squaw

From Massachusett squàw (“woman”), from Proto-Algonquian *eθkwe·wa (“(young) woman”). Cognate with Abenaki -skwa (“female, wife”), Mohegan-Pequot sqá, Cree iskwew / ᐃᐢᑫᐧᐤ (iskeyw, “woman”), Ojibwe ikwe (“woman”). In the 1970s, some non-linguists began to claim that the word originally meant vagina; this has been discredited.^[1] The first English attestation of the word is found in a book called Mourt’s Relation: A Journey of the Pilgrims at Plymouth written in 1622, where the "squa sachim or Massachusets Queen" is mentioned in a journal entry from September 20, 1621.^[2]

• IPA^(key): /skwɔː/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔː

squaw (plural squaws)

1. (now offensive, ethnic slur) A woman, wife; especially a Native American woman.
   • 1963, Lester del Rey, The Sky Is Falling:

     The Indian maids, of course, turned out to be a few fat old squaws who knew all about white men.

• Previously used neutrally, the word began to be used as a term of contempt in the late 1800s; it is now generally considered offensive.^[3] See Squaw § Historical usage on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

From English squaw.

• IPA^(key): /skwo/

squaw f (plural squaws)

1. squaw (not pejorative in French), Native American woman

   Synonym: Amérindienne

   • 1873, Jules Verne, Le Pays des fourrures:

     Ces chefs, au nombre d'une douzaine, n’avaient point amené leurs femmes, malheureuses « squaws » qui ne s’élèvent guère au-dessus de la condition d’esclaves.

     (please add an English translation of this quotation)

• “squaw”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012