amah

• ama

From Portuguese ama (“female nurse”), from Medieval Latin amma (“wet nurse, amma”), perhaps an alteration of Latin mamma, of imitative origin, or from Ancient Greek.

• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɑː.mə/
• (Singapore English) IPA^(key): /ˈɑː.mɑ/
• Rhymes: -ɑːmə

amah (plural amahs)

1. (India) A woman employed to look after children; (formerly) a wet nurse.
2. (Singapore, Malaysia, Brunei, Indonesia) A female domestic helper; a maid.
   • 1977, John Le Carré, The Honourable Schoolboy, Folio Society, published 2010, page 20:

     Then one day he disappeared and when Luke called apprehensively at his apartment the old amah told him that ‘Whisky Papa runrun London fastee.’

• amma

• AHAM, Hama, MAHA, maha, mahā

• IPA^(key): /aˈmah/ [ʔʌˈmʌh]
• Hyphenation: a‧mah

amáh

1. this, that (masculine; proximal to the spoken to)

• Mohamed Hassan Kamil (2015) L’afar: description grammaticale d’une langue couchitique (Djibouti, Erythrée et Ethiopie)‎^[1], Paris: Université Sorbonne Paris Cité (doctoral thesis)

From Arabic أَمَة (ʔama).

amah

1. A female domestic worker, a housemaid.

• IPA^(key): /ˈa.mah/
• Rhymes: -mah
• Hyphenation: a‧mah

Borrowed from Hokkien 阿媽 / 阿妈.

amah

1. a (Chinese) woman who works as a housemaid

From Arabic عَامَّة (ʕāmma).

amah

1. ordinary or most people

From Malay amah, from Arabic أَمَة (ʔama).

amah

1. housemaid (a female domestic worker)

amah

1. alternative form of amati (“paternal blood aunt”)

• “amah” in Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Jakarta: Agency for Language Development and Cultivation – Ministry of Education, Culture, Research, and Technology of the Republic of Indonesia, 2016.

From Arabic أَمَة (ʔama).

• IPA^(key): /amah/
• Rhymes: -mah, -ah

amah (Jawi spelling امه, plural amah-amah)

1. maidservant, nursemaid, housemaid

• Indonesian: amah

• “amah” in Pusat Rujukan Persuratan Melayu | Malay Literary Reference Centre, Kuala Lumpur: Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka, 2017.

The first part (a-) from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *ʔa. Cognates include Zou ema.

amah

1. he, she

• Zomi Ordbog based on the work of D.L. Haokip