Pinoy

Pinoy (/ˈpinɔɪ/) is an informal demonym referring to some of the Filipino people in the Philippines and overseas Filipinos around the world.

An unspecified number of Filipinos refer to themselves as Pinoy or sometimes the feminine Pinay. The word is formed by taking the last four letters of Filipino and adding the diminutive suffix -y in the Tagalog language (the suffix is commonly used in Filipino nicknames: "Ninoy" or "Noynoy" for Benigno (Jr. and III respectively), "Totoy" for Augusto, etc.). Pinoy was used for self-identification by the first wave of Filipinos going to the continental United States before World War II and has been used both in a pejorative sense as well as a term of endearment similar to Chicano. Although Pinoy and Pinay are regarded as derogatory by some younger Filipino-Americans, the terms are widely used and gaining mainstream usage particularly among members of the masses.