"prissy" meaning in English

See prissy in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Adjective

IPA: /ˈpɹɪsi/ Audio: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav Forms: prissier [comparative], prissiest [superlative]
Rhymes: -ɪsi Etymology: 1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris. Etymology templates: {{blend|en|prim|sissy|nocap=1}} blend of prim + sissy, {{blend|en|prim|fussy|nocap=1}} blend of prim + fussy Head templates: {{en-adj|er}} prissy (comparative prissier, superlative prissiest), {{tlb|en|colloquial|originally|US}} (colloquial, originally US)
  1. Prim and fussy; too precise; overparticular. Tags: colloquial Translations (prim and fussy): превзет (prevzet) (Bulgarian), престорен (prestoren) (Bulgarian), cimprlich (Czech), upjatý (Czech), prudérní (Czech), sievistelevä (Finnish), zimperlich (German), überkorrekt (German), spießig (German), σεμνότυφος (semnótyfos) [masculine] (Greek), perbenista (Italian), perbenistico [masculine] (Italian), жема́нный (žemánnyj) (Russian), чо́порный (čópornyj) (english: prim) (Russian), remilgado (Spanish), finolis (Spanish), repipi (Spanish), finoli (Spanish), pimpinett (Swedish), мані́рний (manírnyj) (Ukrainian), мані́жний (manížnyj) (Ukrainian)
    Sense id: en-prissy-en-adj-Wu3sVE7R Categories (other): American English Disambiguation of American English: 33 20 40 7 Disambiguation of 'prim and fussy': 96 2 2
  2. (usually derogatory) Lacking masculine vigor; sissified; effeminate. Tags: colloquial, derogatory, usually
    Sense id: en-prissy-en-adj-kDGfo82C Categories (other): American English Disambiguation of American English: 33 20 40 7
  3. Well-mannered; well-behaved. Tags: colloquial Translations (well-behaved, well-mannered): brav (German), bieder (German), благонра́вный (blagonrávnyj) (Russian), caballero [masculine] (Spanish), ґре́чний (gréčnyj) (Ukrainian)
    Sense id: en-prissy-en-adj-5LjDnV-f Categories (other): American English, English blends, English entries with incorrect language header, Entries with translation boxes, Pages with 1 entry, Pages with entries, Terms with Bulgarian translations, Terms with Czech translations, Terms with Finnish translations, Terms with German translations, Terms with Greek translations, Terms with Italian translations, Terms with Russian translations, Terms with Spanish translations, Terms with Swedish translations, Terms with Ukrainian translations Disambiguation of American English: 33 20 40 7 Disambiguation of English blends: 25 27 40 8 Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 25 26 44 5 Disambiguation of Entries with translation boxes: 13 14 71 2 Disambiguation of Pages with 1 entry: 27 14 58 2 Disambiguation of Pages with entries: 21 24 54 1 Disambiguation of Terms with Bulgarian translations: 18 16 64 3 Disambiguation of Terms with Czech translations: 15 14 44 26 Disambiguation of Terms with Finnish translations: 17 16 64 3 Disambiguation of Terms with German translations: 19 18 60 3 Disambiguation of Terms with Greek translations: 25 16 56 3 Disambiguation of Terms with Italian translations: 21 16 59 3 Disambiguation of Terms with Russian translations: 15 14 68 2 Disambiguation of Terms with Spanish translations: 16 14 69 2 Disambiguation of Terms with Swedish translations: 20 19 60 2 Disambiguation of Terms with Ukrainian translations: 20 19 58 3 Disambiguation of 'well-behaved, well-mannered': 6 5 90
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Derived forms: priss, prissily, prissiness, prisspot, unprissy
Categories (other): Personality Disambiguation of Personality: 0 0 0 0

Noun

IPA: /ˈpɹɪsi/ Audio: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav Forms: prissies [plural]
Rhymes: -ɪsi Etymology: 1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris. Etymology templates: {{blend|en|prim|sissy|nocap=1}} blend of prim + sissy, {{blend|en|prim|fussy|nocap=1}} blend of prim + fussy Head templates: {{en-noun}} prissy (plural prissies)
  1. (rare) A person who is prissy. Tags: colloquial, rare
    Sense id: en-prissy-en-noun-903lpkt7 Categories (other): People Disambiguation of People: 0 0 0 100
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Categories (other): Personality Disambiguation of Personality: 0 0 0 0

Inflected forms

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  "categories": [
    {
      "_dis": "0 0 0 0",
      "kind": "other",
      "langcode": "en",
      "name": "Personality",
      "orig": "en:Personality",
      "parents": [],
      "source": "w+disamb"
    }
  ],
  "derived": [
    {
      "_dis1": "0 0 0",
      "word": "priss"
    },
    {
      "_dis1": "0 0 0",
      "word": "prissily"
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      "_dis1": "0 0 0",
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      "_dis1": "0 0 0",
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  "etymology_text": "1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "prissier",
      "tags": [
        "comparative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "prissiest",
      "tags": [
        "superlative"
      ]
    }
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    {
      "args": {
        "1": "er"
      },
      "expansion": "prissy (comparative prissier, superlative prissiest)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    },
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        "2": "colloquial",
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "33 20 40 7",
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          "ref": "1949, Raymond Chandler, The Little Sister:",
          "text": "She was a small, neat, rather prissy-looking girl with primly smooth brown hair and rimless glasses […]",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
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          "ref": "2012 March 22, Scott Tobias, “Cabin Boy”, in AV Club:",
          "text": "As Nathanial Mayweather, heir to the Mayweather Hotel fortune, Elliott doesn’t disdain the hoi polloi so much as he considers everyone, even the faculty and headmaster at the prissiest private school in existence, to be part of it.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              41,
              49
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2014, John H. McWhorter, The Language Hoax:",
          "text": "European languages like English are just prissier about getting that pronoun in there.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Prim and fussy; too precise; overparticular."
      ],
      "id": "en-prissy-en-adj-Wu3sVE7R",
      "links": [
        [
          "Prim",
          "prim"
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        [
          "fussy",
          "fussy"
        ],
        [
          "precise",
          "precise"
        ],
        [
          "overparticular",
          "overparticular"
        ]
      ],
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        "colloquial"
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      "translations": [
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "bg",
          "lang": "Bulgarian",
          "lang_code": "bg",
          "roman": "prevzet",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "превзет"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "bg",
          "lang": "Bulgarian",
          "lang_code": "bg",
          "roman": "prestoren",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "престорен"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "cs",
          "lang": "Czech",
          "lang_code": "cs",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "cimprlich"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "cs",
          "lang": "Czech",
          "lang_code": "cs",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "upjatý"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "cs",
          "lang": "Czech",
          "lang_code": "cs",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "prudérní"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "lang_code": "fi",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "sievistelevä"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "zimperlich"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "überkorrekt"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "spießig"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "el",
          "lang": "Greek",
          "lang_code": "el",
          "roman": "semnótyfos",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "tags": [
            "masculine"
          ],
          "word": "σεμνότυφος"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "it",
          "lang": "Italian",
          "lang_code": "it",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "perbenista"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "it",
          "lang": "Italian",
          "lang_code": "it",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "tags": [
            "masculine"
          ],
          "word": "perbenistico"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "lang_code": "ru",
          "roman": "žemánnyj",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "жема́нный"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "ru",
          "english": "prim",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "lang_code": "ru",
          "roman": "čópornyj",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "translation": "prim",
          "word": "чо́порный"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "remilgado"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "finolis"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "repipi"
        },
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          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "finoli"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "sv",
          "lang": "Swedish",
          "lang_code": "sv",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "pimpinett"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "uk",
          "lang": "Ukrainian",
          "lang_code": "uk",
          "roman": "manírnyj",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "мані́рний"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "96 2 2",
          "code": "uk",
          "lang": "Ukrainian",
          "lang_code": "uk",
          "roman": "manížnyj",
          "sense": "prim and fussy",
          "word": "мані́жний"
        }
      ]
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          "ref": "1994, H W Wilson, Joni Richards Bodart, Booktalking the Award Winners - Volume 3, page 31:",
          "text": "Mom was always pushing her only daughter to become some kind of prissy feminine beauty.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              35,
              41
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2002, Eileen Wilks, The Loner and the Lady, page 179:",
          "text": "A pink can held shaving gel with a prissy, feminine smell.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              124,
              130
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2004, Tom Wolfe, I Am Charlotte Simmons: A Novel:",
          "text": "Her clothes were not at all unusual or fashionable, a plain slate-blue dress and a magenta cardigan sweater with a somewhat prissy line of pearl buttons down the front.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              78,
              84
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2012, Simon Doonan, Gay Men Don't Get Fat:",
          "text": "A healthy trepidation about microbes, lice and the like is the key to a happy prissy lifestyle.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              48,
              54
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2012, Sheldon Russell, Dreams to Dust:",
          "text": "“Boots won't fit,” the man said, “and the hat's prissy.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              82,
              88
            ],
            [
              135,
              141
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2014, Linda Grabeman, No Prissy Shoes:",
          "text": "I love pretty shoes that are utterly gorgeous and totally impractical—what I call prissy shoes. […] I would love it if I could wear my prissy shoes for my whole life's journey — no stones on my path, no difficult cracks or crevices; just nice, smooth, straight highways of life.",
          "type": "quote"
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        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              24,
              30
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2015, David H. Brantley, Duct Tape Won’T Stick to a Leaky Ostomy Bag:",
          "text": "I had grown up a rather prissy kind of guy. I was never the rough-and-tumble, plastic-gun-toting stereotype of a boy. I preferred neat and orderly and clean and bathed to scattered and strewn and grass-stained and smudged. Clothes pressed, shoes shined. Hair combed, activities quiet.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Lacking masculine vigor; sissified; effeminate."
      ],
      "id": "en-prissy-en-adj-kDGfo82C",
      "links": [
        [
          "derogatory",
          "derogatory"
        ],
        [
          "masculine",
          "masculine"
        ],
        [
          "vigor",
          "vigor"
        ],
        [
          "sissified",
          "sissified"
        ],
        [
          "effeminate",
          "effeminate"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(usually derogatory) Lacking masculine vigor; sissified; effeminate."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial",
        "derogatory",
        "usually"
      ]
    },
    {
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          "_dis": "25 27 40 8",
          "kind": "other",
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        {
          "_dis": "25 26 44 5",
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        {
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          "name": "Terms with Bulgarian translations",
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        {
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          "ref": "2007, Steven Levy, The Best of Technology Writing 2007, page 48:",
          "text": "As women post en masse over the course of the day and long into the night, the mood changes: The daylight crowd tends to be prissier; the night crowd rowdier (and drunker); the late-night crowd surrealistic and unpredictable, made up of the extremely sleep deprived, from mothers of newborns to insomniacs in the midst of a divorce.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
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          ],
          "ref": "2010, J. D. Robb, Visions In Death, page 19:",
          "text": "You drive like one of those prissy ladies at lunch who won't take the last cookie in case somebody else wants it.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              216,
              222
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          ],
          "ref": "2014, Lynne Barrett-Lee, One Day Someday:",
          "text": "I may – I forget now – have suffixed it slightly; with a well-rounded 'Stuff you!' or 'But my car, you bastard!'. But then again, surely not. This was my boss, after all. More likely I would have said something more prissy, like 'Oh, really It may be only a car to you,' etc., before dissolving, which was what I actually did, into a flurry of impotent fury and tears.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Well-mannered; well-behaved."
      ],
      "id": "en-prissy-en-adj-5LjDnV-f",
      "links": [
        [
          "Well-mannered",
          "well-mannered"
        ],
        [
          "well-behaved",
          "well-behaved"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "_dis1": "6 5 90",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
          "word": "brav"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "6 5 90",
          "code": "de",
          "lang": "German",
          "lang_code": "de",
          "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
          "word": "bieder"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "6 5 90",
          "code": "ru",
          "lang": "Russian",
          "lang_code": "ru",
          "roman": "blagonrávnyj",
          "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
          "word": "благонра́вный"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "6 5 90",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "lang_code": "es",
          "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
          "tags": [
            "masculine"
          ],
          "word": "caballero"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "6 5 90",
          "code": "uk",
          "lang": "Ukrainian",
          "lang_code": "uk",
          "roman": "gréčnyj",
          "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
          "word": "ґре́чний"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈpɹɪsi/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.mp3",
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    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-ɪsi"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Joel Chandler Harris"
  ],
  "word": "prissy"
}

{
  "categories": [
    {
      "_dis": "0 0 0 0",
      "kind": "other",
      "langcode": "en",
      "name": "Personality",
      "orig": "en:Personality",
      "parents": [],
      "source": "w+disamb"
    }
  ],
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    {
      "args": {
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      "name": "blend"
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        "1": "en",
        "2": "prim",
        "3": "fussy",
        "nocap": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "blend of prim + fussy",
      "name": "blend"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "prissies",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "prissy (plural prissies)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "0 0 0 100",
          "kind": "other",
          "langcode": "en",
          "name": "People",
          "orig": "en:People",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "1970-1975, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure\nI really like Beau. He sure enjoys being admired & lusted over. He just lays back like a king & enjoys. What a prissy!"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A person who is prissy."
      ],
      "id": "en-prissy-en-noun-903lpkt7",
      "links": [
        [
          "prissy",
          "prissy#Adjective"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(rare) A person who is prissy."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial",
        "rare"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈpɹɪsi/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.ogg"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-ɪsi"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Joel Chandler Harris"
  ],
  "word": "prissy"
}
{
  "categories": [
    "American English",
    "English adjectives",
    "English blends",
    "English colloquialisms",
    "English compound terms",
    "English countable nouns",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English nouns",
    "Entries with translation boxes",
    "Pages with 1 entry",
    "Pages with entries",
    "Rhymes:English/ɪsi",
    "Rhymes:English/ɪsi/2 syllables",
    "Terms with Bulgarian translations",
    "Terms with Czech translations",
    "Terms with Finnish translations",
    "Terms with German translations",
    "Terms with Greek translations",
    "Terms with Italian translations",
    "Terms with Russian translations",
    "Terms with Spanish translations",
    "Terms with Swedish translations",
    "Terms with Ukrainian translations",
    "en:People",
    "en:Personality"
  ],
  "derived": [
    {
      "word": "priss"
    },
    {
      "word": "prissily"
    },
    {
      "word": "prissiness"
    },
    {
      "word": "prisspot"
    },
    {
      "word": "unprissy"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prim",
        "3": "sissy",
        "nocap": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "blend of prim + sissy",
      "name": "blend"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prim",
        "3": "fussy",
        "nocap": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "blend of prim + fussy",
      "name": "blend"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "prissier",
      "tags": [
        "comparative"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "prissiest",
      "tags": [
        "superlative"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "er"
      },
      "expansion": "prissy (comparative prissier, superlative prissiest)",
      "name": "en-adj"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "colloquial",
        "3": "originally",
        "4": "US"
      },
      "expansion": "(colloquial, originally US)",
      "name": "tlb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "adj",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              30,
              36
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1949, Raymond Chandler, The Little Sister:",
          "text": "She was a small, neat, rather prissy-looking girl with primly smooth brown hair and rimless glasses […]",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              175,
              184
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2012 March 22, Scott Tobias, “Cabin Boy”, in AV Club:",
          "text": "As Nathanial Mayweather, heir to the Mayweather Hotel fortune, Elliott doesn’t disdain the hoi polloi so much as he considers everyone, even the faculty and headmaster at the prissiest private school in existence, to be part of it.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              41,
              49
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2014, John H. McWhorter, The Language Hoax:",
          "text": "European languages like English are just prissier about getting that pronoun in there.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Prim and fussy; too precise; overparticular."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "Prim",
          "prim"
        ],
        [
          "fussy",
          "fussy"
        ],
        [
          "precise",
          "precise"
        ],
        [
          "overparticular",
          "overparticular"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        "English derogatory terms",
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              64,
              70
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "1994, H W Wilson, Joni Richards Bodart, Booktalking the Award Winners - Volume 3, page 31:",
          "text": "Mom was always pushing her only daughter to become some kind of prissy feminine beauty.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              35,
              41
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2002, Eileen Wilks, The Loner and the Lady, page 179:",
          "text": "A pink can held shaving gel with a prissy, feminine smell.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              124,
              130
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2004, Tom Wolfe, I Am Charlotte Simmons: A Novel:",
          "text": "Her clothes were not at all unusual or fashionable, a plain slate-blue dress and a magenta cardigan sweater with a somewhat prissy line of pearl buttons down the front.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              78,
              84
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2012, Simon Doonan, Gay Men Don't Get Fat:",
          "text": "A healthy trepidation about microbes, lice and the like is the key to a happy prissy lifestyle.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              48,
              54
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2012, Sheldon Russell, Dreams to Dust:",
          "text": "“Boots won't fit,” the man said, “and the hat's prissy.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              82,
              88
            ],
            [
              135,
              141
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2014, Linda Grabeman, No Prissy Shoes:",
          "text": "I love pretty shoes that are utterly gorgeous and totally impractical—what I call prissy shoes. […] I would love it if I could wear my prissy shoes for my whole life's journey — no stones on my path, no difficult cracks or crevices; just nice, smooth, straight highways of life.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              24,
              30
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2015, David H. Brantley, Duct Tape Won’T Stick to a Leaky Ostomy Bag:",
          "text": "I had grown up a rather prissy kind of guy. I was never the rough-and-tumble, plastic-gun-toting stereotype of a boy. I preferred neat and orderly and clean and bathed to scattered and strewn and grass-stained and smudged. Clothes pressed, shoes shined. Hair combed, activities quiet.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Lacking masculine vigor; sissified; effeminate."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "derogatory",
          "derogatory"
        ],
        [
          "masculine",
          "masculine"
        ],
        [
          "vigor",
          "vigor"
        ],
        [
          "sissified",
          "sissified"
        ],
        [
          "effeminate",
          "effeminate"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(usually derogatory) Lacking masculine vigor; sissified; effeminate."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial",
        "derogatory",
        "usually"
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              124,
              132
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2007, Steven Levy, The Best of Technology Writing 2007, page 48:",
          "text": "As women post en masse over the course of the day and long into the night, the mood changes: The daylight crowd tends to be prissier; the night crowd rowdier (and drunker); the late-night crowd surrealistic and unpredictable, made up of the extremely sleep deprived, from mothers of newborns to insomniacs in the midst of a divorce.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              28,
              34
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2010, J. D. Robb, Visions In Death, page 19:",
          "text": "You drive like one of those prissy ladies at lunch who won't take the last cookie in case somebody else wants it.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "bold_text_offsets": [
            [
              216,
              222
            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2014, Lynne Barrett-Lee, One Day Someday:",
          "text": "I may – I forget now – have suffixed it slightly; with a well-rounded 'Stuff you!' or 'But my car, you bastard!'. But then again, surely not. This was my boss, after all. More likely I would have said something more prissy, like 'Oh, really It may be only a car to you,' etc., before dissolving, which was what I actually did, into a flurry of impotent fury and tears.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Well-mannered; well-behaved."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "Well-mannered",
          "well-mannered"
        ],
        [
          "well-behaved",
          "well-behaved"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈpɹɪsi/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.ogg"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-ɪsi"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "bg",
      "lang": "Bulgarian",
      "lang_code": "bg",
      "roman": "prevzet",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "превзет"
    },
    {
      "code": "bg",
      "lang": "Bulgarian",
      "lang_code": "bg",
      "roman": "prestoren",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "престорен"
    },
    {
      "code": "cs",
      "lang": "Czech",
      "lang_code": "cs",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "cimprlich"
    },
    {
      "code": "cs",
      "lang": "Czech",
      "lang_code": "cs",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "upjatý"
    },
    {
      "code": "cs",
      "lang": "Czech",
      "lang_code": "cs",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "prudérní"
    },
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "lang_code": "fi",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "sievistelevä"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "zimperlich"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "überkorrekt"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "spießig"
    },
    {
      "code": "el",
      "lang": "Greek",
      "lang_code": "el",
      "roman": "semnótyfos",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "tags": [
        "masculine"
      ],
      "word": "σεμνότυφος"
    },
    {
      "code": "it",
      "lang": "Italian",
      "lang_code": "it",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "perbenista"
    },
    {
      "code": "it",
      "lang": "Italian",
      "lang_code": "it",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "tags": [
        "masculine"
      ],
      "word": "perbenistico"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "lang_code": "ru",
      "roman": "žemánnyj",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "жема́нный"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "english": "prim",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "lang_code": "ru",
      "roman": "čópornyj",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "translation": "prim",
      "word": "чо́порный"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "remilgado"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "finolis"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "repipi"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "finoli"
    },
    {
      "code": "sv",
      "lang": "Swedish",
      "lang_code": "sv",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "pimpinett"
    },
    {
      "code": "uk",
      "lang": "Ukrainian",
      "lang_code": "uk",
      "roman": "manírnyj",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "мані́рний"
    },
    {
      "code": "uk",
      "lang": "Ukrainian",
      "lang_code": "uk",
      "roman": "manížnyj",
      "sense": "prim and fussy",
      "word": "мані́жний"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
      "word": "brav"
    },
    {
      "code": "de",
      "lang": "German",
      "lang_code": "de",
      "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
      "word": "bieder"
    },
    {
      "code": "ru",
      "lang": "Russian",
      "lang_code": "ru",
      "roman": "blagonrávnyj",
      "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
      "word": "благонра́вный"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "lang_code": "es",
      "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
      "tags": [
        "masculine"
      ],
      "word": "caballero"
    },
    {
      "code": "uk",
      "lang": "Ukrainian",
      "lang_code": "uk",
      "roman": "gréčnyj",
      "sense": "well-behaved, well-mannered",
      "word": "ґре́чний"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Joel Chandler Harris"
  ],
  "word": "prissy"
}

{
  "categories": [
    "American English",
    "English adjectives",
    "English blends",
    "English colloquialisms",
    "English compound terms",
    "English countable nouns",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English nouns",
    "Entries with translation boxes",
    "Pages with 1 entry",
    "Pages with entries",
    "Rhymes:English/ɪsi",
    "Rhymes:English/ɪsi/2 syllables",
    "Terms with Bulgarian translations",
    "Terms with Czech translations",
    "Terms with Finnish translations",
    "Terms with German translations",
    "Terms with Greek translations",
    "Terms with Italian translations",
    "Terms with Russian translations",
    "Terms with Spanish translations",
    "Terms with Swedish translations",
    "Terms with Ukrainian translations",
    "en:People",
    "en:Personality"
  ],
  "etymology_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prim",
        "3": "sissy",
        "nocap": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "blend of prim + sissy",
      "name": "blend"
    },
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "prim",
        "3": "fussy",
        "nocap": "1"
      },
      "expansion": "blend of prim + fussy",
      "name": "blend"
    }
  ],
  "etymology_text": "1895, either an alteration of precise, blend of prim + sissy, or a blend of prim + fussy; first attested in a work of American writer Joel Chandler Harris.",
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "prissies",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {},
      "expansion": "prissy (plural prissies)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English terms with rare senses"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "1970-1975, Lou Sullivan, personal diary, quoted in 2019, Ellis Martin, Zach Ozma (editors), We Both Laughed In Pleasure\nI really like Beau. He sure enjoys being admired & lusted over. He just lays back like a king & enjoys. What a prissy!"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "A person who is prissy."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "prissy",
          "prissy#Adjective"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(rare) A person who is prissy."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "colloquial",
        "rare"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈpɹɪsi/"
    },
    {
      "audio": "LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-prissy.wav",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/3/37/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav/LL-Q1860_%28eng%29-Vealhurl-prissy.wav.ogg"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-ɪsi"
    }
  ],
  "wikipedia": [
    "Joel Chandler Harris"
  ],
  "word": "prissy"
}

Download raw JSONL data for prissy meaning in English (12.3kB)

{
  "called_from": "form_descriptions/2013",
  "msg": "more than one value in \"roman\": finical vs. žemánnyj",
  "path": [
    "prissy"
  ],
  "section": "English",
  "subsection": "adjective",
  "title": "prissy",
  "trace": ""
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-12-23 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-12-02 using wiktextract (6fdc867 and 9905b1f). 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.