so-called

English

Etymology

so +‎ called

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) enPR: sōʹkôld', IPA^(key): /ˈsəʊˌkɔːld/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈsoʊˌkɔld/

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Adjective

so-called (not comparable)

1. So named; commonly called.

   the so-called Ising mode

   • 1988, Ingrid Coetzee, Gerhard-Mark Van der Waal, Conservation of Culture: Changing Context and Challenges:

     Another Canadian example is that of the so-called Halfback Program initiated in the province of Ontario. With this scheme state lottery tickets with which no prizes are won retain 50% of the value of their initial cost […]

   • 2010, Matty McEire, Looking for Sheville, Dog Ear Publishing, →ISBN, page 78:

     ... I hadn't met any straight women at the gay bars — a few so called "fag hags" fraternizing with the boys, of course, but ...

2. (ironic) Commonly called by such a name, but not worthy of it.

   These so-called "assistants" are making our jobs harder, not easier!

   • 1895, Marie Corelli, The Sorrows of Satan, →OCLC, page 5:

     […] dawdling away the hours in the Park as if all the world and its millions of honest hard workers were created solely for the casual diversion of the so-called 'upper' classes, […]

Derived terms

• so-called dollar

 

Translations

so named

• Arabic: مَا يُسَمَّى (mā yusammā)
• Armenian: այսպես կոչված (ayspes kočʻvac)
• Azerbaijani: adlanan
• Belarusian: так зва́ны (tak zvány), т.з. (t.z.)
• Bulgarian: така́ наре́чен (taká naréčen)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 所謂／所谓 (zh) (suǒwèi)

• Czech: takzvaný (cs)
• Danish: såkaldt
• Dutch: zogenaamd (nl), zgn. (nl), zogeheten (nl), zogenoemd (nl)
• Finnish: niin sanottu (fi), niin kutsuttu (fi)
• French: dénommé (fr)
• German: sogenannt (de)
• Greek: αποκαλούμενος (apokaloúmenos), λεγόμενος (el) (legómenos)
• Hebrew: נקרא כך (nikrá kakh), שנקרא כך (shenikrá kakh), כך נקרא (kakh nikrá)
• Hungarian: úgynevezett (hu)
• Italian: cosiddetto (it)
• Japanese: 所謂 (ja) (いわゆ​る, iwayuru)
• Korean: 소위(所謂) (ko) (sowi), 이른바 (ko) (ireunba)
• Latin: nuncupativus
• Macedonian: таканаречен (takanarečen)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: såkalt

• Polish: tak zwany (pl), tzw. (pl)
• Romanian: așa-numit, așa-zis
• Russian: так называ́емый (ru) (tak nazyvájemyj), т.н. (t.n.)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: тако̀зва̄нӣ

  Roman: takòzvānī (sh)

• Slovak: takzvaný
• Slovene: tako imenovan
• Swedish: så kallad (sv)
• Tibetan: ཟེར་བའི (zer ba'i), གྲག་པའི (grag pa'i) (colloquial), ཅེས་ཟེར་བ (ces zer ba), ཅེས་བྱ་བ (ces bya ba), ཞེས་བྱ་བ (zhes bya ba), ཅེས་བྱ་ཞིང (ces bya zhing), ཅེས་བྱ་སྟེ (ces bya ste) (literary)
• Ukrainian: так зва́ний (tak zványj), т.з. (t.z.)

so named, but wrongly so

• Albanian: ashtuquajtur (sq)
• Armenian: այսպես կոչված (ayspes kočʻvac)
• Azerbaijani: dırnaqarası
• Belarusian: так зва́ны (tak zvány), т.з. (t.z.)
• Bulgarian: така́ наре́чен (taká naréčen)
• Catalan: anomenat (ca), dit (ca)
• Chinese:

  Cantonese: 所謂嘅／所谓嘅 (so² wai⁶ ge³)

  Mandarin: 所謂／所谓 (zh) (suǒwèi)

• Czech: takzvaný (cs)
• Danish: såkaldt
• Dutch: zogenaamd (nl), zgn. (nl)
• Estonian: nõndanimetatud
• Finnish: muka (fi), niin sanottu (fi), niin kutsuttu (fi)
• French: soi-disant (fr), prétendu (fr)
• German: sogenannt (de), sog. (de)
• Greek: αποκαλούμενος (apokaloúmenos), λεγόμενος (el) (legómenos), δήθεν (el) (díthen)

  Ancient: λεγόμενος (legómenos), οὕτω καλούμενος (hoútō kaloúmenos), οὕτω ὀνομαζόμενος (hoútō onomazómenos)

• Hebrew: כביכול (he) (kiv’yakhól, k’vayaklhól) used as a conjunctive adverb, not an adjective
• Hindi: कहने को (kahne ko), बोलने को (bolne ko)
• Hungarian: úgynevezett (hu)
• Italian: cosiddetto (it)
• Japanese: 所謂 (ja) (いわゆ​る, iwayuru)
• Korean: 소위(所謂) (ko) (sowi), 이른바 (ko) (ireunba)
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: såkalt

• Persian: کذایی (fa) (kazâyi)
• Polish: tak zwany (pl), tzw. (pl)
• Portuguese: assim chamado, chamado (pt), dito (pt), suposto (pt)
• Romanian: așa-zis
• Russian: так называ́емый (ru) (tak nazyvájemyj), т.н. (t.n.)
• Serbo-Croatian:

  Cyrillic: тако̀зва̄нӣ

  Roman: takòzvānī (sh)

• Sindhi: نام نهاد
• Slovene: tako imenovan
• Spanish: llamado (es)
• Swedish: så kallad (sv)
• Tibetan: ཟེར་བའི (zer ba'i), གྲག་པའི (grag pa'i) (colloquial), ཅེས་ཟེར་བ (ces zer ba), ཅེས་བྱ་བ (ces bya ba), ཞེས་བྱ་བ (zhes bya ba), ཅེས་བྱ་ཞིང (ces bya zhing), ཅེས་བྱ་སྟེ (ces bya ste) (literary)
• Turkish: sözde (tr)
• Ukrainian: так зва́ний (tak zványj), т.з. (t.z.)
• Vietnamese: cái gọi là
• Yiddish: אַזוי גערופֿן (azoy gerufn)

Further reading

• “so-called”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• So-Called. Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Retrieved on 6 June 2016.