n. — Ethnicities, derogatory, extremely offensive
an ethnic slur referring to people of Italian background.
Type: 6. Memorial — Wop is a derogatory term used to refer to people of Italian descent. OED-3 (s.v. "wop" (n.2A)) labels the term as being from the US but the term was unfortunately also pervasive in Canadian English, as evidenced by the many Canadian citations available throughout the 20th century. COD-2 (s.v. "wop") and ITP Nelson (s.v. "wop"), as well as OED-3, DARE (s.v. "wop"), DA (s.v. "wop"), W-3 (s.v. "2wop") and AHD-5 (s.v."wop"), cite the Italian word guappo, meaning "bold" or "bully", as the possible origin of the term.
See also: crawfish
- The term is included for reasons of historical accuracy and completeness. It is not intended, as clearly indicated in the usage labels "derogatory" and "extremely offensive", as a term for current use or a term, meaning or usage that is in any way condoned.