Karen

From Danish Karen, a vernacular form of Catherine that arose in medieval Denmark. The sense "middle-aged woman" comes from the popularity of the name among baby boomers and Gen-Xers. The derogatory usage was popularized via African-American Vernacular English.^[1]

• Caren, Caron, Caryn, Karin, Karyn

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈkæɹən/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈkæɹən/, /ˈkɛɹən/

  • Audio (General American):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -æɹən, -ɛɹən, -ɛə(ɹ)n
• Homophone: caron
• Homophone: caring (weak vowel merger, g-dropping)
• Homophones: cairn, carn (some American accents)

Karen

1. A female given name from Ancient Greek.
   • 1878 Celia Thaxter, Drift-Weed, Houghton, Osgood,1878, page 28 ("Karen"):

     Left you a lover in that far land, / O Karen sad, that you pine so long! / Would I could unravel and understand / That sorrowful, sweet Norwegian song!

   • 1918 Cecily Ullman Sidgwick, Karen, W.Collins, 1918, page 12:

     I was not called Karen after Hans Andersen's dancing girl, but after a Danish friend of my mother's who married an Englishman and was my godmother. So much for our family affairs.

• First taken up as a given name in the US, and popular in the English-speaking world from the 1950s to the 1970s.

Karen (plural Karens)

1. (slang, derogatory, originally African-American Vernacular) A middle-aged white woman exhibiting a sense of entitlement or white privilege.

   Coordinate term: Darren

   • 2020 May 26, Sarah Maslin Nir, quoting Christian Cooper, “White Woman Is Fired After Calling Police on Black Man in Central Park”, in The New York Times‎^[2]:

     “I pull out the dog treats I carry for just for such intransigence,” he wrote. “That’s when I started video recording with my iPhone, and when her inner Karen fully emerged and took a dark turn,” he said, using the name that has become slang for an entitled white woman.

   • 2020 December 27, Julia Carrie Wong, “The year of Karen: how a meme changed the way Americans talked about racism”, in The Guardian‎^[3]:

     It was through that performance that Amy Cooper took on the mantle of an American archetype: the white woman who weaponizes her vulnerability to exact violence upon a Black man. […] In 2020, she is simply Karen.

   • 2024 February 2, Alaina Demopoulos, quoting Jeremy, “‘I’m annoying, to some degree’: New York’s dog owners debate Chloë Sevigny’s anti-pup take”, in The Guardian‎^[4], →ISSN:

     “If I lived Chloe’s life, where she was walking around with other wealthy people basically being upper-class Karens having a fit when their dogs aren’t allowed at yoga, then I might understand,” he said.

   • 2024 November 17, Zach Vasquez, “Saturday Night Live: Charli xcx has fun in otherwise middle of the road episode”, in The Guardian‎^[5], →ISSN:

     He plays a suburban homeowner who loves nothing more than to snitch on his fellow whites, calling the cops on any Caucasian who steps foot on his lawn, be they old lady, a girl scout, or Colin Jost. Charlie xcx gets in on the action as his proud Karen of a wife.

2. (by extension, derogatory) Any person, especially female, exhibiting an exaggerated sense of entitlement.

   This Karen threatened to get me fired if I didn't give her a free meal.

   • 2021 Adam Korson as Phil Orley in "Ft. Ghost Child", episode five of SurrealEstate

     The organization wasn't meeting my needs, so I became a total Karen and asked to see the manager. He wasn't available so I took my business elsewhere.

• gammon
• Miss Ann

From Parthian 𐭊𐭓𐭍𐭉 (krny /⁠Kārēn⁠/), from Old Iranian. The Armenian name is from Armenian Կարեն (Karen), from the same Parthian name.

• Garen (from Western Armenian)
• Kārēn (from Middle Iranian)
• Qarin, Qārin (from Arabic)
• Karin, Kārin (from New Iranian)

Karen

1. (historical) One of the seven great Parthian feudal families.
2. a transliteration of the Armenian male given name Կարեն (Karen).

• Karen-Pahlav, Karen-Pahlaw

• http://www.iranicaonline.org/articles/karin

From Burmese ကရင် (ka.rang), of disputed origin.

• (General American, Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /kəˈɹɛn/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

  • Audio (Canada):

    (file)

• Rhymes: -ɛn

Karen (plural Karens or Karen)

2. A member of a diverse ethnic group originating in Myanmar and Thailand.

   Synonym: Kayin

   • 1968, Daniel George Edward Hall, “Burma”, in Encyclopedia Britannica‎^[6], volume 4, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 442, column 2:

     U Nu's government was Socialist with a program of nationalization. But it had to fight for survival against almost universal disorder complicated by a Communist rebellion, a Karen rising, which was far more serious, and, in 1950, the arrival from Yünnan of General Li Mi's Kuomintang division after its rout by the Chinese Communists.

   • 2011, Terry Miller, Sean Williams, The Garland Handbook of Southeast Asian Music, page 303:

     There are more than a hundred such groups, including the Karen of Thailand and Burma; the Kachin in Burma; the Akha, the Lahu, and the Lisu in Thailand; the Hmong, the Kmhmu, and the Yao in Laos; and the Nùng and the Lati in Vietnam.

Karen

1. A group of Sino-Tibetan languages spoken by people of the Karen ethnic group, also called Karenic.
2. Former name of Kayin (“state (administrative division) of Myanmar”).

• Black Karen
• Karenic
• Red Karen
• S'gaw Karen
• White Karen

• Ethnologue report on the Karen languages
• Nick Cheesman (2002) Seeing 'Karen' in the Union of Myanmar, Asian Ethnicity, 3:2, 202, DOI:10.1080/14631360220132736

• naker, knare, ranke, nerka, Krane, anker

From English Karen, from Danish.

Karen

1. a female given name from English [in turn from Danish, in turn from Ancient Greek]

For quotations using this term, see Citations:Karen.

A medieval variant of Katharina (“Catherine”).

Karen

1. a female given name

• → English: Karen
• → German: Karen
• → Icelandic: Karen
• → Norwegian: Karen

• [7] Danskernes Navne, based on CPR data: 83 320 females with the given name Karen have been registered in Denmark between about 1890 (=the population alive in 1967) and January 2005, with the frequency peak in the 1910s. Accessed on 19 May 2011.

Karen

1. genitive singular of Kare (the given name)

• rekan

• Caren

Borrowed from Danish Karen.

• Audio:

  (file)

Karen

1. a female given name, a much less popular variant of Karin

• Katharina

• IPA^(key): /ˈkʰaːrɛ(ː)n/

Karen f (proper noun, genitive singular Karenar)

1. a female given name

Sometimes also Karen in accusative and dative.

Karen

1. plural of Kar (“cart”)

Karen

1. a female given name of Danish origin