Tilapia
noun ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 Any of various edible fish, formerly species of the genus Tilapia, but now placed in other cichlid genera (such as Oreochromis), native to Africa and the Middle East but cultivated worldwide.
"Well I dined last night with Scarface Ron On tilapia fishcakes and fried black swan."
- 2 A fishy (resembling a cisgender woman) drag queen; a drag queen who could pass for a woman, as opposed to one who is exaggeratedly feminine.
"Vietnamese tilapia Plastique Tiara was at the forefront of one of Drag Race's most controversial eliminations earlier this year. Although the Texan performer and biological woman was leaving us gooped week-after-week with her runways, she was – spoiler alert! – eliminated in eighth place after lip-syncing against Miss Vanjie, despite having a better track record."
Example
More examples"At a large fish farm along the Mekong in Vientiane, tilapia swarm to the surface of their floating cages as food is shoveled into the water."
Etymology
Learned borrowing from taxonomic name Tilapia, from Tswana tlhapi (“fish”). The drag race slang usage is a reference to the comment by Gia Gunn on entering Ru Paul's Drag Race (season 6) "Just landed like fresh tilapia".
Related phrases
More for "tilapia"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.