Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- noun A male child.
- noun A son.
- noun Often Offensive A man, especially a young man.
- noun Informal A man socializing in a group of men.
- noun Offensive A male servant or employee.
- interjection Used to express mild astonishment, elation, or disgust.
from The Century Dictionary.
- To treat as a boy, or as something belonging to or befitting a boy.
- To act or represent in the manner of a boy: in allusion to the acting by boys of women's parts on the stage.
- noun In India, as far north as the Nerbudda river, a palankin-bearer. Yule and Burnell, Anglo-Ind. Glossary.
- noun A male child, from birth to full growth, but especially from the end of infancy to the beginning of youth: also applied to a young man, implying immaturity, want of vigor or judgment, etc.
- noun In familiar or playful use (usually in the plural), a grown man regarded as one of the younger members of a family, as an intimate friend or associate, or as having in any respect a boyish relation or character.
- noun Specifically, in the United States— In the South, especially before the abolition of slavery, a negro man.
- noun An unscrupulous local politician, especially in a large city; one of the managers or subordinates of the “machine” of a party in local politics and elections: as, a ticket not acceptable to the boys.
- noun A young servant; a page: as, “boys, grooms, and lackeys,”
- noun [Supposed by some to be “a corruption of Hind. bhaiee, a servant”; but the Hind. word, prop. bhāī, means ‘brother,’ and boy in this use is merely the E. word. Cf.
boy .] In India and the treaty-ports of China and Japan, etc., a native male servant, especially a personal servant; a butler or waiter, house-boy, office-boy, etc., as distinguished from a coolie or porter: in common use among foreigners. - noun Old boy, a familiar name for the devil.
- noun Roaring boys. See
roaring .
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- transitive verb To act as a boy; -- in allusion to the former practice of boys acting women's parts on the stage.
- noun A male child, from birth to the age of puberty; a lad; hence, a son.
- noun derog. In various countries, a male servant, laborer, or slave of a native or inferior race; also, any man of such a race; -- considered derogatory by those so called, and now seldom used.
- noun a boy (usually a chorister) elected bishop, in old Christian sports, and invested with robes and other insignia. He practiced a kind of mimicry of the ceremonies in which the bishop usually officiated.
- noun [Slang] the Devil.
- noun [Slang, Eng.] guineas.
- noun a popular English name of Southernwood (
Artemisia abrotonum ); -- called alsolad's love . - noun childish amusements; anything trifling.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Male servant.
- interjection Exclamation of surprise, pleasure or longing.
- verb To use the word boy to refer to someone.
- verb transitive To act as a boy (in allusion to the former practice of boys acting women's parts on the stage).
from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.
- noun a male human offspring
- noun (ethnic slur) offensive and disparaging term for Black man
- noun a friendly informal reference to a grown man
- noun a youthful male person
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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If we think about ˜every boy sang™ analogously, ˜boy™ is the internal argument of
Logical Form Pietroski, Paul 2009
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This boy I started to talk to before I was dating * the boy* ...
moschikat Diary Entry moschikat 2005
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I say to you, mother, and oh, so earnestly: 'Go teach your boy that which you may never be ashamed to do, about these organs that make him _specially a boy_.'
Searchlights on Health The Science of Eugenics B. G. Jefferis
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I say to you, mother, and oh, so earnestly: 'Go teach your boy that which you may never be ashamed to do, about these organs that make him _specially a boy_.'
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Here puer, boy, and Displicent, displease or annoy, seem to determine, not merely the first rhyme, but the rhyme arrangement (a, a), and it needs but a glance at the close of the first stanza of the original to show that another word rhyming with boy would be hard to obtain.
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In the sentence _The boy who wastes his time does not study_, the words _who wastes his time_ form an adjective clause modifying _boy_, and the sentence is complex.
Latin for Beginners Benjamin Leonard D'Ooge 1900
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In _The boy wasting his time does not study_, the words _wasting his time_ form an adjective phrase modifying _boy_.
Latin for Beginners Benjamin Leonard D'Ooge 1900
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Périque of Octave Roussel, w'at dey use call 'im Chat-oué; [2] but he git tired dat name, and now he got lil boy 'bout twenny-five year' ole, an 'dey call de ole man Catou, an' call his lil _boy_ Chat-oué.
Bonaventure A Prose Pastoral of Acadian Louisiana George Washington Cable 1884
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A starving boy, he roamed the streets of Florence; and the widespread intelligence of the city is marked by Browning's account of the way in which the _boy_ observed all the life of the streets for eight years.
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"Boy, boy, _boy_!" called the old lady in a voice so entreating, though tremulous, that Bobby felt constrained to return.
Dusty Diamonds Cut and Polished A Tale of City Arab Life and Adventure 1859
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While Gypsy worked on a mystery called The G-String Murders and Auden and Britten collaborated on a very bad opera about Paul Bunyan, Carson haunted the halls with a thermos full of a tea and sherry concoction she called ‘sonnie boy’ and chiselled away at the book that would become The Member of the Wedding.
Patricia Lockwood · Aviators and Movie Stars: Carson McCullers · LRB 18 October 2017 Patricia Lockwood 2019
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