badmouth
See also: bad-mouth
English
Alternative forms
Etymology
Calque of a Mande term, perhaps Vai [Term?][1] or Mandinka [Term?],[2] which entered English via Gullah [Term?].[3] Compare Japanese 悪口 (waruguchi, “badmouthing”), which is a compound of 悪 (waru, “bad, wicked”) and 口 (kuchi, “mouth”).
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /ˈbæd.maʊθ/
Verb
badmouth (third-person singular simple present badmouths, present participle badmouthing, simple past and past participle badmouthed)
- (informal) To criticize or malign, especially unfairly or spitefully.
- 1987 August 30, Benedict Nightingale, Theater: England's Endless Love Affair with Farce, New York Times (retrieved 22 July 2013):
- […] those cross-Atlantic aficionados who persistently idolize the British theater and bad-mouth Broadway.
- 1987 August 30, Benedict Nightingale, Theater: England's Endless Love Affair with Farce, New York Times (retrieved 22 July 2013):
Translations
to criticize or malign, especially unfairly or spitefully
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References
- “badmouth”, in Dictionary.com Unabridged, Dictionary.com, LLC, 1995–present.
- Smitherman, Geneva (1977), Talkin and Testifyin: The Language of Black America (Boston: Houghton Mifflin)
- The Atlantic World, 1450-2000 (2008, →ISBN, page 58
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