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hooligan.

A young person who causes trouble or violence, typically as a member of a gang or other group.

8 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈhuː.lɪ.ɡən/
  1. A young person who causes trouble or violence, typically as a member of a gang or other group.

    attributive · informal
  2. Ellipsis of football hooligan.

    abbreviation · alt-of · ellipsis
  3. A member of the United States Coast Guard.

    US · slang
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂ewh₂yos Proto-Celtic *awyos Primitive Irish ᚐᚃᚔ (avi) Old Irish aue Irish uader. Irish óder. Irish Ó Irish uallachder. Irish Uallachán Irish Ó hUallacháinder. English Houlihander. English hooligan Probably a variant of the Irish surname Houlihan, 1890s.

verb/ˈhuː.lɪ.ɡən/
  1. To act as a hooligan (etymology 1, noun sense 1).

    intransitive
  2. To treat (a person) roughly.

    broadly · transitive
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *h₂ewh₂yos Proto-Celtic *awyos Primitive Irish ᚐᚃᚔ (avi) Old Irish aue Irish uader. Irish óder. Irish Ó Irish uallachder. Irish Uallachán Irish Ó hUallacháinder. English Houlihander. English hooligan Probably a variant of the Irish surname Houlihan, 1890s.

noun/ˈhuː.lɪ.ɡən/
  1. A type of fish, an anadromous smelt, Thaleichthys pacificus, found in the North Pacific.

Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Chinook Jargon ulakan, from Clatsop Chinook, with spelling and pronunciation influenced by the preceding.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.