"bluehair" meaning in English

See bluehair in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

Audio: En-au-bluehair.ogg Forms: bluehairs [plural], blue hair [alternative], blue-hair [alternative]
Etymology: From blue + hair. The "elderly person" sense, first documented in the 1980s, refers to the blue rinse once used by older women to conceal grey hair. The second sense emerged from the stereotypical association of dyed blue hair with social-justice activists. Etymology templates: {{com|en|blue|hair}} blue + hair Head templates: {{en-noun|~}} bluehair (countable and uncountable, plural bluehairs)
  1. (slang, derogatory or humorous) An elderly person, especially a woman or one viewed as senile, old-fashioned, or out of touch. Tags: countable, derogatory, humorous, slang, uncountable Synonyms: fogey, fossil, fuddy-duddy, geezer, old-timer
    Sense id: en-bluehair-en-noun-qAdd7XDq Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Age, Hair, Liberalism, Women Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 91 9 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 94 6 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 95 5 Disambiguation of Age: 51 49 Disambiguation of Hair: 99 1 Disambiguation of Liberalism: 48 52 Disambiguation of Women: 96 4
  2. (slang, derogatory) A young or naive supporter of social-justice causes. Tags: countable, derogatory, slang, uncountable Synonyms: social justice warrior, wokester
    Sense id: en-bluehair-en-noun-pIDRFHFj Categories (other): Age, Liberalism, Social justice Disambiguation of Age: 51 49 Disambiguation of Liberalism: 48 52 Disambiguation of Social justice: 21 79
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Related terms: bluenette

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

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  "etymology_text": "From blue + hair. The \"elderly person\" sense, first documented in the 1980s, refers to the blue rinse once used by older women to conceal grey hair. The second sense emerged from the stereotypical association of dyed blue hair with social-justice activists.",
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        {
          "ref": "1997, Karin Vonesh, \"Who are the worst drivers of all?\", Southwords (Maine South High School, Park Ridge, IL), Volume 34, Issue 7, 19 December 1997, page 3",
          "text": "I have memories from a young age in which my father is yelling about \"blue hairs\" and their inability to drive. And everyone remembers that scene in \"Ferris Bueller's Day Off\" in which the old lady cannot see over the steering wheel and is swerving down the road."
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          "ref": "2011, Lola Newmar, Devlin's Beast, page 33:",
          "text": "He'd recently swiped the little orange bottle of OxyContin from the old hag he often watched on Tuesday nights when her cold, indifferent middle-aged daughter played bingo with the other bluehairs from the strip-mall salon she frequented.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2019, Chris O'Neill, quoted in Jordan Bradley, \"Do Something Different: Try These Alternative Recreation Options\", Encore (Michigan), June 2019, page 25",
          "text": "“Anyone can join,” O'Neill says. “We have age ranges from children to blue hairs.”"
        }
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        "An elderly person, especially a woman or one viewed as senile, old-fashioned, or out of touch."
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        [
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        [
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        [
          "old-fashioned",
          "old-fashioned"
        ],
        [
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        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(slang, derogatory or humorous) An elderly person, especially a woman or one viewed as senile, old-fashioned, or out of touch."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "fogey"
        },
        {
          "word": "fossil"
        },
        {
          "word": "fuddy-duddy"
        },
        {
          "word": "geezer"
        },
        {
          "word": "old-timer"
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          "_dis": "48 52",
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          "name": "Liberalism",
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          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        },
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          "_dis": "21 79",
          "kind": "other",
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          "name": "Social justice",
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          "source": "w+disamb"
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          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              135,
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            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2019 September 29, Pitt Griffin (@pittgriffin), Twitter:",
          "text": "Trump is demolishing America's institutions - including the media FAKE, FAKE, FAKE - and this chucklehead is worried about offending a bluehair.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
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          "bold_text_offsets": [
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              65,
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          ],
          "ref": "2021 January 18, hassiktirbok (@UQSKnotme), Twitter:",
          "text": "Americans thinking it was based to worship capitalism to own the bluehairs while bitching about big tech silencing them was so embarrassing.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
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          "bold_text_offsets": [
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          "ref": "2022 March 24, TAFKAMacM (@TAFKAMacM), Twitter:",
          "text": "There's a sizeable cohort of gullible bluehairs who'd protest outside a lake if someone told them carp were an anti-trans hate group.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
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        "A young or naive supporter of social-justice causes."
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(slang, derogatory) A young or naive supporter of social-justice causes."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "social justice warrior"
        },
        {
          "word": "wokester"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
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  "sounds": [
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  "forms": [
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          "text": "I have memories from a young age in which my father is yelling about \"blue hairs\" and their inability to drive. And everyone remembers that scene in \"Ferris Bueller's Day Off\" in which the old lady cannot see over the steering wheel and is swerving down the road."
        },
        {
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          "ref": "2011, Lola Newmar, Devlin's Beast, page 33:",
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          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2019, Chris O'Neill, quoted in Jordan Bradley, \"Do Something Different: Try These Alternative Recreation Options\", Encore (Michigan), June 2019, page 25",
          "text": "“Anyone can join,” O'Neill says. “We have age ranges from children to blue hairs.”"
        }
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        "An elderly person, especially a woman or one viewed as senile, old-fashioned, or out of touch."
      ],
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        "(slang, derogatory or humorous) An elderly person, especially a woman or one viewed as senile, old-fashioned, or out of touch."
      ],
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        {
          "word": "fogey"
        },
        {
          "word": "fossil"
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        {
          "word": "fuddy-duddy"
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          "word": "geezer"
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          "ref": "2019 September 29, Pitt Griffin (@pittgriffin), Twitter:",
          "text": "Trump is demolishing America's institutions - including the media FAKE, FAKE, FAKE - and this chucklehead is worried about offending a bluehair.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
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            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2021 January 18, hassiktirbok (@UQSKnotme), Twitter:",
          "text": "Americans thinking it was based to worship capitalism to own the bluehairs while bitching about big tech silencing them was so embarrassing.",
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        },
        {
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            [
              38,
              47
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2022 March 24, TAFKAMacM (@TAFKAMacM), Twitter:",
          "text": "There's a sizeable cohort of gullible bluehairs who'd protest outside a lake if someone told them carp were an anti-trans hate group.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(slang, derogatory) A young or naive supporter of social-justice causes."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "social justice warrior"
        },
        {
          "word": "wokester"
        }
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    }
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  "word": "bluehair"
}

Download raw JSONL data for bluehair meaning in English (4.5kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-06-10 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-06-01 using wiktextract (58c391d and f1c2b61). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.