hoopla

Etymology

Earlier houp-la, hoop la first attested in c. 1877, probably from French houp-là, oup-là (“upsadaisy, upsy-daisy”), a cry to various animals close to humans like horses and dogs, of likely onomatopoeic origin (but see là). Compare interjections like whoop, ahoy, hoo.

noun

1. A bustling to-do, excited speech or noise.
   Say you don't know me, or recognize my face / Say you don't care who goes to that kind of place / Knee deep in the hoopla, sinking in your fight / Too many runaways eating up the night 1985, “We Built This City”, in Bernie Taupin, Martin Page, Dennis Lambert, Peter Wolf (music), Knee Deep in the Hoopla, performed by Starship
   Campers enjoyed all of the traditional camp hoopla: color wars, shared team games with other camps and young eager college students spending their summer as counselors. 2008, Michigan Jewish History, volume 48, page 24
   Some astronomers dislike the whole supermoon hoopla. They point out that the term originated with astrology, not astronomy; that perigee full moons are not all that rare, coming an average of every 13 months; and that their apparently swollen dimensions are often as much a matter of optical illusion and wishful blinking as of relative lunar nearness. 7 September 2014, Natalie Angier, “The Moon comes around again [print version: Revisiting a moon that still has secrets to reveal: Supermoon revives interest in its violent origins and hidden face, International New York Times, 10 September 2014, p. 8]”, in The New York Times
2. A carnival game in which the player attempts to throw hoops around pegs.