I understand that キモい comes from 気持ち悪い and I have only heard it used by women. I am wondering if it is exclusively used by women like how ending sentences with わ or かしら is only used by women.
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1As istrasci writes, it is not feminine, but women might use it more often to classify and discriminate men than men do to women. – user458 Feb 14 '12 at 21:53
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No. Many of my male friends in Osaka/Kansai use キモい, especially the emphatic キモッ！.
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2Good observation. In fact, using the root of an adjective is not peculiar to this particular word, but is peculiar to the Kansai dialects:
短か!,さむ!,小さ!,くっさ!. In Kansai,きしょいmay also be used. – user458 Feb 14 '12 at 21:46 -
@sawa san Exactly~ (笑) Ah and we also say きっしょ！and ちっさ！(Do you say さぶ！in Kanto too?) – user1016 Feb 15 '12 at 0:06
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@Chocolate: If you mean さぶ as in when someone tells a lame joke, then I hear it used in Tokyo. What is きっしょ, though? – Questioner Feb 15 '12 at 0:19
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@DaveMG san, Yes but we also use さぶ just to mean 寒い. きっしょ is the same as キモッ, but I think we use きっしょ more often in Kansai. – user1016 Feb 15 '12 at 0:40
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@Chocolate I think さぶ (and even さむ) is Kansai dialect. さぶいぼ is even more obviously Kansai dialect (とりはだ in standard dialect). – user458 Feb 15 '12 at 1:20
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I have heard university age males in Hokkaido use きもい in a very emphatic way.
