shanty
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˈʃænti/
rhymes: -ænti
Forms: form: shanties
Etymology: From Canadian French chantier (“lumberjack's headquarters”). An alternative theory that the word derives from Irish seantí (meaning "old house") is not considered likely by lexicologists.
* (unlicensed pub): New Zealand from 1848.
Senses: examples: text: A chap named Eleazir Kendrick and I had chummed in together the summer afore and built a fish-weir and shanty at Setuckit Point, down Orham way. For a spell we done pretty well.
ref: 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter I, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y.; London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC:
text: He wondered how many people were destitute that same night even in his own prosperous country, how many homes were shanties, how many husbands were drunk and wives socked, and how many children were bullied, abused or abandoned.
ref: 1961 November 10, Joseph Heller, “The Eternal City”, in Catch-22 […], New York, N.Y.: Simon and Schuster, →OCLC, page 428:
text: 1965 January, Stuart James, Angling′s New Gadgets, Popular Mechanics, page 224,
The ice fishing shanty is not a necessity, but it does add to the comfort. A shanty can be any size or shape, four pieces of plywood banged together with a plywood roof, or as elaborate as one I was told about by a Minneapolis fisherman that has four rooms with gas heat and wall-to-wall carpeting.
text: 1999 January, Lawrence Pyne, In Vermont: Rental Shanties Give Hassle-Free Ice-Fishing, Field & Stream, page 78,
The solution is to use ice-fishing shacks, called shanties on Champlain. Every winter, veritable shanty towns spring up as safe ice develops, and their snug occupants harvest fresh meals of perch, pike, walleye, salmon, trout, and smelt without first being flash-frozen themselves.
text: Shanties are the most interesting and original of early housing in the Adirondacks.[…]Bark for roofs and even walls on occasion seems to be an attribute of the shanty. Large shanties at staging grounds in the woods included bunkhouses holding one to three dozen men, so not all shanties were small.
ref: 2000, Craig A. Gilborn, Adirondack Camps: Homes Away from Home, 1850-1950, page 51:
synonyms: shack
hovel
glosses: A roughly-built hut or cabin.
examples: text: Shanties along canal banks and road reserves have emerged since independence in 1948 onwards, and consist of unauthorized and improvised shelter without legal rights of occupancy of the land and structures.
ref: 2003, United Nations Human Settlements Programme, The Challenge of Slums: Global Report on Human Settlements 2003, page 208:
text: A few governments recognise the shanties as a form of self-help housing that places very little burden upon government funds. Such governments sometimes encourage shanty development by providing water, electricity and garbage collection services.
ref: 2005, Stephen Codrington, Planet Geography, page 481:
text: In the hard times of the 1930s, shanty boats along the Ohio River′s banks were home to many families, who felt fortunate to have a roof over their heads even if it was not on dry land.
ref: 2009, James E. Casto, The Great Ohio River Flood of 1937, page 83:
glosses: A rudimentary or improvised dwelling, especially one not legally owned.
examples: text: The shanty-keeper is not, as a rule, a bachelor.
ref: 1881, Henry W. Nesfield, A Chequered Career; Or, Fifteen years in Australia and New Zealand, page 351:
synonyms: speakeasy
glosses: An unlicensed pub.
Derived terms: Big Shanty
claim shanty
grog shanty
shanty back
shanty boy
shanty-keeper
shanty town