Klryz
Pronunciation guide: IPA symbols, stress and word endings

Vowels

iːseeɪsite / ɛbedæcat
ɑːfatherɒhot (UK)ɔːlawʊput
uːtooʌcupɜːbirdəabout
eɪdayaɪmyɔɪboyaʊnow
əʊ / oʊgo (UK / US)ɪəneareəhairʊətour

Consonants that look unusual

θthinðthisʃsheʒmeasure
tʃchurchdʒjudgeŋsingjyes

p b t d k g f v s z h m n l r w sound as in ordinary English spelling.

Marks

  • ˈ main stress, before the stressed syllable: /ˈwɔːtə/ water · ˌ lighter (secondary) stress: /ˌʌndəˈstænd/ understand
  • ː a long vowel · (r) an r said only in accents that pronounce it (most American, Scottish, Irish)

Common word endings

  • -s / -es (plurals; he/she form of verbs): /s/ after voiceless sounds (cats), /z/ after voiced (dogs), /ɪz/ after s, z, sh, ch, j sounds (buses, watches). Spelling: -es after s, x, z, ch, sh; consonant + y → -ies (city → cities).
  • -ed (past): /t/ after voiceless sounds (walked), /d/ after voiced (played), /ɪd/ after t or d (wanted). Spelling: love → loved, stop → stopped, carry → carried.
  • -ing: make → making, run → running, see → seeing.
  • Irregular: go, went, gone · be, was, been · see, saw, seen · man → men · child → children · mouse → mice.
  • Older (King James) forms: -eth = -s (he loveth = he loves) · -est with “thou” (thou lovest) · spake = spoke.

English Dictionary · 107,383 entries · Sources & licences

jig

/d͡ʒɪɡ/ noun, verb

Forms jigs jigging jigged

  1. noun (music) A light, brisk musical movement; a gigue.
  2. noun (traditional Irish music and dance) A lively dance in 6/8 (double jig), 9/8 (slip jig) or 12/8 (single jig) time; a tune suitable for such a dance. By extension, a lively traditional tune in any of these time signatures. Unqualified, the term is usually taken to refer to a double (6/8) jig. “They danced a jig.”
  3. noun (traditional English Morris dance) A dance performed by one or sometimes two individual dancers, as opposed to a dance performed by a set or team.
  4. noun (fishing) A type of lure consisting of a hook molded into a weight, usually with a bright or colorful body.
  5. noun A device in manufacturing, woodworking, or other creative endeavors for controlling the location, path of movement, or both of either a workpiece or the tool that is operating upon it. Subsets of this general class include machining jigs, woodworking jigs, welders' jigs, jewelers' jigs, and many others. “Cutting circles out of pinewood is best done with a compass-style jig.”
  6. noun (mining) An apparatus or machine for jigging ore.
  7. noun (obsolete) A light, humorous piece of writing, especially in rhyme; a farce in verse; a ballad.
  8. noun (obsolete) A trick; a prank.
  9. verb To move briskly, especially as a dance. “The guests were jigging around on the dance floor.”
  10. verb To move with a skip or rhythm; to move with vibrations or jerks.
  11. verb (fishing) To fish with a jig.
  12. verb To sing to the tune of a jig.
  13. verb To trick or cheat; to cajole; to delude.
  14. verb (mining) To sort or separate, as ore in a jigger or sieve.
  15. verb To cut or form, as a piece of metal, in a jigging machine.
  16. verb To skip school or be truant.
  17. noun (US, offensive, slang, dated, ethnic slur) A black person.
  18. noun (World War II era, joint US/RAF) radiotelephony clear-code word for the letter J.

Synonyms

Juliett gigue

Etymology

Unknown. Derivation from Middle English gyge (“fiddle”), from Old French gigue (“a fiddle”) has been proposed, but the connection and sense development are obscure. The sense “a type of dance” of modern French gigue is borrowed from English.

Probably a clipping of jigaboo, of uncertain origin, perhaps an African/Bantu word. Alternatively, jigaboo may be derived from jig (“dance”).

Webster’s 1913

  1. noun A light, brisk musical movement.
  2. noun A light, humorous piece of writing, esp. in rhyme; a farce in verse; a ballad. [Obs.]
  3. verb To sing to the tune of a jig. Jig off a tune at the tongue's end. Shak.
  4. verb To trick or cheat; to cajole; to delude. Ford.

Etymology [OF. gigue a stringed instrument, a kind of dance, F. gigue dance, tune, gig; of German origin; cf. MHG. gige fiddle, G. geige. Cf. Gig a fiddle, Gig a whirligig.]

Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “jig”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details