different between gaffer vs gaffe

English

Etymology 1

From gaff (“hook”) +? -er. The natural lighting on early film sets was adjusted by opening and closing flaps in the tent cloths, called gaff cloths or gaff flaps.

Pronunciation

• (General American) IPA^(key): /?æf?/
• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /?æf?/
• Rhymes: -æf?(?)

Noun

gaffer (plural gaffers)

1. (film) A chief lighting technician for a motion-picture or television production.
2. A glassblower.

Related terms

• gaffer tape

Translations

Etymology 2

Likely a contraction of godfather, but with the vowels influenced by grandfather. Compare French compère, German Gevatter.

Noun

gaffer (plural gaffers)

1. (colloquial) An old man.
   • 1845, Thomas Cooper, The Purgatory of Suicides, Book the Fourth, Stanza IX:

     If thou return not, Gammer o'er her pail

     Will sing in sorrow, 'neath the brinded cow,

     And Gaffer sigh over his nut-brown ale […]

2. (Britain) A foreman.
3. A sailor.
4. (in Maritime regions) The baby in the house.

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:old man

Related terms

• gammer

Translations

References

• “gaffer”, in OED Online ?, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, 1989

Anagrams

• Graeff

French

Etymology

gaffe +? -er

Verb

gaffer

1. to make a gaffe; to mess up; botch up
2. to gaffer tape

Conjugation

Further reading

• “gaffer” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

Norman

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Pronunciation

Verb

gaffer

1. (Jersey) to grasp

Welsh

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /??af?r/

Verb

gaffer

1. Soft mutation of caffer.

Mutation

English

Alternative forms

• gaff

Etymology

From French gaffe (“blunder”). Doublet of gaff.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?æf/
• Rhymes: -æf

Noun

gaffe (plural gaffes)

1. A foolish and embarrassing error, especially one made in public.

   Synonyms: blooper, blunder, mistake, error, slip, slip-up; see also Thesaurus:error

Translations

See also

• malapropism
• Freudian slip
• Bushism

French

Etymology

From Old Occitan gaf (“clasp”), from Gothic ???????????????????? (gafah, “clasp”, noun), from ????????- (ga-, intensifier) + ???????????????????? (fahan, “to catch”).

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?af/
• Rhymes: -af

Noun 1

gaffe f (plural gaffes)

1. gaffe, blunder, goof-up (North American), cock-up (British)

Derived terms

• faire gaffe

Descendants

• ? Portuguese: gafe

Noun 2

gaffe f (plural gaffes)

1. (nautical) boathook

Further reading

• “gaffe” in Trésor de la langue française informatisé (The Digitized Treasury of the French Language).

German

Pronunciation

Verb

gaffe

1. inflection of gaffen:
   1. first-person singular present
   2. singular imperative
   3. first/third-person singular subjunctive I

Italian

Noun

gaffe f

1. plural of gaffa

Noun

gaffe f (invariable)

1. gaffe, blunder, boob