girl
/ˈɡɜɹl/
Word Rarity
Common
Frequency: 5.38 in modern English
5
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
A female non-human animal, especially, in affectionate address, a female pet, especially a dog.
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "I saw a little girl feeding, brushing, and talking to a heifer."
- "He has a crush on a girl at work. We were kidding with him yesterday about his work crush."
- "Hey, girl, I haven't seen you since last week! Where you been?"
- ""My dear girl, what has he done?" said Mrs. Mallowe, sweetly. It is noticeable that ladies of a certain age call each other "dear girl," just as commissioners of twenty-eight years' standing address their equals in the Civil List as "my boy.""
- ""What a pity you couldn't see it." "Isn't it?" I agreed. "Now do go away, there's a good girl.""
- "'Now, girls,' continued Healey, 'you're very high-spirited and that's as it should be but I won't have you getting out of hand.[…]' […] Setting a spatted foot on the bench that ran down the middle of the changing-room with elegant distain, Adrian began to flip through a pile of Y-fronts and rugger shorts with his cane."
Etymology
From Middle English gerle, girle, gyrle (“young person (boy or girl)”), perhaps from Old English *gyrele, from Proto-West Germanic *gurilā, from a zero-grade diminutive of *gaurā (“young child”) + *-ilā. Ultimately of unknown origin. Doublet of gal/gyal and gyaru. Cognates Cognate with Yola gurl (“child, girl”), German Gör, Göre (“brat, cheeky young child”), Low German Gör (“child”).
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: gerle, *gyrele, *gurilā
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈɡɜɹl/
- British English: /ˈɡɜːl/
Usage
- Countable
- Uncountable
- Offensive
- Colloquial
- Informal
- American usage
- Slang
- British usage
Inflected Forms
girls (plural)
gal (alternative, colloquial)
guhl (alternative, colloquial)
gel (alternative, UK)
girle (alternative, obsolete)
gyrle (alternative, obsolete)
gorl (alternative, Internet)
gril (alternative, Internet)
grrrl (alternative, slang)
grrl (alternative, slang)
guhrl (alternative, nonstandard)
gurl (alternative, nonstandard)