folk

Of or pertaining to the inhabitants of a land, their culture, tradition, or history.

Adjective

  1. Of or pertaining to the inhabitants of a land, their culture, tradition, or history.
  2. Of or pertaining to common people as opposed to ruling classes or elites.
  3. Of or related to local building materials and styles.
  4. Believed or transmitted by the common people; not academically or ideologically correct or rigorous.
    • folk psychology; folk linguistics
    • Americans are not libertarians in the Cato Institute sense of the word, but they are folk libertarians in this sense of impulsive behaviour, which is a feature of American life that anyone who wants to govern the United...

Origin

Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *fulkazder. Proto-Germanic *fulką Proto-West Germanic *folk Old English folc Middle English folk English folk From Middle English folk, from Old English folc, from Proto-West Germanic *folk, from Proto-Germanic *fulką, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *pl̥h₁-gós, from *pleh₁- (“to fill”). Cognate with German Volk, Dutch volk, Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish folk, Icelandic fólk. Doublet of volk.

Forms

vok volk volge volke

Derived

folk etymology folk medicine

Noun

  1. A people; a tribe or nation; the inhabitants of a region, especially the native inhabitants.
    • The organization of each folk, as such, sprang mainly from war. - 1878-1880, John Richard Green, History of the English People:
    • We thus arrive at a most unexpected imbroglio. The French have become a Germanic folk and the Germanic folk have become Gaulish! - 1907, Race Prejudice, Jean Finot, page 251
  2. People, persons.
    • There were a lot of folk in the streets.
    • Young folk, old folk, everybody come / To our little Sunday School, and have a lot of fun.
    • “[…] the awfully hearty sort of Christmas cards that people do send to other people that they don't know at all well. You know. The kind that have mottoes[…]. And then, when you see [the senders], you probably find that...
  3. One’s relatives, especially one’s parents.
    • I need to call my folks back home.
  4. Ellipsis of folk music.

Forms

folks vok volk volge volke

Related

Folketing landfolk Norfolk Suffolk volk

Derived

adfolk alms-folk almsfolk anti-folk avant-folk beaker folk blackfolk Britfolk businessfolk chairfolk Chinese folk religion cisfolk clansfolk commonfolk congressfolk countryfolk cunning folk doom folk electrofolk elfenfolk elf-folk elfinfolk elle-folk elvenfolk