Waif
Waif literally means a homeless, forsaken or orphaned child, similar to a ragamuffin or urchin. In recent popular culture, the term has been used to described an almost unhealthily thin person, usually a woman. The 'waif look' was first used to describe the 1960s model Twiggy[citation needed], who had large round eyes and a very thin body. The "gamine" look of the 1950s, associated with actresses like Audrey Hepburn, Leslie Caron and Jean Seberg, was, to some extent, a precursor.
The term "waif" was seemingly ubiquitous in the 1990s, with Heroin chic fashion and models like Kate Moss and Jaime King on the runways and in advertisements. Actresses like Ally McBeal star Calista Flockhart, Winona Ryder and singer Celine Dion have all been pinned with the term.
Although the heroin chic look has gone out of fashion, it is still apparently popular in Hollywood. For example, Wonderbra model Eva Herzigova has dealt with negative criticism over her new waif-like figure. Sue Carroll wrote:
Had Eva Herzigova climbed out of a coffin at a New York fashion show this week, her appearance could hardly have been more shocking. The supermodel, looking like a throwback to the 'heroin chic' era of waif-like undernourished models, was an X-ray of her old self, skeletally thin with greasy hair, blue lips, a cold sore and sunken eyes. Even a Wonderbra couldn't rescue the legendary 'Hello Boys' boobs, shrunk now to oblivion.
Today
In 2006, Madrid's fashion week turned away underweight models, based on their body mass index or BMI, after protests that eating disorders develop among young girls and women trying to copy their rail-thin looks. Lily Cole is one such model, 5"10 and around 8 stones. She has been mauled by some critics, called 'freakishly skinny' by a diet expert on a Living TV documentary, Extreme:Skinny Celebrities 2.
In literature
A waif in The Edge Chronicles is a thin and rather weak creature who resides in the deepwoods. It can hear many sounds that other beings can not.