yokel
English
Etymology
1812, possibly from dialectal German Jokel, diminutive of Jakob, cf. Yankee (“little John”) and jacquerie (“peasant uprising”). Alternatively, from dialectal English yokel (“woodpecker”).[1]
Pronunciation
Noun
yokel (plural yokels)
- (derogatory) A person from or living in the countryside, viewed as being unsophisticated or naive.
- Synonyms: boor, bumpkin, country bumpkin, joskin, hillbilly, hick, peasant, provincial, rube, rustic, yahoo
- They love the scenery near their summer home, but have no desire to mix with the local yokels.
- 1838, Boz [pseudonym; Charles Dickens], “Involves a Critical Position”, in Oliver Twist; or, The Parish Boy’s Progress. […], volume II, London: Richard Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 181:
- “ […] my opinion at once is […] that this [robbery] wasn’t done by a yokel―eh, Duff?”
“Certainly not,” replied Duff.
“And, translating the word yokel, for the benefit of the ladies, I apprehend your meaning to be that this attempt was not made by a countryman?” said Mr. Losberne with a smile.
- 1848 June 28, William Makepeace Thackeray, “Before the Curtain”, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], →OCLC, page vii:
- […] and yokels looking up at the tinselled dancers and poor old rouged tumblers, while the light-fingered folk are operating upon their pockets behind.
- 1895, Stephen Crane, chapter 8, in The Red Badge of Courage, New York: Appleton, page 88:
- He eyed the story-teller with unspeakable wonder. His mouth was agape in yokel fashion.
- 1985, Peter De Vries, chapter 6, in The Prick of Noon, Penguin, page 119:
- I went to New York and bought myself a secondhand stretch limousine twenty-eight feet long, calculated to reduce the most blasé country-club sophisticates to bug-eyed yokels.
- 1993, Vikram Seth, A Suitable Boy, London: Phoenix, 1994, Chapter 8.6, p. 560,
- ‘You may think that because you live in Brahmpur you have seen the world―or more of the world than we poor yokels see. But some of us yokels have also seen the world―and not just the world of Brahmpur, but of Bombay. […] ’
Translations
a person from or living in the countryside, viewed as being unsophisticated and/or naive
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References
- Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “yokel”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.
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