ghet·to

[get-oh]
noun, plural ghet·tos, ghet·toes.
1.
a section of a city, especially a thickly populated slum area, inhabited predominantly by members of an ethnic or other minority group, often as a result of social or economic restrictions, pressures, or hardships.
2.
(formerly, in most European countries) a section of a city in which all Jews were required to live.
3.
a section predominantly inhabited by Jews.
4.
any mode of living, working, etc., that results from stereotyping or biased treatment: job ghettos for women; ghettos for the elderly.
adjective
5.
pertaining to or characteristic of life in a ghetto or the people who live there: ghetto culture.
6.
Often Disparaging and Offensive. noting something that is considered to be unrefined, low-class, cheap, or inferior: Her furniture is so ghetto!
00:10
Ghetto is always a great word to know.
So is bezoar. Does it mean:
a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.
the offspring of a zebra and a donkey.

Origin:
1605–15; < Italian, orig. the name of an island near Venice where Jews were forced to reside in the 16th century < Venetian, literally, foundry for artillery (giving the island its name), noun derivative of ghettare to throw < Vulgar Latin *jectāre; see jet1

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World English Dictionary
ghetto (ˈɡɛtəʊ) [Click for IPA pronunciation guide]
 
n , pl -tos, -toes
1.  sociol a densely populated slum area of a city inhabited by a socially and economically deprived minority
2.  an area in a European city in which Jews were formerly required to live
3.  a group or class of people that is segregated in some way
 
[C17: from Italian, perhaps shortened from borghetto, diminutive of borgo settlement outside a walled city; or from the Venetian ghetto the medieval iron-founding district, largely inhabited by Jews]

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
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Etymonline
Word Origin & History

ghetto
1611, from It. ghetto "part of a city to which Jews are restricted," various theories of its origin include: Yiddish get "deed of separation;" special use of Venetian getto "foundry" (there was one near the site of that city's ghetto in 1516); Egitto "Egypt," from L. Aegyptus (presumably in memory of
the exile); or It. borghetto "small section of a town" (dim. of borgo, of Gmc. origin, see borough). Extended 1892 to crowded urban quarters of other minority groups. Ghetto-blaster "large portable stereo" is from 1982.
Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper
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Slang Dictionary

ghetto definition


  1. mod.
    super; cool. (Streets.) : He called the iced out pimp 100 percent ghetto.
Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
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Example sentences
Gambling is from the old ghetto culture,and I still see it today.
He deals with reality in the ghetto.
Still, escaping the foreign-student ghetto isn't easy.
There are good people in the ghetto.
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