what is a gringo?

Answer 1

In Brazil and in some spanish-speaking countries as well "gringo" is slang for "foreigner", specifically those coming from Europe, North America or Australia. That means Asians and Africans are not considered "gringos", and neither are the Spanish and the Portuguese, because they speak the same languages as south americans.

I think it was originally a pejorative word, but now, at least in Brazil, most of the times it's used as normal slang, without a good or a bad connotation. Although of course it also depends on the tone of voice and the context.

Answer 2

"Gringo" is a slang term used to refer to white people from the United States.

Did you know Wikipedia has an article about this word? It's got everything, it seems like:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gringo

"Gringo" has a negative connotation for some people and is not always considered a kind way to refer to a white person. I prefer the term "güero" which is a term referring to a white person with blond hair and general light coloring. "Blanco" also works. In Spanish-speaking culture it's much more common and acceptable to talk about the color of someone's skin.

Answer 3

the words gringo and gringa were created by Mexicans and mean white American nothing more nothing less, African Americans as well as Mexican Americans are refered to differently and any other kind of Americans for that matter. To each his own. I almost forget to point out that gringo is not considered offensive by Mexicans

Answer 4

in my country, we say gringo to people from the u.s. its not in a bad meaning, just faster way of talking.

since i was a kid my dad told me this story, that i never really believed but who knows... he said that when u.s.a. was figthing the mexicans for the land, the mexicans had signs all over saying, green go home. so when they say it fasta in spanish sounded gringo ( greengo). we arent mexicans, we are from south america, so i really dont know about this story if its true or not.

in school i dont remeber the teachers telling us this but somehow, this word was born and we all use it. i guess from what the girl from brasil said, they use it for anybody that is from another country, with exceptions. we only use it for the u.s.

we call the u.s. people, no matter what color they are, if you are from the u.s., born in the u.s., you are north american, meaning gringo. its not just to white people, its for blacks, yellows, blues, greens whatever your color is. to us, white is the color of your skin no the race. theres so many white people around the world, in every country that we cant call white a race.

canadians, europeans, asians, etc thats what we called the rest...

Answer 5

"Gringo" is a slang term for an American in Spanish. ("Gringa" is for girls). It doesn't have a negative connotation, it's just a word to describe Americans.

Answer 6

"gringo", typically people from mexico calls white people "gringo" it is slang for them.

Answer 7

From my knowledge, it could be a person who pronounces things completely wrong because of their accent or their first language or w/e.

Answer 8

its the spanish word for white man i think.

Answer 9

white person in spanish