# foo
## English
### Pronunciation

* (UK) IPA: /fuː/
* Audio (General Australian):(file)
* Rhymes: -uː
* Homophone: -fu

### Etymology 1

From Mandarin 府 (fǔ).

#### Noun

foo (plural foos)
* (historical, obsolete) Alternative form of fu: an administrative subdivision of imperial China; the capital of such divisions.

### Etymology 2

From Chinese 福 (fú, “fortunate; prosperity, good luck”), via its use as 福星 (Fúxīng, “Jupiter”) in Chinese statues of the Three Lucky Stars, picked up from c. 1935 as a nonsense word in Bill Holman's Smokey Stover comic strip, whence it was picked up by Pogo, Looney Tunes, and others. Used by Jack Speer as the name of a mock god of mimeography in the 1930s.
Popularized in computing contexts by the Tech Model Railroad Club's 1959 Dictionary of the TMRC Language, which incorporated it into a parody of the Hindu chant om mani padme hum, possibly under the influence of WWII military slang FUBAR, which had been repopularized by Joseph Heller's Catch-22.

#### Noun

foo (uncountable)
* (programming) A metasyntactic variable used to represent an unspecified entity. If part of a series of such entities, it is often the first in the series, and followed immediately by bar.
    Suppose we have two objects, foo and bar.
* (fandom slang) Alternative letter-case form of Foo (“placeholder god”)

##### Derived terms

* foobar

##### Related terms

* FUBAR

### Etymology 3

A minced form of fuck.

#### Interjection

foo
* Expression of disappointment or disgust.
    Oh foo – the cake burnt!

##### Synonyms

* (expression of disgust): darn, drat

### Etymology 4
#### Alternative forms

* foo'

#### Noun

foo (plural foos)
* (slang) Pronunciation spelling of fool.
** 2020, J. Lewis Johnson, A Dark Night in the Fieldhouse:[page 10:] "I knew you'd be scared," Reggie laughed. "What are you doin', foo? You must be crazy. You don't scare me." "Then why did you almost fall out of that chair? I scare everyone." [page 38:] "This is coo," said Fred. "It's almost like being there." "We are there, foo!" said Reggie as the boys slapped palms.

### References

* 1 2 Eric S[teven] Raymond, editor (2003 December 29), “foo”, in The Jargon File, version 4.4.7.
* ↑ "The History of Bill Holman", Smokey-Stover.com, Smokey Stover LLC – article by nephew of Bill Holman
* ↑ "Warner Brothers Cartoon Companion"
* rfc:3092, Etymology of "Foo", Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF)

### See also

* foo dog
* foo fighter
* foo-foo
* foo-foo band
* foo-foo juice
* foo lion
* foo young
* foo yung

### Anagrams

* oof

## Japanese
### Pronunciation

* IPA: [ɸɯ̟ː]

### Interjection

foo(フー) • (fū)
* (chiefly in popular music) whoo

## Middle English
### Etymology 1

From the oblique stem of Old English ġefāh.

#### Noun

foo (plural foos)
* Alternative form of fo

### Etymology 2

From Old English fā, variant of fāh.

#### Adjective

foo
* Alternative form of fo

#### Adverb

foo
* Alternative form of fo

## Murui Huitoto
### Alternative forms

* fo

### Pronunciation

* IPA: [ˈɸɔː]
* Hyphenation: foo

### Adverb

foo
* in, inside

### References

* Shirley Burtch (1983) Diccionario Huitoto Murui (Tomo I) (Linguistica Peruana No. 20)‎ (in Spanish), Yarinacocha, Peru: Instituto Lingüístico de Verano, page 91
* Katarzyna Izabela Wojtylak (2017) A grammar of Murui (Bue): a Witotoan language of Northwest Amazonia.‎, Townsville: James Cook University press (PhD thesis), page 145

## Scots
### Etymology

See also hoo.

### Pronunciation

* IPA: /fuː/

### Adverb

foo (not comparable)
* how
* why

### References

* “foo, adv.”, in The Dictionary of the Scots Language, Edinburgh: Scottish Language Dictionaries, 2004–present, →OCLC.

## Tetum
### Verb

foo
* to stink