Naco (slang)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Naco (fem. naca) is a pejorative word often used in Mexican Spanish that may be translated into English as "low-class", "uncultured", "vulgar" or "uncivilized ".[1]
A naco (Spanish: [ˈnako] ⓘ) is usually associated with lower socio-economic classes. Although, it is used across all socioeconomic classes, when associated with middle - upper income people, it means “vulgar”, “bad taste”, "las de suchi", and “pretentious”.
The Cuban lexicographer Felix Ramos y Duarte, in his Diccionario de Mejicanísmos (1895), records the word for the first time. He explains it as usual in Tlaxcala (Mexico) and defines it with the following terms: "Indian dressed in blue cotton, white underpants and guaraches".
The term naco is generally used to describe people, behaviors or aesthetic choices seen as unrefined or unsophisticated, often in a comic way. As a person, the "naco" may display a general lack of refinement by adopting a "gangster mentality", unrefined verbal expressions or slang, peculiar accents, lack of social manners, or comically bad taste. The word likely originated as a contraction of "totonaco" referring to the members of the Totonac people, which is sometimes used as a disparaging term for indigenous people in general.[2]
The term is often associated to lower social classes, but it is also used as an elitist expression from the educated to describe the uneducated, and among the middle and upper classes as a synonym of bad taste. In many situations, the word has derogatory intentions.[3]
The Mexican definition of a naco does not perfectly translate to the American term redneck or hillbilly.