- This word was used in a reddit post by a deaf person to refer to themselves and other deaf people. The word is slang used in the deaf community to refer to a group of people who are deaf and is similar to the word “hearie.” The word started as the root “deaf,” since it describes a distinguishing feature of the group, then it was made into a noun by adding the suffix -ie to the word “deaf” to form a word for a person that is deaf. After the noun was created, the suffix -s made the word plural.
Deafies
noun; derivation (Affixation)
A group of people that are deaf.
Etymology : From Deaf plus -ie, variant of -y, suffix indicating state, condition, or quality, from Anglo-French and Old French -é, from Latin -ia, Greek -ia, from PIE *-a-, suffix forming abstract or collective nouns, plus -s, a plural suffix (etymonline).
Source : “Again, the deafies are just thinking yet another person with a sign language question, the hearie can handle it.” (Reddit post: Speak English or GTFO - 11/2/2019)
Last modified: 14 December 2019