Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun An Australian cockatoo (Eolophus roseicapillus syn. Cacatua roseicapilla) having pale blue-gray plumage and a pink breast.
  • noun Australian A fool; an idiot.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun One whose hair is shaven, namely, a Roman Catholic priest. The term is now applied by Jews to all Gentile clergymen.
  • noun The Australian rose-breasted cockatoo, Cacatua roseicapilla.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun A pink and grey species of cockatoo, Eolophus roseicapilla, native to Australia.
  • noun Australia, slang A fool, an idiot.

Etymologies

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition

[Yuwaalaraay (Pama-Nyungan language of southeast Australia) gilaa.]

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Gamilaraay gilaa.

Support

Help support Wordnik (and make this page ad-free) by adopting the word galah.

Examples

Comments

Log in or sign up to get involved in the conversation. It's quick and easy.

  • An Australian cockatoo.

    December 5, 2007

  • I like these a lot. These birds are very pretty, as well as being sociable and funny. In Australian slang galah can also mean a daft person.

    December 5, 2007

  • They are wonderful birds. I guess calling someone a galah is similar to calling someone a goose. :-)

    December 5, 2007

  • I got 404 on that link. Must have left too much seed out to attract that many galahs.

    Umm, this worked: http://photos.rnr.id.au/birds_galah.html

    The other bird = idiot word we have is coot.

    December 5, 2007

  • That's precisely the photo I was linking to--fixed now, I hope. Thanks.

    Same here with "coot," though it usually implies that one is old, too.

    December 5, 2007

  • In Australian lingo "galah" is also often adopted as a mock pronunciation for gala, which we would otherwise pronounce GAH-luh. (We never say GAY-luh.)

    April 10, 2008