brutal
broo-TAHLadjectiveInformal
A Cuban Spanish slang term. Browse all Cuban slang.
What it means
Brilliant, amazing, outstanding. The most common clean superlative in Cuban speech, and the one you can safely use in front of anyone.
Intensifying a noun: un calor brutal — a punishing heat. Here it keeps its ordinary negative force.
Examples with translations
El concierto estuvo brutal, asere.
The concert was unreal, bro.
Esa muchacha canta brutal.
That girl sings incredibly well.
Where it comes from
Ordinary Spanish brutal, 'brutish, savage', turned into a positive intensifier — the same inversion English performs with wicked or sick. Cuba is not alone in this, but the frequency is distinctive: brutal does the work that bacán or bacano does elsewhere in the Caribbean.
Other forms
- Similar terms:
- tremendo, bárbaro, arriba