FOLKS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does folks mean? 

• FOLKS (noun)
  The noun FOLKS has 2 senses:

1. your parents

2. people in general (often used in the plural)

  Familiarity information: FOLKS used as a noun is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• FOLKS (noun)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Your parents

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Context example:

he wrote to his folks every day

Hypernyms ("folks" is a kind of...):

clan; kin; kin group; kindred; kinship group; tribe (group of people related by blood or marriage)

Domain usage:

plural; plural form (the form of a word that is used to denote more than one)

Sense 2

Meaning:

People in general (often used in the plural)

Classified under:

Nouns denoting groupings of people or objects

Synonyms:

common people; folk; folks

Context example:

the common people determine the group character and preserve its customs from one generation to the next

Hypernyms ("folks" is a kind of...):

people ((plural) any group of human beings (men or women or children) collectively)

Meronyms (members of "folks"):

pleb; plebeian (one of the common people)

Hyponyms (each of the following is a kind of "folks"):

country people; countryfolk (people raised in or living in a rural environment; rustics)

gentlefolk (people of good family and breeding and high social status)

grass roots (the common people at a local level (as distinguished from the centers of political activity))

home folk (folks from your own home town)

rabble; ragtag; ragtag and bobtail; riffraff (disparaging terms for the common people)

Derivation:

folksy (very informal and familiar)

 Context examples 

I didn't mind, for I like 'to see folks eat with a relish', as Hannah says, and the poor man must have needed a deal of food after teaching idiots all day.

(Little Women, by Louisa May Alcott)

“Some folks might say there was madness in his method,” muttered the Inspector.

(The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Ay, sir, free enough for honest folks.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

We heard the folks shouting from the fields, under the impression that we were a runaway.

(Rodney Stone, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

“If it come to that.” said one of the foresters, “the tough meat of them will wear folks teeth out, and there is a trade for the man who can draw them.”

(The White Company, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Say anything of me; but don't visit my disgrace and shame, more than I have done, on folks who are as honourable as you!

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

Come in—your sisters are quite uneasy about you, and I believe there are bad folks about.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

And when the old folks had fallen asleep, he got up, put on his little coat, opened the door below, and crept outside.

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

She apprehended some mischief would happen to me from rude vulgar folks, who might squeeze me to death, or break one of my limbs by taking me in their hands.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Young folks in their situation should be excused complying with the common forms.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)