rada

plural radas

1. governmentA parliamentary body in a number of Slavic countries.
2. A soviet, a form of governing council in the former Soviet Union.

1. An unincorporated community in West Virginia.

plural Radas

1. A transliteration of the Bulgarian or Ukrainian female given name Ра́да (Ráda)

1. uncountableIn Haitian voodoo, a class of loa of Dahomeyan origin, chiefly associated with warmth and benevolence.

   Most books on Vodou have concentrated largely on the Rada pantheon.

   2007, Kevin Filan, The Haitian Vodou Handbook, Destiny Books, page 31

   3 more examples

   The majority of the deities are Dahomean and the rites of these are called Rada, from the town Allada.

   1953, Maya Deren, Divine Horsemen, McPherson & Company, published 2004, page 60

   In Haiti, the Rada have come to represent the emotional stability and warmth of Africa, the hearth of the nation.

   1985, Wade Davis, The Serpent and the Rainbow, Simon & Schuster, page 49

   We associate the Rada Lwa with the color white and with a sense of purity and formality. Because of this, anthropologists and non-Haitians often described the Rada as the “good ancestral Lwa,” while the spirits of the Petro nation of Lwa were considered “evil,” or invented by slaves in Haiti, though this is extremely oversimplified.

   2012, Mambo Chita Tann, Haitian Vodou, page 95

1. Alternative letter-case form of rada.