Meanings
plural Kheks
- Singaporea Hakka person
And the names of a Khek family, illustrating the custom among Khek people of giving an identical middle name to both sons and daughters:[...]
1959, Journal of the Malayan Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, →OCLC2 more examples
He gave up a relationship with a Khek woman whom he considered unbeneficial for his business and married instead another woman who was socially well-connected in business.
1994, Kwok Bun Chan, Stepping Out: The Making of Chinese Entrepreneurs, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 120The Khek speak Akha (or Hakkah), which is the language spoken by the Akha people of southern China Yunnan Province. The Khek were driven out of their lands into the inhospitable highlands of the Yunan in south-west China by the Han Chinese some two thousand years ago, but they spread father south beyond the frontiers of China into Kentung Shan of Burma, into northern Laos, Thailand, North Vietnam, and of course Malaya. Ioka is the name of the guardian spirit of the Khek community. The Khek shamans are believed to be in direct contact with the Ioka. In the Akha language, the word of this shaman is tumo. The Khek are a very superstitious people.
2020, Vincent Hancock, Legends of the Dragonfly: Fighting the Communists During the Malaya Emergency, 1947-1960, →ISBN, →OCLC
- Singaporethe Hakka dialect
More than half of respondents in Khek family usually use the address terms in the Khek language, while the other offspring in Hokkian family use the address terms in the Hokkian language.
2019, Antonius Suratno, editor, Sociolinguistics Research in the Journey of Time, Semarang, Indonesia: Soegijapranata Catholic University, →ISBN, page 1251 more example
The dialect of the first child, born in 1978 in a government hospital, was already omitted in her birth certificate. However, the dialect of the next three children born in private hospitals was registered as Khek (Hakka).
2015, Jessieca Leo, Global Hakka: Hakka Identity in the Remaking, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 182
- Singaporenot comparableHakka
Synonyms & antonyms
Origin
- Hokkien客
- EnglishKhek
From Hokkien 客 (Kheh, literally “guest people”).
More words from Hokkien
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
Khek. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 3, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Khek
“Khek.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Khek. Accessed November 3, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “Khek,” accessed November 3, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/Khek.
Source: Khek on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.