Bimbettes

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. A term used to describe young women who display superficial behavior often characterized by a focus on appearance and attractiveness
2. It can imply a lack of depth in personality or intellect often associated with youth and vanity
3. The word often suggests a light-hearted or derogatory view of femininity centered on physical allure rather than seriousness

Etymology: "Bimbettes" is the plural of "bimbette," which is a playful diminutive formed by adding the suffix "-ette" to "bimbo." The suffix comes from French, where it made small or feminine forms of nouns, and English adopted it to produce words like "kitchenette" and "majorette." Attaching it to "bimbo" gives the sense of a smaller or lesser version of the already disparaging original, so a bimbette is a young woman seen as a more junior or less substantial example of the type. Since the source only records that the plural is formed from "bimbette," the word's history rests on the earlier term "bimbo," and that is where the real story lies. The word "bimbo" itself is the term the suffix was attached to, and "bimbette" is simply the diminutive built on top of it.

Synonyms: ditzes, airheads, flirts, coquettes, silly girls

Antonyms: intellectuals, scholars, brains, thinkers, intellects