Entry · catalog no. 6210
womanish
/ /ˈwʊmənɪʃ/ /WUUM-uh-nish
adjective · south · 1900s
✓ Verified
1.
Of a girl: acting grown, bold, and knowing beyond her years.
“Sit down somewhere — you getting womanish.”
Origin & Attribution
A Black Southern word a mother throws at a daughter reaching past childhood: You acting womanish. Alice Walker built her definition of womanist on it in In Search of Our Mothers'' Gardens (1983) — a Black feminist, from the black folk expression, You acting womanish, meaning grown-up, willful, wanting to know more than is thought good for you.
traditional
Long current in Black Southern speech: You acting womanish
1983
Alice Walker defines womanist from the phrase
Region of origin
West
Midwest
N.East
South
The South
south · 1900s
Spoken by
the South
$WOMANIThe Record · cultural traction
▲ Steady26 yrs
ahead of the mainstream
45/100
peak cultural energy
Introduced to English by the culture — logged here before the mainstream caught on.
Cultural usage — the recordMainstream search interest
Cultural energy indexed from documented usage, search interest, and citation frequency. The recorded date is the archive’s permanent point of record.
Hear it spoken
By region — how it actually sounds
@nolakid
New Orleans, LA
@htxdri
Houston, TX
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Citations & Sources
■
+ Cite a sourceAlice Walker, In Search of Our Mothers'' Gardens — book · 1983
book
See also