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yankee

noun

Simple meaning

An anglo, someone without French ancestry.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

yangkee

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈjæŋki

This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.

IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. chiefly french louisiana

    An anglo, someone without French ancestry; a native or inhabitant of the rest of the United States.

  2. A native or inhabitant of some part of the United States

  3. An American who lives in New England

  4. chiefly northern us

    A native or inhabitant of New England.

  5. chiefly Commonwealthsometimes derogatory

    A native or inhabitant of the United States in general.

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: An anglo, someone without French ancestry; a native or inhabitant of the rest of the United States.

Used this way, yankee is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: anglo or someone without French ancestry

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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.