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La·ti·na¹

(lə-tēnə, lă-, lä-)

1. A woman or girl who is a member of one of the Spanish-speaking peoples of the Americas.

2. A woman or girl who is a descendant of any of these peoples, especially when living in the United States.

[Spanish , feminine of Latino, Latino; see LATINO.]

La·tina adj.

Usage Note: The nouns Latina, Chicana, and other words ending in -a in reference to women are common in American English, and many women prefer them over forms ending in -o when referring to themselves or to other women or girls. Although constructions such as She is a Latino and a group of Chicano women are grammatically correct in English (because English grammar does not require agreement in gender between nouns and adjectives the way Spanish and other Romance languages do), the use of a feminine ending with such words is a matter of personal choice. · Recently, the word Latinx has gained favor as a non-gender-specific alternative to Latino and Latina.

La·ti·na²

(lə-tēnə, lä-tēnä)

A city of west-central Italy southeast of Rome. It is a commercial and industrial center.

Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices

Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices:

Indo-European Roots

Semitic Roots

The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots.

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