gack

See also: Gack and gäck

English

Pronunciation

• enPR: găk, IPA^(key): /ɡæk/

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

• Rhymes: -æk
• Homophone: gac

Etymology 1

Apparently onomatopoeic and believed to have first appeared in comic strips. Compare gag (“to choke; to retch”) and hack (“to cough noisily”).

The "cocaine" and "meth" senses apparently comes from the fact that snorting the drugs often activates a person's gag reflex.

Alternative forms

• gak

Interjection

gack

1. (often repeated several times) A sharp, sudden sound from someone's throat while they're coughing, vomiting, gagging, etc.
   • 1999 April, Carole Nelson Douglas, “Newsmaker, Heartbreaker”, in Cat in an Indigo Mood'‎^[1], Tom Doherty Associates, →ISBN, page 198:

     Sports was immediately consigned to a recycle pile where it was handy in case she heard the unmistakable gack-gack-gack machine-gun regurgitation sound of Midnight Louie about to deposit a hairball on some particularly cherished piece of paper or furniture.

   • 2006, J. C. Greenburg, Andrew Lost in the Garbage‎^[2], 1st edition, Random House Children's Books, →ISBN, page 64:

     With loud pops, a cloud of blue smoke exploded from the beetle's behind. A steaming spray that stunk worse than burning rubber shot into the air. "Ack!" gagged Andrew. "Gack! Gack! Gack!" coughed Judy.

   • 2016 October, Bryan Cranston, quoting John Shiban, Breaking Bad #212 "Title TBD" Writer's Draft‎^[3], September 17, 2008, quoted in Life in Parts, Scribner, →ISBN, page 204:

     Gravity does the rest as Jane's vomit spills back into her trachea. Guck-guck-^[sic] GACK...guck-gack....GACK! GACK!...GACK!

2. An expression of disgust or disapproval.
   • a. 2004, Mister Moose [pseudonym], “Arriving in New Zealand: My First Experiences in This Far Off Land”, in MisterMoose.org‎^[4], archived from the original on 2004-04-10:

     The family wanted me to try marmite, which is some sort of dark brown yeast extract that many Kiwis seem to enjoy. […] The family asked me to try it saying that it "tastes better than it smells." They were completely wrong. Gack! No more marmite for this boy.

3. An expression of trepidation.
   • 1995 March, Mary Daheim, Major Vices‎^[5], Avon Books, →ISBN, page 112:

     “Gack,” said Judith. “I don’t remember that. I wish you hadn’t. […] ”

   • 2012 September 20, Brandylion [pseudonym], “After A Year And A Half – NOW You Find Out He Doesn’t Want A Serious Relationship – EVER!”, in Have The Relationship You Want‎^[6], archived from the original on 2022-09-10, Comments:

     Gack! Me too! I spent the whole decade of my 20s too afraid to try even online dating and I just focused on my career and doing things that interested me, and I feel SO AFRAID that if I return to focusing on my life that another decade will go by before I know it and I'll still be single and childless.

Verb

gack (third-person singular simple present gacks, present participle gacking, simple past and past participle gacked)

1. (intransitive) To make a sharp, sudden sound in one's throat, such as before vomiting or while coughing, gagging, etc.
   • 1999, Dennis Lehane, Payers for Rain, 1st edition, New York: William Morrow and Company, →ISBN, page 31:

     I slipped the punch, dropped the paper, and closed my right hand around his throat. I backed him into his desk and pushed him onto his back. […] He rubbed his throat, gacked like a cat spitting up a hair ball.

   • 2015, Kristan Higgins, If You Only Knew‎^[7], Harlequin Books, →ISBN, page 248:

     Then we hear the unmistakable gacking of a dog about to puke. Ooah. Ooah. Ooaah... And puke Loki does, right under the coffee table.

2. To do something that causes a sharp, sudden sound in one's throat.
   1. (intransitive) To vomit, throw up.
      • 1996, Pat Pollari, Barf-o-Rama: The Legend of Bigfart‎^[8], Transworld Books, published 1997, →ISBN, page 6:

        I mean, if cheese could make me gack, you know that poop snake, coiled around that worthless pen, wasn't going to calm my jumpy stomach down.

   2. (transitive) To cough something up.
      • 2006, Gary Paulsen, The Amazing Life of Birds‎^[9], 1st edition, Wendy Lam Books, →ISBN, page 12:

        It reminded me of the time Willy tried to get a whole hamburger in his mouth on a bet. […] he almost choked to death before we figured out how to do the Heimlich maneuver on him. […] finally Pete Honer said, "He's turning blue," and we all just grabbed something and squeezed and he gacked it up and out. Pickles and all.

   3. (intransitive) To choke (be unable to breathe because of obstruction of the windpipe)
      • 2010, Jeff Lindsay, Dexter is Delicious‎^[10], Orion Books, →ISBN, page 340:

        […] Chutsky came around and kicked the other one in the throat, so hard I could hear it crack, and he went over backward making gacking noises and clutching at his windpipe.u

   4. (intransitive) To choke (experience tightness in one's throat as a result of strong emotion)
      • 2010, Yxta Maya Murray, The Good Girl's Guide to Getting Kidnapped‎^[11], Penguin Group, →ISBN, page 178:

        My throat made some gacking noises, though. No, no crying! Stiff lip, stiff lip, stiff lip—you got an interview! I stood in the kitchen, shaking and swallowing everything down.

Noun

gack (uncountable)

1. (slang) Crystal meth.
2. (slang) Powder cocaine.
   • 2005, Niall Griffiths, Wreckage‎^[12], Vintage, published 2006, →ISBN, page 217:

     —What, an he deals gack on the side? / —Aye, yeh. Dead easy for him to get a hold of, innit? / —How's that, well? / —Every fuckin ozzy's gorra supply of charlie, Dar. Skag n all. Best fuckin painkillers goin, lar.

   • 2009 March, Christopher John Campion, Escape from Bellevue: A Dive Bar Odyssey‎^[13], Gotham Books, →ISBN, page 195:

     Getting gilled on gack without the precious reward of a drink on top, though, really sucked. Alcohol was my great love. Cocaine was just something I did to keep my altitude up […]

   • 2017, Roman Caribe [pseudonym], Robert Cea, “Bait and Switch”, in Confidential Source Ninety-Six, Hachette Books, →ISBN:

     Robbie dug his hand in and pulled out a loose kilo of cocaine. […] Robbie held up a kilo for me to hold, but there was no way I was going to touch one single package. The last thing I wanted were my fingerprints on that gack […]

Translations

to make a 'gack' noise

• Finnish: kakoa (fi), kakistella (fi)

to cough something up

• Finnish: kakistaa (fi), kakoa (fi)

Etymology 2

Apparently onomatopoeic. Compare German gack (“call of a hen”), German gackern (“(of a chicken) to loudly and repetitive cry”), and Dutch gakken (“(of a goose) to honk”).

Comparison to more terms

Pokorny compared German gackern to words including English gaggle, Latvian gâgát (“cry like a goose”), Russian gogotátь (gogotátʹ, “(of geese) cackle; laugh loudly”), Old Norse gaga (“mock, ridicule”), and Albanian gogësínj (“yawn, burp”), among others. Pokorny considered common origin or separate innovation both as possibilities to explain the similarities.

Interjection

gack

1. The sound of a bird's call in response to disturbance.
   • 2009, Rachel Dickinson, Falconer on the Edge‎^[14], Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, →ISBN, page 97&endash;98:

     It was a big downy chick, about twenty-three days old. […] Steve shot ptargmigan for it, and every time it ate or saw Steve it would scream, Gack gack gack gack, […]

   • 2010, Eugene S. Hunn, Thomas F. Thornton, “Tlingit Birds: An Annotated List with a Statistical Comparative Analysis”, in Sonia Tidemann, Andrew Gosler, editors, Ethno-Ornithology: Birds, Indigenous Peoples, Culture and Society, Earthscan, →ISBN, pages 195—196:

     k’eikw’w, Black-legged Kittiwake Rissa tridactyla, a cliff-nesting gull and an important clan symbol or ‘totem’. […] The bird is described as a smaller version or relative of the ‘seagull’, a colonial cliff-nesting species that when disturbed forms swirling masses of birds overhead which call ‘gack, gack, gack, gack’.

Verb

gack (third-person singular simple present gacks, present participle gacking, simple past and past participle gacked)

1. (of a bird) To call in response to disturbance.
   • 1977, Jon Fjeldså, Guide to the Young of European Precocial Birds, →ISBN, page 59:

     During a disturbance the young run to the water and dive from fear, […] On other occasions the adults swim or walk about, incessantly gacking.

Swedish

Verb

gack

1. (archaic) singular imperative of gå