and hang and ihop means together -- and it means "come together", "fit (together)". If that is how things do, they seem easy to understand. I.e. Culbert owes me money/Culbert darts off when he sees me -- ergo: Culbert is still brooke. Or take another more complex example like reading a manual how to set programs on your video machine. After some trial and error you get the hang of it because the directions in the manual "comes together" in a logical fashion (hopefully).
PS The above is in no way any etymological explanation and I don't claim you got it from Swedish.

An equivalente expression in Portuguese I remember of is "pegar o jeito (da coisa)". It's an almost literal translation, were it not for the word "jeito" (way, manner) in place of "hang".
BD will surely be able to tell if I'm right or wrong on this one.

WQ

No, you're absolutely corre(c)to.

Brazilian dude

Iterman, your hänga ihop expression reminds me of a famous quote from Benjamin Franklin, during the American Revolution:

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

-Tim

"I can hang with that". I can aggree....

or just "hang out" verb or noun. to 'do nothing', together AND 'No boyz allowed!'

Katy

Iterman, your hänga ihop expression reminds me of a famous quote from Benjamin Franklin, during the American Revolution:

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

-Tim

Maybe Benjamin Franklin was a Swede after all?

. . . We have an expression going hänga ihop -- you can see the resemblence between hänga and hang and ihop means together -- and it means "come together", "fit (together)". . . .

In some parts of the US, IHOP is the International House Of Pancakes, a good place to hang out together when you are hungry, 24x7 . . .

Iterman, your hänga ihop expression reminds me of a famous quote from Benjamin Franklin, during the American Revolution:

We must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately.

Tim

Maybe Benjamin Franklin was a Swede after all?

not possible, Ben was a revolutionary.

Katy

In some parts of the US, IHOP is the International House Of Pancakes, a good place to hang out together when you are hungry, 24x7 . . .

Let's disgress from the Good Word.
I checked the site and found a lot of blue dots all over the map of US to find a location near me. I didn´t. There are albeit some in Canada, but what makes it international, I wonder. It is the same thing with The International Brotherhood of Teamsters (Union), which has few if any links with the world outside the US as far as I know. And the World Series! Is it called that because a very limited uimber of players come from three or five countries outside the US?
Are there any ideas among the honorable participants of this esteemed forum about these very mundane questions that troubles my poor head?