Comments on: Words that mean female or feminine?

Question: Words that mean female or feminine?

giggleknickers — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:46:38 -0800

Words that mean woman/girl/female?

I'm looking for words that mean woman, female, feminity etc. Nouns, adjectives, prefixes, whatever.

So far I've got:
female, girl, woman, girly, chick, dame, lady, gal, fem-, -ess, -ette, -euse, pink, lass, femina, femme, miss, missy, mistress. It's a short list, mostly what I can find in the thesaurus. I suck. There must be loads more.

Non-sexist, please! I don't need words like "bitch" or sexual slurs.

By: ninazer0

ninazer0 — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:48:03 -0800

maid
maiden
colleen
sheila
chica

By: samthemander

samthemander — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:49:51 -0800

betty, shorty, doll
(ugh)

By: Sara Anne

Sara Anne — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:49:51 -0800

bird
honey

By: andraste

andraste — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:50:30 -0800

sheila (Australia-specific, I'm sure), babe, wench, broad

By: mumkin

mumkin — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:51:27 -0800

bint!

By: mumkin

mumkin — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:53:34 -0800

Oh, bugger. Scratch that. It appears that the British have managed to pervert it.

By: Frank Grimes

Frank Grimes — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:55:31 -0800

vixen, nanny, doe, hen, etc.

By: ninazer0

ninazer0 — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:58:36 -0800

I forgot: also "mother" and all the variations thereof (mom, mum, momma, ma etc)

By: saucysault

saucysault — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 20:59:16 -0800

Ma'am. Do other languages count (madam, mademoiselle, frau, fraulein)?

By: heathergirl

heathergirl — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:02:22 -0800

broad.

By: Ironmouth

Ironmouth — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:03:05 -0800

shorty.

By: special-k

special-k — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:03:50 -0800

broad

By: kisch mokusch

kisch mokusch — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:06:15 -0800

effeminate

By: 23skidoo

23skidoo — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:12:23 -0800

-trix
co-ed

By: 517

517 — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:13:42 -0800

Fox.

By: burnmp3s

burnmp3s — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:16:17 -0800

she-

By: frobozz

frobozz — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:25:40 -0800

Moll.

By: JABof72

JABof72 — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:32:33 -0800

Tomato.

By: nicwolff

nicwolff — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:35:26 -0800

skirt, squaw

Is "femina" a word? Which thesaurus did you use?

By: giggleknickers

giggleknickers — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:38:45 -0800

Great, guys (and...chicas)! Thanks so much. Keep them coming!

nicwolff, femina is a slang word, and I think it's also Latin. They don't need to be real words. Slang is just fine. Even newly made-up slang would be fine as long as it's instantly recognizable as meaning "woman."

saucysault, foreign words are great if they are universably recognizable.

By: hydrophonic

hydrophonic — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 21:54:03 -0800

distaff (sometimes offensive)

By: suedehead

suedehead — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:12:25 -0800

yoni/yonic.

By: Joh

Joh — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:29:53 -0800

gyno- or gyn-

(I thought shorty was meant to describe kids?)

By: zouhair

zouhair — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:35:20 -0800

In french there is :
Nana
fille
fillette
gamine

By: doctor_negative

doctor_negative — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 22:35:58 -0800

Indirectly, "your better half", when referring to someone's wife.
The fairer sex, goddess, diva.

By: tim_in_oz

tim_in_oz — Sun, 06 Jan 2008 23:02:10 -0800

filly is sometimes used in Oz. And I once heard a Welshman refer so his boss as a 'silly mare'.

By: dcbarker

dcbarker — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 00:26:15 -0800

Quine / Quinie

In "doric", a dialect of North East Scotland (Aberdeenshire area specifically).

By: flutable

flutable — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 00:45:01 -0800

I find the Norwegian jente (girl) and Swedish equivalent flicka strangely erotic, for some reason.

@tim_in_oz: yes filly is common, especially on race day.

girlie is another term I use (and have heard used), mainly when talking about someone who isn't present... eg "Where's your girlie from"?

By: breath

breath — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 01:45:44 -0800

"mound" (as seen here)

By: brujita

brujita — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 02:00:24 -0800

Squaw, yoni, and mound (so far) specifically mean vulva--and Native Americans consider "squaw" pejorative--is this what you want, giggleknickers?

By: wuzandfuzz

wuzandfuzz — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 02:47:20 -0800

hahahaha

"shiksa" (non-jewish woman, in yiddish, may be perjorative)
oh my god, now my schmendrick son is seeing that shiksa? Oy vey... </i)

By: jozxyqk

jozxyqk — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 03:20:06 -0800

daughter, mother, aunt?

By: Faint of Butt

Faint of Butt — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 04:42:40 -0800

Wench.

By: corvine

corvine — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 04:49:34 -0800

Donna? Italian for woman.

I always thought there was a Destiny's Child lyric that went 'All the donnas who got the dollars' but apparently it's 'mommas' according to the internet. Still stands though.

By: artifarce

artifarce — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 05:42:15 -0800

If slang counts, then how about "grrl"? Of course, that is so 5 years ago.

By: electroboy

electroboy — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 06:40:11 -0800

Chippy

By: fearfulsymmetry

fearfulsymmetry — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 06:40:27 -0800

The feminist 'Wimmin' which later became a cliche and was used to mock feminism

By: SuperSquirrel

SuperSquirrel — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 06:40:43 -0800

I call my friends who have kids "mama".

Busia is Polish for grandmother, and in my [English-speaking of Polish descent] family, we use it to refer to any older woman.

Gal-pal for girlfriend.

By: yeti

yeti — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 06:41:42 -0800

Belle

By: SuperSquirrel

SuperSquirrel — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 06:42:54 -0800

The feminist 'Wimmin' which later became a cliche and was used to mock feminism
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 8:40 AM on January 7 [+] [!]

Womyn and womon also, although I don't know of their use to mock.

By: nebulawindphone

nebulawindphone — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:06:12 -0800

(I thought shorty was meant to describe kids?)

Originally it was. It went through the same sort of semantic drift that "babe" did.

By: goo

goo — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:38:06 -0800

'Hen', from Scotland.

And regardless of what wikipedia says, bint isn't usually offensive but I guess it depends on the adjective used. 'Silly bint' is a soft deride and the most common usage I've heard, used in the same context as 'silly mare' or 'silly chook' - implying she's a bit of a duffer but in no way offensive.

By: kaizen

kaizen — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:39:43 -0800

Bitty's, as in Bitty's in the BK Lounge ( De La Soul )

Honeydips, Hotties, Lovelies, and Dime Pieces.

By: languagehat

languagehat — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 07:41:25 -0800

Quine / Quinie
In "doric", a dialect of North East Scotland (Aberdeenshire area specifically).

Those are the Scots equivalent of English quean, which rapidly fell out of use when it merged in sound with queen; it's a very interesting word because it goes back to the Indo-European root for 'woman,' which also gave rise to Sanskrit jani 'woman, wife,' Old Church Slavonic ~ena 'woman, wife' (> Old Russian ~ena 'woman, wife,' Russian ~ena 'wife'), Old Irish ben 'woman, wife' (Irish bean), Old Welsh ben 'woman, wife,' and (with another form of the same base) Sanskrit gn- 'goddess, divine female,' Avestan gYn 'woman, wife,' and ancient Greek gun 'woman, wife.'

Here's the OED on the Scots form, with some citations:

Sc. Freq. in form quine. A young woman, a girl, a lass; esp. one with a youthful bloom or a healthy appearance. Also: a daughter.
1488 (c1478) HARY Actis & Deidis Schir William Wallace (Adv.) IV. 782 A stalwart queyne, forsuth, yon semys to be. [...] 1574 in D. H. Fleming Reg. Christian Congregation St. Andrews (1889-90) 405 [He] said to Elspet his dochtir.. 'Quein! quhat auchtis to thé?' 1619 Rec. Kirk Session Brechin 10 Aug., And namelie lounes and queynes wha usis commonlie to run out off the kirk.. befoir the hour. [...] a1796 R. BURNS Poems & Songs I. 326, I see her yet, the sonsy quean, That lighted up my jingle. 1817 SCOTT Rob Roy II. xiv. 309 It shews a kind heart in sae young a quean—Mattie's a carefu' lass. [...] 1916 Banffshire Jrnl. 30 May 6 He got a muckle parcel frae Hilly's aul'est quine. [...] 1958 J. KESSON White Bird Passes (1992) x. 152 My faith ye! But ye've shot up, Quean! Ye was just a bairn the other day. 1996 W. N. HERBERT Cabaret McGonagall 91 Noo gaither roond baith quine an loon And a nitherin screed Eh'll read. 2007 Aberdeen Evening Express (Nexis) 2 Mar. 26, I was out celeb-spotting with my quine in London.

(You'll note from the last citation that this entry is quite up-to-date; it was revised just last month!)

And while I'm at it, some cites for the English form (which over time, unfortunately, took on the meaning 'a bold or impudent woman; a hussy'):

1780 R. B. SHERIDAN School for Scandal III. iii. 36 Here's to the flaunting, extravagant quean, And then to the housewife that's thrifty. 1823 BYRON Don Juan VI. xcvi, This martial scold, This modern Amazon and queen of queans. 1827 T. HOOD Flowers i, in Friendship's Offering 107 The tulip is a courtly quean, Whom, therefore, I will shun. 1880 T. E. WEBB Goethe's Faust III. ii. 190 The dame's a most commodious quean, A gypsy born and go-between! 1924 E. SITWELL Sleeping Beauty xiv. 47 My eyes are dim,—I yet can see You, lazy quean! Go work!

By: 6550

6550 — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 08:19:19 -0800

Cow; not always derogatory or at least my impression is that in the UK it can sometimes be used affectionately.

By: BenzeneChile

BenzeneChile — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 08:50:26 -0800

Chandler novels and Bogart movies to the rescue!

skirt
necker
moll
tomato
baby vamp
chassis (referring to the female body)
Jane

and one of my favorites,

"a choice bit of calico."

By: dirtdirt

dirtdirt — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 10:58:42 -0800

Frail

Clearly sexist, but no more so than some others.

(I also like that frail can mean "75 lbs of raisins." Now THERE is a word that I'm going to use every day!)