whack
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /wæk/
note: without the wine–whine merger
ipa: /ʍæk/
rhymes: -æk
homophone: wack (wine–whine merger)
Forms: form: whacks
Etymology: Uncertain. Originally Scottish; probably onomatopoeic, but compare Middle English thakken, from Old English þaccian (whence Modern thwack by conflation with whack). Sense 6 of the verb is likely a semantic loan from Malay hentam (“to strike; to do something carelessly”).
Senses: synonyms: thwack
glosses: The sound of a heavy strike.
examples: text: Saka was a threat from the first whistle; Ukraine rightly wary of him and dishing out the usual whacks.
ref: March 26 2023, David Hytner, “Kane and Bukayo Saka combine against Ukraine for England’s perfect Euros start”, in The Guardian:
synonyms: thwack
glosses: The strike itself.
glosses: The stroke itself, regardless of its successful impact.
examples: text: C'mon. Take a whack at it.
text: 40 bucks a whack.
text: The number arrested is not over 600 — at $805 a whack, New Jersey has made half-a-million dollars arresting gay men.
ref: 1989 April 15, Jon Autiello et al., “Police Cruisers Smash Queers”, in Gay Community News, page 5:
glosses: An attempt, a chance, a turn, a go, originally an attempt to beat someone or something.
examples: text: I don’t care about much wine afterwards—I take my whack at dinner—I mean my share, you know; and when I have had as much as I want I toddle up to tea.
ref: 1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 39, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:
text: “It’s damned tame, whatever it is, comin’ in here at feedin’ time an’ gettin’ its whack of fish.”
ref: 1906 May–October, Jack London, chapter 2, in White Fang, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., published October 1906, →OCLC, part 1 (The Wild), page 16:
text: “[…] O'Cannon's a taxpayer. He pays his whack towards the upkeep of the State School up in town—”
ref: 1938, Xavier Herbert, chapter VII, in Capricornia, New York: Appleton, page 108:
text: For one thing I had a splendid supper when I got on board—a whack of cold, lean beef and pighells, bread, butter ad lib., tea, and plenty of good bread.
ref: 1951, Katherine Mansfield, Letters to John Middleton Murry, 1913-1922:
text: There were problems over the installation of the engine and the handling. The team had paid top whack for the two Coopers, but the company gave them no help at all.
ref: 2014, Anthony Pritchard, Grand Prix Ferrari, page 203:
glosses: A share, a portion, especially a full share or large portion.
glosses: A whack-up: a division of an amount into separate whacks, a divvying up.
examples: text: "I'll stay if you will."
"Good—that's a whack."
ref: 1876, Mark Twain [pseudonym; Samuel Langhorne Clemens], chapter VI, in The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Hartford, Conn.: The American Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 70:
text: It's a whack!
glosses: A deal, an agreement.
qualifier: disco-era drug slang
glosses: PCP, phencyclidine (as also wack).
examples: del c:\docs\readme.txt
Delete c colon whack docs whack readme dot text.
topics: computing
engineering
mathematics
media
natural-sciences
physical-sciences
publishing
sciences
typography
glosses: The backslash, ⟨ \ ⟩.
glosses: Alternative spelling of wack (“annoyingly or disappointingly bad”)
Derived terms: cop one's whack
full whack
go whacks
have a whack at
out of whack
sack-whack
take a whack at
top whack
wacky
whackjob
whack one out
whack out
whack shack
whack up
whack-up