Paddyism
noun, slang ·Uncommon ·College level
Definitions
- 1 The quality of being stereotypically Irish. colloquial, derogatory, uncountable
"Faith and begorrah it’s that time of year again. Time, that is, for the kind of “virulent eruptions of Paddyism” that, in the words of Ireland’s greatest newspaper columnist, is another form of “the claptrap that has made fortunes for cute professional Irishmen in America.” Yes it’s St Patrick’s Day and Myles na Gopaleen’s withering verdict on the nonsense of professional Irishism remains about the best there is."
- 2 A Hibernianism. colloquial, countable
"Leaving aside the Paddyisms we put upon ourselves in order to sell aran jumpers and claddagh rings to Yanks, how do we define ourselves in this country? What makes a person Irish? What qualifies as “Irishness”?"
Example
More examples"Faith and begorrah it’s that time of year again. Time, that is, for the kind of “virulent eruptions of Paddyism” that, in the words of Ireland’s greatest newspaper columnist, is another form of “the claptrap that has made fortunes for cute professional Irishmen in America.” Yes it’s St Patrick’s Day and Myles na Gopaleen’s withering verdict on the nonsense of professional Irishism remains about the best there is."
Etymology
From Paddy (“Irishman”) + -ism.
More for "paddyism"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.