/skæŋk/, /skeɪŋk/
OriginUnknown. Perhaps from skag (“unattractive woman”), but the origins of skag are unknown. Compare scold (“troublesome woman”), skeevy (“disgusting”). Attested from the 1960s.
- countable, uncountableAnything that is particularly foul, unhygienic or unpleasant.
“Virgins. I love 'em. No diseases, no loose as a goose pussy, no skank. No nothin'. Just pure pleasure.”
“Hughes CRAVED dirt. Hughes CRAVED slander skank to share with Mr. Hoover. What Hughes CRAVED, Hughes BOUGHT. ¶ Pete bought an issue’s worth of dirt. His cop contacts supplied him with a one-week load ”
- A dance performed to ska, dub, or reggae music.
“[…]the ability to double up with contagious laughter; the feeling of pure child-like glee; and the mesmerizing, trance-like skank dancing that looks like African aerobics after centuries of rhythm.”
“All reggae dance represents a dialogue with that basic movement which is the skank — a kind of offbeat walking on the spot”
- A style of rhythmic guitar strumming in ska, reggae, and punk.
“A typical skank guitar rhythm:
{\time3/4\tempo4=180\set Staff.midiInstrument=#"electric guitar (muted)"\repeat unfold2{r8a4}\repeat unfold2{r8g4”
“He took it another step and brought blues into reggae music. I don’t play skank. I don’t play reggae guitar. So I had to call.”
- The act of cheating a person.
“That's not a good deal; it's a skank.”
“As for the identities of those behind the plan, the mere mention of ‘some millionaire’ reinforced the conviction of those who were ready to part with their money that they were onto a winner. While fo”
- To dance the skank.
“Four-thousand miles away, there is a reggae night spot called Club 69, where local youth wear dreadlocks... and dance ska, rocksteady, and skank to the beats of the Wailers.... Club 69 is in Tokyo, th”
- To play guitar with a skank rhythm.
“Joe Strummer and Mick Jones did a lot of skanking. Skanking refers to a style of playing using scratch (page 17) rhythms with a strong accent on the off-beats (1 & 2 & 3 & 4 &) rather than the on-beat”
- Jamaica, intransitive, transitiveTo be dishonest or unreliable, to defraud or deceive, to steal.
“Only Tosh, Marley and Livingston had been signed, and Aston Barrett harboured an unarticulated resentment that later would be couched in the language of betrayal[…] In any event ‘Family Man’ believed ”
- transitiveTo cheat, especially a friend.
“He short-changed a partner, leaving him feeling skanked.”
“He thought I was trying to skank him and wouldn’t wait any more; he wanted to be there. He wouldn’t wait!”
Formsskanks(plural) · skanks(present, singular, third-person) · skanking(participle, present) · skanked(participle, past) · skanked(past)