For other uses, see Boy (disambiguation).

A boy is a male human child or adolescent, as contrasted to a female child, which is a girl. The term "boy" is used to indicate biological sex distinctions, cultural gender role distinctions, or both. An adult male human is a man.

The boundary is not clear cut. In English, a youth or a teenager may be either male or female. No gender specific term exists for an intermediate stage between a boy and a man.

In the Royal Navy there is a rank "ship's boy".

Colloquial uses

Many occasions occur when an adult male could be referred to as a boy. A man or woman will refer to a boyfriend in one or two words regardless of age. A man's group of male friends are often "the boys". A young man who has not assumed (or has been denied) the traditional roles of a man might also be called a boy. It may feel uncomfortable to a young male upon being referred to as a "man" before he believes he has assumed these roles, such as having a career, a family,a wife, and fathering children. Conversely, it may feel uncomfortable to a male to be called a "boy" if he believes he has assumed the traditional roles of a "man."

In the UK, football managers quite often refer to footballers as "The boy so-and-so" and this usage is by no means restricted to the youngest players, though it is rarely applied to the most senior.

Historically, in countries such as the U.S. and South Africa, "boy" was used as a disparaging, racist insult towards a black male slave.

The words, "man/boy" and "woman/girl" seem to cause much confusion in society. The best idea is to use extreme caution and be thoroughly aware of the semantics behind either option, one may be offended accidentally by another who holds a different view of these words.

Etymology

The origin of the English word boy is unclear; it is probably related to East Frisian boi, Old Norse bГіfi, Dutch boef "knave, rogue", and German Bube. These apparently all have their origin in baby talk (like the word baby itself) (Buck 1949: 89).

But there is a theory that English "boy" derives from an Anglo-Saxon word *boia = "boy or servant", thus explaining the English placenames Boyton and Boycott. If so, the word may have originated from the Celtic tribe called the Boii, who formerly lived in Bohemia but were driven out by the Marcomanni German tribe taking the area over in Roman times. In the dispersal, many Boii may have become slaves or servants, and their name became a word for "servant". (The same happened later to many Slav people, whence the word slave.)

See also

• Boy band
• Boy Scouts
• Child
• Boyish boys

References

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