junk
Language: English
Part of speech: noun
Pronunciation: ipa: /d͡ʒʌŋk/
ipa: /d͡ʒɐŋk/
rhymes: -ʌŋk
homophone: junque
Forms: form: junks
Etymology: From earlier meaning "old refuse from boats and ships", from Middle English junk, jounke, jonk, joynk (“an old cable or rope”, nautical term), sometimes cut into bits and used as caulking; of uncertain origin; perhaps related to join, joint, juncture. Often compared to Middle English junk, jonk, jonke, junck (“a rush; basket made of rushes”), from Old French jonc, from Latin iuncus (“rush, reed”); however, the Oxford English Dictionary finds "no evidence of connexion".
Senses: examples: text: This shed is full of junk – will you help me sort it out?
text: She needs to find a better place to keep her junk [= belongings].
text: What a piece of junk!
ref: 1977, George Lucas, Star Wars: A New Hope, spoken by Luke Skywalker:
text: In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result.
ref: 2013 May 25, “No hiding place”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8837, page 74:
synonyms: word: clutter
word: cultch
word: crap
word: debris
word: dreck
word: drek
word: garbage
word: junk
word: litter
word: pelf
word: piece of crap
word: piece of garbage
word: piece of shit
word: pile of crap
word: pile of shit
word: piece of trash
word: rubbish
word: refuse
word: roughage
word: service item
word: shit
word: stuff
word: trash
word: waste
glosses: Miscellaneous items of little value, especially discarded or unwanted items.
examples: text: junk food
text: junk fish; junk trees
glosses: Material or resources of poor quality or low value, especially resources that lack commercial value.
examples: text: The student put down junk for answers just to finish his homework more quickly.
glosses: Nonsense; gibberish.
examples: text: The poor fellow took so much junk into his system he could only weather the greater proportion of his day in that chair with the lamp burning at noon, but in the morning he was magnificent.
ref: 1957, Jack Kerouac, On the Road, Viking Press, →OCLC:
text: Trace a line of goose pimples up the thin young arm. Slide the needle in and push the bulb watching the junk hit him all over. Move right in with the shit and suck junk through all the hungry young cells.
ref: 1966 [1961], William S. Burroughs, The Soft Machine (The Nova Trilogy), New York: Grove Press, page 7:
text: Ah love nothing (except junk), ah hate nothing (except forces that prevent me getting any) and ah fear nothing (except not scoring).
ref: 1994 [1993], Irvine Welsh, Trainspotting, London: Minerva, →ISBN, page 21:
glosses: Any narcotic drug, especially heroin.
examples: text: I'm talking about everybody getting crunk, crunk / Boys tryin' to touch my junk, junk / Gonna smack him if he getting too drunk, drunk
ref: 2009, “Tik Tok”, performed by Kesha:
text: But what to do about a kid who flashes his privates at your child? And worse, how do you make sure your kid does not reciprocate? That's exactly the dilemma one mom faced when she learned that her 5-year-old neighbor had flashed his "junk" at her two sons and then made them swear not to tell.
ref: 2019 April 18, Genny Glassman, “Parent Torn After Discovering 5-Year-Old Neighbor 'Flashed' Kids & Told Them to Keep It a Secret”, in CafeMom:
text: Got a spot on the voice, I'm a neo punk / Old ladies cum when I flash my junk
ref: 2023, “Neo Punk”, in Every Loser, performed by Iggy Pop:
synonyms: word: anaconda
word: baloney pony
word: bald-headed hermit
word: banana
word: birdie
word: bobby
word: boonga
word: cack
word: choad
word: choda
word: chode
word: chopper
word: cigar
word: cock
word: corey
word: crank
word: cucumber
word: custard launcher
word: D
word: dick
word: dicklet
word: diddle
word: diddly
word: dingaling
word: ding-a-ling
word: ding-dong
word: dinger
word: dingle
word: dingus
word: dingy
word: dink
word: dinkle
word: dipstick
word: dirk
word: disco stick
word: dog bone
word: dong
word: donger
word: Donkey Kong
word: doodle
word: dork
word: down
word: fire hose
word: fuckpole
word: gherkin
word: hairy canary
word: hammer
word: hog
word: hot dog
word: hot rod
word: hoo-hoo
word: hooter
word: it
word: jade stalk
word: jamoke
word: jigger
word: jimmy
word: jock
word: johnson
word: John Thomas
word: joint
word: Jonathan
word: joystick
word: kielbasa
word: knob
word: lad
word: langer
word: lingam
word: love muscle
word: love stick
word: love truncheon
word: love sausage
word: love wand
word: machine
word: magnum
word: Master John Goodfellow
word: male member
word: manhood
word: man-meat
word: meat
word: meat puppet
word: meat rod
word: meat scepter
word: meatstick
word: meat stick
word: member
word: membrum virile
word: nature's scythe
word: nob
word: old chap
word: old fellow
word: one-eyed trouser snake
word: organ
word: package
word: pecker
word: peen
word: pee-pee
word: pee-wee
word: pego
word: penis
word: Percy
word: peter
word: phallus
word: pickle
word: piece
word: piece of pork
word: pike
word: pillicock
word: pingas
word: pink cigar
word: pink oboe
word: pintle
word: pipe
word: pisser
word: piston
word: pizzle
word: plonker
word: pork sword
word: prick
word: pud
word: purple-headed yogurt slinger
word: putz
word: p-word
word: python
word: ramrod
word: rape tool
word: rod
word: root
word: rutter
word: salami
word: sausage
word: schlong
word: schmuck
word: sex tool
word: shaft
word: shlong
word: shmekl (qualifier
word: colloquial
word: Yiddish)
word: short arm
word: skin flute
word: snake
word: snausage
word: spitstick
word: stem
word: stretcher
word: sucker
word: swipe
word: tadger
word: tagger
word: tail
word: tallywhacker
word: tarse
word: thing
word: thingy
word: third leg
word: tic tac
word: todger
word: tool
word: trouser monkey
word: trouser snake
word: truncheon
word: tube steak
word: unit
word: virile member
word: wang
word: weapon
word: wee-wee
word: weenie
word: weeny
word: whang
word: wick
word: widgie
word: widdler
word: wiener
word: willie
word: willy
word: wingwang
word: winkle
word: winky
word: yard
word: ying-yang
glosses: The genitalia, especially of a male.
examples: text: My physician has ordered me three pounds of minced salt-junk at every meal .
ref: c. 1851-1852, James Russell Lowell, Leaves from My Journal in Italy and Elsewhere
topics: nautical
transport
glosses: Salt beef.
glosses: Pieces of old cable or cordage, used for making gaskets, mats, swabs, etc., and when picked to pieces, forming oakum for filling the seams of ships.
examples: text: Dear Uncle Sam pervides fer his,
An' gives a good-sized junk to all
ref: 1848, [James Russell Lowell], “(please specify the page)”, in Homer Wilbur [pseudonym], editor, Melibœus-Hipponax. The Biglow Papers, […], Cambridge, Mass.: George Nichols, →OCLC:
text: Then he lay quiet for a little, and then, pulling out a stick of tobacco, begged me to cut him a quid.
“Cut me a junk o’ that,” says he, “for I haven’t no knife and hardly strength enough, so be as I had. […]”
ref: 1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC:
glosses: A fragment of any solid substance; a thick piece; a chunk.
Derived terms: antijunk
chartjunk
cyberjunk
dejunk
hunk of junk
Jesus junk
junkaholic
junkball
junkboard
junk bond
junk bottle
junkbox
junk conference
junk DNA
junk drawer
junk email
junker
junk fee
junk food
junk food news
junk gun
junk head
junkhead
junkheap
junk-hook
junkie
junky
junk in one's trunk
junk in the trunk
junk job
junkless
junklike
junk mail
junk mailer
junkman
junkmobile
junk news
junkpile
junk rig
junk ring
junkroom
junkscape
junk science
junkshop
junk shop
junk shot
junk sick
junk-sick
junk sickness
junkspace
Junkspace
junk sport
junk time
junk title
junk vat
junk wad
junkware
junkyard
nonjunk
piece of junk
salt junk
space junk