“Hey, gringo!” is not something most people want to hear on the street in Latin America. For many different reasons, it just doesn’t sit right with most of us. Maybe because we — and when I say we I mean Americans with European heritage — are usually the ones doing the naming of other people who don’t fit neatly into our culture.
Tracing the word gringo back through time doesn’t lead to any concrete evidence, as with many things having to do with language and humans. One theory is that the word is a condensed or truncated version of “green, go home,” a phrase which was allegedly coined during the Mexican-American war that lasted from 1846 to 1848. The legend goes that the U.S. military wore green coats when they were fighting and illegally seizing territory from Mexico, so Mexicans would scream, “Green, go home!” at the offending soldiers. Then as time went on, the words were condensed into something sounding like gringo.
Another theory is that gringo comes from “green grows,” also from the time period of the Mexican-American War. This story doesn’t focus on the soldiers’ uniforms though — it focuses on what the soldiers were doing. Allegedly, the soldiers were heard singing out loud in unison a song that begins: “green grow,” which are lyrics to the song “Green Grow the Lilacs,” a traditional ballad that was sung by soldiers in the American Civil War. Here’s a recording of that song:
While there are many words coined through the messy process of war, when cultures violently clash into one another, these theories feel unlikely to me.
The most likely source of the word is from Spain, where the term “griego,” which sounds quite similar to gringo, means “Greek.” A popular Spanish saying is “está hablando griego,” or “he/she is speaking Greek,” which is very similar to the English saying, “It’s all Greek to me.” Both phrases are used to describe something the listener deems incomprehensible. As time went on, some Spanish speakers in Spain would simply mutter “griego” if they didn’t understand something or someone, likely because the person couldn’t speak Spanish. Sociologist Beatriz Varela writes in “Ethnic Nicknames of Spanish Origin in American English” that the term gringo is documented in Spain at least since 1786, when it first appears in the Diccionario castellano con las voces de Ciencias y Artes. Written by Esteban de Terreros y Pando, the listing goes:
GRINGOS, llaman en Málaga a los extranjeros, que tienen cierta especie de acento, que los priva de una locución fácil, y natural Castellana; y en Madrid dan el mismo, y por la misma causa con particularidad a los Irlandeses.
And in English: Gringos is what, in Malaga, they call foreigners who have a certain type of accent that prevents them from speaking Castilian easily and naturally; and in Madrid they give the same name, and for the same reason, in particular to the Irish. This seems to be the earliest reference to gringo in print, so most likely the true root of this word that is now spoken around the world.
So is gringo an insult? That depends on who you are and who’s saying it. If you’re from the United States, you may consider the word at least rude and possibly downright offensive. But if you ask a Mexican person, which I did, gringo is fairly neutral in meaning, usually without negative or positive connotation. It’s shorthand along the Mexican-U.S. border to just mean someone from the U.S. who doesn’t have Mexican, Latino , Hispanic or indigenous heritage, and/or doesn’t speak Spanish. It basically means “foreigner” and the object of the label could be anyone from a traveler to an expat to someone who’s lived in the country for their entire life. Gringo can certainly be used as an insult, though it seems this is a far less common use. Of course, if someone — a tourist for example — acts rudely or stupidly or inappropriately in Mexico or in a Central or South American country, they’re likely to be ridiculed by locals as a gringo, though most likely behind their back.
Gringo means slightly different things in different countries. In Mexico, it’s generally used to describe someone, or some thing, from the United States. Your mom can be a gringa if she’s not of Latino or Hispanic heritage, and so can a restaurant — “that gringo restaurant on the beach.” And, in Mexico, don’t confuse a gringa with a gringa, a flour tortilla filled with pork, cheese and pineapple.
In Spain, the word isn’t really used. They use “guiri” instead, which can refer to any foreigner, but is usually lobbed at the “ugly tourist,” often people from the UK or Germany or the U.S., especially when they behave badly. The word gringo is also widely used in Costa Rica, Panama, Peru, Colombia, Nicaragua and even Belize, where the official language is English. It’s not generally used in Argentina and Chile, likely because many of them think of themselves as more aligned with their European heritage and culture.
Any word can be reclaimed or repurposed and gringo is no exception. My friend Maya Kroth, when I asked her about her perception of gringa the other day, said that she often labeled herself gringa and/or guiri, depending on whether she’s in Mexico or Spain. There’s even an American Spanish verb — engringarse — “to act like a foreigner.”
Have you been called a gringo/gringa? Were you insulted by it? Let me know, and please subscribe here on Substack or on Instagram.