bayou

/ˈbaɪju/

/ˈbaju/

Other forms: bayous

Imagine a large, sluggish, often stagnant body of water and you are probably thinking about a bayou, a marshy inlet or outlet of a lake or river. Perhaps the most famous bayou in the United States is found in Louisiana.

The term bayou is a true Americanism, most probably evolving in the early 19th century from the Choctaw word bayuk, meaning "small stream," and making its way into the Louisiana French language. There is a culture specific to the Gulf of Mexico bayou areas from Texas to Florida, a mingling of the early Acadian settlers, known as "Cajuns," and the Creole culture. The bayou is a fragile ecosystem that is threatened by pollutants and environmental disasters, such as oil spills.

Definitions of bayou

1. noun

   a swampy arm or slow-moving outlet of a lake (term used mainly in Mississippi and Louisiana)
   type of:

   lake

   a body of (usually fresh) water surrounded by land