''Malakas'' ( gr, μαλάκας ) is a commonly used profane

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

slang word, with a variety of different meanings, but literally meaning "man who

masturbates Masturbation is the sexual stimulation of one's own genitals for sexual arousal or other sexual pleasure, usually to the point of orgasm. The stimulation may involve hands, fingers, everyday objects, sex toys such as vibrators, or combinatio ...

". While it is typically used as an insult, with its literal equivalent in Commonwealth English being "

wanker Wanker is slang for "one who wanks (masturbates)", but is most often used as a general insult. It is a pejorative term of English origin common in Britain and other parts of the English-speaking world (mainly Commonwealth nations), including ...

” and “jerk off” in American English, the meaning varies depending on the tone and context used. It can be an exclamation of pleasure, an expression of dark horror, a cry of anger, a declaration of affection, and other different things. Common alternative meanings include "

asshole The word ''asshole'' (in North American English) or arsehole (in all other major varieties of the English language), is a vulgarism used to describe the anus, and often used pejoratively (as a type of synecdoche) to refer to people. History ...

", "

motherfucker ''Motherfucker'' ( ), sometimes abbreviated as ''mofo'', ''mf'', or ''mf'er'', is an English-language vulgarism. It is a form of the profanity ''fuck''. While the word is usually considered highly offensive, it is rarely used in the literal ...

" "jerk" or "

idiot An idiot, in modern use, is a stupid or foolish person. 'Idiot' was formerly a technical term in legal and psychiatric contexts for some kinds of profound intellectual disability where the mental age is two years or less, and the person cannot ...

", and the contrasting "

dude ''Dude'' is American slang for an individual, typically male. From the 1870s to the 1960s, dude primarily meant a male person who dressed in an extremely fashionable manner (a dandy) or a conspicuous citified person who was visiting a rural ...

", or "mate", depending on the context. It has been described as "the most used Greek slang word".

Overview

''Malakas'' derives from the Greek word '' malakos'' (), which means "soft" or "spoilt, well-used to luxuries of life". It is one of the most frequent words picked up by tourists (often in its

vocative case In grammar, the vocative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which is used for a noun that identifies a person (animal, object, etc.) being addressed, or occasionally for the noun modifiers ( determiners, adjectives, participles, and num ...

form, i.e. ''malaka'' ) and travelers to

Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...

and is not unusual among the younger

Greek diaspora The Greek diaspora, also known as Omogenia ( el, Ομογένεια, Omogéneia), are the communities of Greeks living outside of Greece and Cyprus (excluding Northern Cyprus). Such places historically include Albania, North Macedonia, parts of ...

, even when the level of Greek is low. While "malakas" is a strictly masculine noun, a female form of the word exists, ''malako'' (), but is a recent coinage and not as widely used, whereas ''malakismeni'' () seems to be rather more vintage, but also more common, though this form is only used as a slur.Cf. th
lemma "μαλάκω"
an
references for "μαλακισμένη"
on slang.gr. Retrieved 2016-01-17. In everyday speech, the word ''malakas'' is often used as a synonym of

. While the term is inappropriate and is traditionally used as a slur, it is acceptable and very commonly used among close friends, especially males, where it takes on a meaning similar to "dude" or "mate". ''Malakas'' is very rarely used in its literal meaning (man who masturbates).

''Malakia''

Malakia ''Malakia'' (, "softness", "weakliness") is an ancient Greek word that, in relation to men, has sometimes been translated as "effeminacy". The contrary characteristic in men was ''karteria'' (, "patient endurance", "perseverance"). Lexicon entr ...

'', literally meaning

masturbation Masturbation is the sexual stimulation of one's own genitals for sexual arousal or other sexual pleasure, usually to the point of orgasm. The stimulation may involve hands, fingers, everyday objects, sex toys such as vibrators, or combinatio ...

, is often also used in a similar sense as ''malakas'' to refer to nonsense, something worthless or of poor quality, or a mistake. It can also be used literally. The use of ''malakia'' to mean "masturbation" traces back to

medieval Greek Medieval Greek (also known as Middle Greek, Byzantine Greek, or Romaic) is the stage of the Greek language between the end of classical antiquity in the 5th–6th centuries and the end of the Middle Ages, conventionally dated to the Ottoman co ...

. It is used in this sense in the ''Life of Saint Andrew the Fool'' and in the ''Life of Saint Niphon'', both of which date to the tenth century. The

verb A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...

"''malakizome"'' (μαλακίζομαι) also exists. Even though its literal meaning is "I masturbate" it is mostly used to define that someone is wasting his time or failing to achieve something.

Notes

References

* * *{{citation , last=Tegopoulos , first=Fytrakis , year=1997 , title=Μείζον Ελληνικό Λεξικό ("Mízon ellinikó lexikó") , publisher=Ekdoseis Armonia A.E. , isbn=960-7598-04-0 Profanity Greek slang Modern Greek words and phrases Masturbation

Overview

''Malakia''

See also

Notes

References