| yídish. |
хуцпа (chutzpah /huut-spə/ is a curious word, having both negative and positive connotations in AmE. On the one hand, some consider it unfavorable—e.g.: "Alan Dershowitz, the white knight of religious correctness, should have been a tad more judicious in his choice of a title for his book Chutzpah. Leo Rosten's book Hooray for Yiddish! defines chutzpah as ‘ultra-brazenness, shamelessness, hard-to-believe effrontery, presumption or gall'—traits that many Jews and Gentiles would hardly classify as desirable." Letter of Chloë Ross, New York, 16 Dec. 1991, at 6.
On the other hand (and perhaps this says something about American culture), many consider chutzpah desirable—e.g.: "Team president Matt Millen approached Detroit management late in the week in hopes of landing coach Marty Mornhinweg a contract extension after the Lions went 2–14 last season. . . . Not only didn't Millen get what he came for, he was told that both he and Mornhinweg would have their positions evaluated at season's end. Ouch. But we do admire Millen's chutzpah." Sean Brennan, "Going Deep," Daily News (N.Y.), 9 Sept. 2002, at 12. W11 defines it first as "supreme self-confidence" but then unnerves us with "nerve, gall." The word sits uneasily on the fence that divides praise and scorn.
Variant spellings include *chutzpa, *hutzpah, and *hutzpa—all best avoided.
Александр Стерляжников); хуспа ('More); хутспа (the quality of audacity, for good or for bad. The Yiddish word derives from the Hebrew word ḥutspâ (חֻצְפָּה), meaning "insolence", "cheek" or "audacity". The modern English usage of the word has taken on a broader meaning, having been popularized through vernacular use in film, literature, and television. The word is sometimes interpreted–particularly in business parlance–as meaning the amount of courage, mettle or ardor that an individual has. However, in more traditional usage, chutzpah has a negative connotation.  wikipedia.org 'More) |
