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Why do we call frivolous, lame or naff things cheesy?

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    I'm wondering why we call "naff" things, well, naff things. ;-)
    – Jürgen A. Erhard
    Commented Apr 13, 2011 at 14:29
  • See here, I didn't realise that!
    – BenCr
    Commented Apr 13, 2011 at 14:31
  • Interesting that etymonline seems to be the only source for that origin.
    – Jürgen A. Erhard
    Commented Apr 13, 2011 at 14:39
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    The OED lists both these meanings of "naff", but says of each that it is probably unrelated to the other. It doesn't give any reason for this, though.
    – Colin Fine
    Commented Apr 13, 2011 at 16:16

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Interestingly enough, Etymonline suggests that it has nothing to do with cheese:

"cheap, inferior," 1896, from Urdu chiz "a thing," from Persian chiz, from O.Pers. *ciš-ciy "something," from PIE pronomial stem *kwo- (see who). Picked up by British in India by 1818 and used in the sense of "a big thing" (especially in the phrase the real chiz). By 1858, cheesy had evolved a slang meaning of "showy," which led to the modern, ironic sense.

Cheese, on the other hand, ultimately comes from Latin (caseus), taking a detour via West Germanic (compare German Käse, Dutch kaas).

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  • Aha! Is this also the origin of calling someone a "big cheese"? I wonder if it's related to Molesworth's "chiz".
    – Tom Anderson
    Commented Apr 13, 2011 at 17:04
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    @Tom: Moleworth's chiz is from chizzer "swindler" which is from chizz or chizzle which are slang forms of chisel "cheat, defraud".
    – Gareth Rees
    Commented Aug 16, 2012 at 18:35
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Another etymology dictionary has a different take:

cheesy (adj.) Meaning "cheap, inferior" is attested from 1896, perhaps originally U.S. student slang, along with cheese (n.) "an ignorant, stupid person." In late 19c. British slang, cheesy was "fine, showy" (1858), probably from cheese (n.2) and some suggest the modern derogatory use is an "ironic reversal" of this. The word was in common use in medical writing in the late 19c. to describe morbid substances found in tubers, decaying flesh, etc.

Upon second look, this etymology also comes from Etymonline.com, the same source as the other answer posted. So it appears that this website has updated their information on this topic since 2011. That is puzzling because they have entirely dropped the stuff about "Urdu chiz", which is just a bit suspicious. Are they just making this stuff up?

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  • FYI: Urdu 'cheez' is nearly equal to 'thing'. But it can not be used as a work/task e.g. 'I am doing my thing' in English. But is used even to refer someone e.g. 'what is this thing (person)'
    – LifeH2O
    Commented Jan 15, 2014 at 0:19
  • The Etymonline editor didn't make up the part about the meaning of Urdu and Persian chiz / چیز (which is LifeH2O's point, I think). About the etymology, I doubt he made it up, but I wish there were references to follow.
    – LarsH
    Commented Jan 25, 2017 at 11:59

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