Dudes

How to spell dudes

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce dudes

What does dudes mean?

1. nounAn informal plural term for men or, loosely, people in general.

Dudes in a sentence

• The two dudes next door spent all weekend fixing their car.

• A group of dudes from the office signed up for the charity run.

Where does dudes come from?

Language of origin: Other

Dude began as American slang in the early 1880s, originally describing an overly fashionable young man, a fop who fussed about clothes and manners. Its exact origin is genuinely uncertain, but the most credited theory links it to 'doodle' as in the song 'Yankee Doodle', where a doodle was a foolish or affected dandy. By the turn of the century the word travelled west and came to mean a city dweller, especially an Easterner unused to ranch life, which is why holiday cattle ranches became known as 'dude ranches'. Through twentieth-century American youth culture the meaning softened and broadened until 'dude' simply meant any man or fellow, and eventually a casual term of address for almost anyone. The plural 'dudes' just adds the regular -s, so the spelling trap is mainly remembering the silent finish of dude before the plural ending.

How the word is built

• dude (man, fellow)
• -s (plural suffix)