lavalava
See also: lava-lava
English
editEtymology
editBorrowed from Samoan lava-lava.
Pronunciation
edit- Rhymes: -ɑːvə
Noun
editlavalava (plural lavalavas or lavalava)
- An everyday item of clothing traditionally worn by Polynesians and other Oceanic peoples, consisting of a single rectangular cloth worn as a skirt, secured around the waist by an overhand knotting of the upper corners.
- 1997, Michel Picard, Robert Everett Wood, Tourism, ethnicity, and the state in Asian and Pacific societies:
- Some tourists buy Samoan identity merchandise as novelties, but most prefer sloganless items such as printed lavalavas.
- 2001, David Sedaris, diary entry January 22, in Theft by Finding, Back Bay Books 2017, p. 436:
- The guy she went out with was named Ziki Fuapopo, and the story she told involved his mother, a pile of cocaine, and a group of men dressed in lavalavas.
Samoan
editNoun
editlavalava
- Alternative form of lava-lava