mama
Forms
- Plural
- mamas
- present (v1)
- mama
- past (v2)
- mamaed
- past participle (v3)
- mamaed
- present participle
- mamaing
- 3rd person singular
- mamas
Definitions
1.Synonym of mother (“a female parent”).
- I love the cookies which mama bakes me every week.
- "Mama!" cried the child sobbing aloud. "Oh dear Mama! oh dear Mama!"
- Silly Mamma, of course you should have your hair done like other Mammas.
2.A lesbian partner.
3.Used as a (respectful) term of address for a woman, especially an older one.(informal)
- About a.d. 1150 Mango Capac and Mama Oella, his sister-wife [Manco Cápac and Mama Ocllo], appeared by the Lake Titicaca.
4.A girlfriend.(slang)
1.Often preceded by oh: used to express approval, joy, surprise, etc.
1.Synonym of mother (“to treat (someone) as a mother would be expected to treat her child; to nurture”).(informal)
- I've been pretty out of the loop, immersed in my small world of day-to-day living, working and baby-mammaing.
- Had Maude deduced that if Cliffie could smoke she was grown and on her own, that she no longer needed mamaing?
- What shall be the effeminating effect upon the rising generation if the brave men of today are to be mammaed by a crew of timid Supervisors?
2.To call (someone) "mama" (noun sense).(informal)
3.To call out "mama".(informal)
Frequency
Overall
Uncommon· #2609
By learning goal
- Everyday conversation
- Uncommon
- General reading & writing
- Rare
- Academic
- Rare
- Literature
- Uncommon
Related words
Etymology
The origin of the noun is uncertain; it is probably a reduplication of ma, thought to be a sound made by babies when breastfeeding. The word is possibly influenced by Middle French maman (“mother”) (modern French maman), mamme (both probably from Latin mamma (“breast; nurse; (childish) mother, mama; grandmother”), probably cognate with Ancient Greek μᾰ́μμη (mắmmē, “breast; (childish) mother, mama; (Koine) grandmother”), both possibly ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂- (“to nurse; mama, mother”)), but this is also uncertain as all the words could have developed independently as onomatopoeias.