Meaning
Thin, skinny, or scrawny — lacking flesh, or, by extension, lacking substance. Applied to people, animals, and even things like a poor, 'maga' harvest, it usually implies being unhealthily or unattractively lean, not trim but wasted and bony. Doubled to 'maga-maga' it stresses the scrawniness further, and a 'maga dog' is a pitiful, half-starved stray. Unlike neutral English 'thin', 'maga' carries a note of pity or disparagement, naming the lean and the meagre, whether a body, a beast, or a scanty yield.
Examples
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Di dog dem maga, dem nuh get no food.
The dogs are skinny, they haven't been fed.
'Dem' pluralises 'dog'; no copula before 'maga.'
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Yuh get maga since mi last si yuh!
You've gotten thin since I last saw you!
Often said with concern about someone's health.
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A maga crop wi reap dis year.
It's a poor, meagre crop we reaped this year.
Extended sense meaning scanty or lacking.
Origin
From English 'meagre', reshaped by Jamaican phonology into 'maga'.
How it’s used
Everyday descriptive word, generally not an insult unless used to mock, as in 'maga dawg' for a wretchedly thin dog or, figuratively, a downtrodden person. The proverb 'Maga cow a bull mumma' (a scrawny cow is still a bull's mother) warns against judging by appearance.