waspy
adjective
resembling a wasp; waspish.
waspy
1 American
[wos-pee]
/ ˈwɒs pi /
adjective
waspier,
waspiest
Waspy
2
American
[wos-pee]
/ ˈwɒs pi /
Also
WASPy,
adjective
Waspier,
Waspiest
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of waspy1
First recorded in 1650–60; wasp + -y 1
Origin of Waspy2
First recorded in 1965–70; WASP + -y 1
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
I go with one of the young English upstarts and choose a slightly exaggerated, magnificently tailored suit that emphasizes my new, waspy figure.
From "Me Talk Pretty One Day" by David Sedaris
Soon the airplanes came, adding their waspy buzz to the music.
From "Milkweed" by Jerry Spinelli
"No wonder she's grown waspy, living a life like that," says Vee.
From Wilt Thou Torchy by Sewell Ford
Well, I feel about it a good deal like that big, burly, good-natured canal laborer who had a little waspy bit of a wife, in the habit of beating him.
From The Lincoln Story Book A Judicious Collection of the Best Stories and Anecdotes of the Great President, Many Appearing Here for the First Time in Book Form by Henry Llewellyn Williams
At others they are vividly white; to a certain extent this banded condition recalls the waspy coloration.
From Wild Bees, Wasps and Ants and Other Stinging Insects by Edward Saunders
And, as David Kissinger put it: “My stepmother came from this Waspy world, straight out of a Katharine Hepburn film, and my father was a refugee from Nazi Germany.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 27, 2026
He quietly infiltrated bohemian and Waspy circles, summered in the Hamptons, and became familiar with the “old New York establishment world”, which he found “so similar to the old guard in Singapore”.
From The Guardian ● Jun. 26, 2020
We were on Martha’s Vineyard, a Waspy idyll off the coast of Massachusetts.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 30, 2019
She alerted me to a Cheever I’d not considered before, one “stranger and more subversive than his increasingly Waspy scenery suggests,” and sent me back to “The Swimmer,” a story I’d not read in decades.
From Slate ● Jan. 10, 2014
"You are tolerably well-known in Foxden; Colonel Prowley, an influential citizen, is your warm friend; and Mr. Waspy tells you how you may get the support of the active generation."
From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 11, No. 68, June, 1863 by Various
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
