zef, adj.

zef
http://www.oed.com/dictionary/zef_adj%3Ftab%3Dmeaning_and_use
First published 2015

# zefadjective (& noun)

## Factsheet

### What does the adjective zef mean?

There is one meaning in OED's entry for the adjective zef. See ‘Meaning & use’ for definition, usage, and quotation evidence.

This word is used in South African English.

### How common is the adjective zef?

Fewer than 0.01occurrences per million words in modern written English

1990 | 0.0017
2000 | 0.0017
2010 | 0.0017

### How is the adjective zef pronounced?

#### British English

/zɛf/
zeff

#### U.S. English

/zɛf/
zeff

#### South African English

/zef/

### Where does the adjective zef come from?

Earliest known use

1990s

The earliest known use of the adjective zef is in the 1990s.

OED's earliest evidence for zef is from 1990, in Style (South Africa).

zef is a borrowing from Afrikaans.

Etymons: Afrikaans zef.

### Nearby entries

1. zedoary, n. Old English–
2. zedonk, n. 1961–
3. zee, n. 1580–
4. Zeelander, n. c1400–
5. Zeelandic, adj. 1802–
6. Zeelandish, adj. 1593–
7. Zeeman, n. 1897–
8. zeep, n. 1878–
9. zeep, v. 1886–
10. zeeping, adj. 1895–
11. zef, adj.1990–
12. zegadine, n. 1651–
13. zeilanite, n. 1815–
14. zein, n. 1820–
15. Zeiss, n. 1876–
16. zeitgeber, n. 1958–
17. zeitgeist, n. 1848–
18. zeitgeisty, adj. 1966–
19. zek, n. 1968–
20. zelant, n. 1624–26
21. zelatrice, n. 1874–

## Etymology

### Summary

A borrowing from Afrikaans.
Etymon: Afrikaans zef.
< Afrikaans zef (a1982 or earlier as noun, 1984 or earlier as adjective), respelling of zeph- (in Ford Zephyr, the name of a car popular with white working-class South Africans…
< Afrikaans zef (a1982 or earlier as noun, 1984 or earlier as adjective), respelling of zeph- (in Ford Zephyr, the name of a car popular with white working-class South Africans).

### Notes

Compare the following quot., which suggests currency of the Afrikaans noun in the 1950s (the Ford Zephyr was first produced in 1950):

1. 1982

   > A fool, country bumpkin or yokel had a variety of titles in ‘isicamtho’ too: vossie, mogo, skappie, barrie, zeff, battersby, mommish zow or zao.

   Rand Daily Mail (Johannesburg) 14 October 5

On Isicamtho see Isicamtho n.

## Meaning & use

Originally and chiefly South African slang.

1. 1990–
   Originally (depreciative): typical of, or associated with, working-class white (esp. Afrikaans-speaking) people of relatively low social status; common; trashy. Now frequently: designating a style of music, dress, or youth culture ironically, knowingly, or ostentatiously appropriating aspects of this. Also as n.: this music or the dress and lifestyle associated with it.
   1. 1990

      > Now I'm writing English with an Afrikaans name. I chose Koos Kombuis because I wanted a name that was as zeph as possible; something academics and purists would never accept.

      Style (South Africa) July 81
   2. 2010

      > Afrikaans rap-tinged Euro-dance has a name, and its name is Zef.

      Guardian (Online edition) (Nexis) 5 February
   3. 2010

      > If you are holding a glass of brandy and coke, you are probably zef. If you have mounted a spoiler on your 1989 Mazda, you are very zef indeed.

      Argus Weekend (South Africa) (Nexis) 14 March 8
   4. 2014

      > Zef..refers to the lower-middle class counterculture of South Africa... ‘Zef is, you're poor but you're fancy. You're poor but you're sexy, you've got style.’

      Cape Times in iol.co.za South Africa 26 May (online newspaper, accessed 18 Dec. 2014)
   5. 2016

      > Die Antwoord blends three languages into its music (English, Afrikaans and Xhosa) and promotes the ‘zef’ culture of being stylish and sexy in spite of monetary and social status in its music.

      Jerusalem Post (Nexis) 31 March 24
   South African English colloquial and slang

## Pronunciation

### British English

/zɛf/
zeff

### U.S. English

/zɛf/
zeff

### South African English

/zef/

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- ɬrhingyll
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛtl/ but /ˈpɛtl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- iːfleece
- ihappy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- atrap, bath
- ɑːstart, palm, bath
- ɒlot
- ɔːthought, force
- ʌstrut
- ʊfoot
- uːgoose
- əletter
- əːnurse
- ɪənear
- ɛːsquare
- ʊəcure
- eɪface
- ʌɪpride
- aʊmouth
- əʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ãgratin
- ɒ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye*
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xloch
- hhay
- llay
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing

* /d/ also represents a 'tapped' /t/ as in

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used, hence /ˈpɛd(ə)l/ but /ˈpɛdl̩i/.

##### Vowels

- ifleece, happy
- ɪkit
- ɛdress
- ætrap, bath
- ɑlot, palm, cloth, thought
- ɑrstart
- ɔcloth, thought
- ɔrnorth, force
- ʊfoot
- ugoose
- əstrut, comma
- ərnurse, letter
- ɪ(ə)rnear
- ɛ(ə)rsquare
- ʊ(ə)rcure
- eɪface
- aɪpride
- aʊmouth
- oʊgoat
- ɔɪvoice
- ɑ̃gratin
- æ̃salon
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)
- ᵿ(/ʊ/-/ə/)

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

##### Consonants

- ppea
- ttea
- kkey
- bbuy
- ddye
- ɡguy
- tʃchore
- dʒjay
- ffore
- θthaw
- ssore
- ʃshore
- vvee
- ðthee
- zzee
- ʒbeige
- xgogga
- hhay
- llay
- rray
- wway
- jyore
- mmay
- nnay
- ŋsing
- ɬlekgotla

Afrikaans uses a sound similar to /t/ and /k/ but made in the same part of the mouth as /j/, which may appear in some speakers’ pronunciations in English, but the OED reflects their common anglicized forms of /tʃ/ or /k/. Similarly, African click sounds are shown as their common anglicized forms, highly variable but often as /g/, /k/ and/or /h/.

Some consonants can take the function of the vowel in unstressed syllables. Where necessary, a syllabic marker diacritic is used as in British and US English.

##### Vowels

- iːfleece
- ihappy
- ɪkit
- edress
- ætrap
- ʌstrut
- ɒlot, cloth
- ɔːthought, north, force
- ʊfoot
- uːgoose
- ɑːbath, palm, start
- ɜːnurse
- ɪənear
- ɛːsquare
- ʊəcure
- aʊmouth
- əʊgoat
- aɪpride
- eɪface
- ɔɪvoice
- əletter
- ᵻ(/ɪ/-/ə/)

The symbols used for several of the South African vowels are less precise than their use in other varieties. For example, in some words the /ɪ/ vowel will sound closer to /ə/ whilst still being in a stressed syllable. Some vowels reflected as /ɒ/ may sound similar to /ɔː/ but significantly shorter. Some vowels transcribed as /e/ may sound longer, or some transcribed as /eɪ/ sound more steady (a sound like /eː/). In some words, /ʌ/ and /æ/ may also sound very similar to each other.

##### Other symbols

- The symbol ˈ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with primary stress.
- The symbol ˌ at the beginning of a syllable indicates that that syllable is pronounced with secondary stress.
- Round brackets ( ) in a transcription indicate that the symbol within the brackets is optional.

View the pronunciation model here.

####

Simple text respell breaks words into syllables, separated by a hyphen. The syllable which carries the primary stress is written in capital letters. This key covers both British and U.S. English Simple Text Respell.

##### Consonants

b, d, f, h, k, l, m, n, p, r, s, t, v, w and z have their standard English values

- gguy
- jjay
- yyore
- chchore
- khloch
- shshore
- ththaw
- dhthee
- zhbeige

##### Vowels

- atrap
- ahpalm
- airsquare
- arstart
- arrcarry (British only)
- awthought
- ayface
- a(ng)gratin
- edress
- eefleece
- eerdeer
- errmerry
- ikit
- ighpride
- irrmirror
- olot (British only)
- ohgoat
- oogoose
- oorcure
- orforce
- orrsorry (British only)
- owmouth
- oyvoice
- o(ng)salon
- ustrut
- uhletter
- urnurse
- urrhurry
- uufoot

## Forms

### Variant forms

1. 1900s–
   zeph
2. 2000s–
   zef, zeff

## Frequency

zef typically occurs fewer than 0.01 times per million words in modern written English.

zef is in frequency band 2, which contains words occurring between 0.001 and 0.01 times per million words in modern written English. More about OED's frequency bands

Frequency data is computed programmatically, and should be regarded as an estimate.

### Frequency of zef, adj., 1990–2010

* Occurrences per million words in written English

Historical frequency series are derived from Google Books Ngrams (version 2), a data set based on the Google Books corpus of several million books printed in English between 1500 and 2010.

The overall frequency for a given word is calculated by summing frequencies for the main form of the word, any plural or inflected forms, and any major spelling variations.

For sets of homographs (distinct entries that share the same word-form, e.g. mole, n.¹, mole, n.², mole, n.³, etc.), we have estimated the frequency of each homograph entry as a fraction of the total Ngrams frequency for the word-form. This may result in inaccuracies.

Smoothing has been applied to series for lower-frequency words, using a moving-average algorithm. This reduces short-term fluctuations, which may be produced by variability in the content of the Google Books corpus.

Decade | Frequency per million words
--- | ---
1990 | 0.0017
2000 | 0.0017
2010 | 0.0017

zef, adj. was first published in June 2015.

zef, adj. was last modified in July 2023.