different between whip vs whack

English

Etymology

From Middle English whippen, wippen (“to flap violently”), from Middle Dutch wippen (“to swing, leap, dance, oscillate”) and Middle Low German wippen (“to move quickly”), from Proto-Germanic *wipjan? (“to move back and forth”). Some similarity to Sanskrit root ???? (vep, “shake, flourish”), Latin vibr? (“I shake”). (See Swedish vippa and Danish vippe (“to shake”)).

Pronunciation

• enPR: w?p, IPA^(key): /w?p/
• Rhymes: -?p
• enPR: hw?p, IPA^(key): /??p/

Noun

whip (plural whips)

1. A lash; a pliant, flexible instrument, such as a rod (commonly of cane or rattan) or a plaited or braided rope or thong (commonly of leather) used to create a sharp "crack" sound for directing or herding animals.
   1. The same instrument used to strike a person or animal for corporal punishment or torture.

2. A blow administered with a whip.
   • 1832, The Atheneum (volume 31, page 493)

     I had hardly said the word, when Kit jumped into the saddle, and gave his horse a whip and a spur — and off it cantered, as if it were in as great a hurry to be married as Kit himself.

3. (hunting) A whipper-in.
   • 1928, Siegfried Sassoon, Memoirs of a Fox-Hunting Man, Penguin 2013, p. 27:

     From the far side of the wood came the long shrill screech […] which signifies that one of the whips has viewed the fox quitting the covert.

4. (politics) A member of a political party who is in charge of enforcing the party's policies in votes.

5. (UK politics, with definite article) A document distributed weekly to MPs by party whips informing them of upcoming votes in parliament.
6. Whipped cream.

7. (nautical) A purchase in which one block is used to gain a 2:1 mechanical advantage.
8. (African-American Vernacular) A mode of personal motorized transportation; an automobile, all makes and models including motorcycles, excluding public transportation.
   • 2017, Stormzy, Return of the Rucksack

     Big whip I'm underground parking

9. (roller derby) A move in which one player transfers momentum to another.
10. A whipping motion; a thrashing about.

11. The quality of being whiplike or flexible; suppleness, as of the shaft of a golf club.
12. Any of various pieces that operate with a quick vibratory motion
    1. A spring in certain electrical devices for making a circuit
    2. (music) A wippen, a rocking component in certain piano actions.
13. (historical) A coach driver; a coachman.

Synonyms

• (last for directing animals): crop (especially for horses), dressage whip (especially for horses), driving whip (especially for horses), jumping bat (especially for horses), flail, knout, lash, quirt, scourge, sjambok (South African), thong
• (lash for corporal punishment): cat (nautical), flail, knout, lash, quirt, scourge, sjambok (South African), thong
• (political party enforcer): party whip

Hyponyms

Derived terms

Related terms

• whip snake

Translations

Verb

whip (third-person singular simple present whips, present participle whipping, simple past and past participle whipped)

1. (transitive) To hit with a whip.

2. (transitive, by extension) To hit with any flexible object.

3. (transitive, slang) To defeat, as in a contest or game.
4. (transitive) To mix in a rapid aerating fashion, especially food.

5. (transitive) To urge into action or obedience.

6. (transitive, politics) To enforce a member voting in accordance with party policy.
7. (transitive, nautical) To bind the end of a rope with twine or other small stuff to prevent its unlaying: fraying or unravelling.
   • 1677-1683, Joseph Moxon, Mechanick exercises

     Its string […] is firmly whipt about with small Gut

8. (transitive, nautical) To hoist or purchase by means of a whip.
9. To sew lightly; specifically, to form (a fabric) into gathers by loosely overcasting the rolled edge and drawing up the thread.

   • In half-whipped muslin needles useless lie.

10. (transitive) To throw or kick an object at a high velocity.
11. (transitive, intransitive) To fish a body of water especially by making repeated casts.
    • 1858, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Adirondac

      whipping its rough surface for a trout

12. (intransitive) To snap back and forth like a whip.

13. (intransitive) To move very fast.
    • 1886, Robert Louis Stevenson, Strange Case Of Dr Jekyll And Mr Hyde

      He looked up when I came in, gave a kind of cry, and whipped upstairs into the cabinet. It was but for one minute that I saw him, but the hair stood upon my head like quills.

14. (transitive) To move (something) very fast; often with up, out, etc.
    • 1742, Horace Walpole, letter to Sir Horace Mann

      He whips out his pocketbook every moment, and writes descriptions of everything he sees.

15. (transitive, roller derby) To transfer momentum from one skater to another.
16. (figuratively) To lash with sarcasm, abuse, etc.
17. To thrash; to beat out, as grain, by striking.

Synonyms

• (to hit with a whip): Thesaurus:whip
• (to move very fast): flail
• thrash
• thresh

Derived terms

Translations

See also

• ghost ride the whip

References

• Samuel Johnson, John Walker, Robert S. Jameson: 1828. A dictionary of the English language 2nd edition. Publisher: William Pickering, 1828. 831 pages. Page 818. Google Public Domain Books : [2]

Further reading

• whip in The Century Dictionary, New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911.
• whip at OneLook Dictionary Search

English

Etymology

Uncertain. Originally Scottish. Probably onomatopoeic, although possibly a variant of thwack.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /wæk/
• (without the wine–whine merger) IPA^(key): /?æk/
• Rhymes: -æk
• Homophone: wack (accents with the wine-whine merger)

Noun

whack (plural whacks)

1. The sound of a heavy strike.
2. The strike itself.
3. The stroke itself, regardless of its successful impact.
4. (US, slang) An attempt, a chance, a turn, a go, originally an attempt to beat someone or something.

   C'mon. Take a whack at it.

   40 bucks a whack.

5. (originally Britain cant, dated) A share, a portion, especially a full share or large portion.
   • 1906, Jack London, White Fang, New York: Grosset and Dunlap, Part 1, Chapter 2, p. 16,^[1]

     “It’s damned tame, whatever it is, comin’ in here at feedin’ time an’ gettin’ its whack of fish.”

   • 1938, Xavier Herbert, Capricornia, New York: Appleton, Chapter VII, page 108,^[2]

     “ […] O'Cannon's a taxpayer. He pays his whack towards the upkeep of the State School up in town—”

   • 1951, Katherine Mansfield, Letters to John Middleton Murry, 1913-1922,

     For one thing I had a splendid supper when I got on board—a whack of cold, lean beef and pighells, bread, butter ad lib., tea, and plenty of good bread.

   • 2014, Anthony Pritchard, Grand Prix Ferrari (page 203)

     There were problems over the installation of the engine and the handling. The team had paid top whack for the two Coopers, but the company gave them no help at all.

6. (obsolete) A whack-up: a division of an amount into separate whacks, a divvying up.
7. (US, obsolete) A deal, an agreement.
   • 1876, Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, Ch. vi, page 70:

     "I'll stay if you will."
     "Good—that's a whack."

   It's a whack!

8. (typography, computing, slang) The backslash, ??\??.

   del c:\docs\readme.txt

   Delete c colon whack docs whack readme dot text.

Derived terms

• full whack
• have a whack at
• out of whack
• take a whack at
• top whack
• wacky
• whack up, whack-up

Translations

Verb

whack (third-person singular simple present whacks, present participle whacking, simple past and past participle whacked)

1. To hit, slap or strike.
   • G. W. Cable

     Rodsmen were whacking their way through willow brakes.

2. (slang) To kill, bump off.
3. (transitive, slang) To share or parcel out (often with up).

   to whack the spoils of a robbery

   • 1851, Henry Mayhew, London Labour and the London Poor, London: G. Newbold, Volume 2, p. 152,

     When the sewer-hunters consider they have searched long enough […] the gang […] count out the money they have picked up, and proceed to dispose of the old metal, bones, rope, &c.; this done, they then, as they term it, “whack” the whole lot; that is, they divide it equally among all hands.

4. (sports) To beat convincingly; to thrash.
   • 2012, Ryan Pyette, Majors, Panthers play mind games, The London Free Press:

     The fidgety Majors were whacked 9-1 by the Kitchener Panthers at Couch and now trail their rivals 2-0 in an increasingly uncomfortable best-of-seven Intercounty Baseball League first-round series.

5. (Britain, chiefly in the negative) To surpass; to better.
   • 2012, Steve Cullen, Total Flyfisher:

     Recently I was over in Ireland, I love the place, proper fishing, can't whack it!

Synonyms

• See also Thesaurus:kill

Derived terms

• whack off
• whack the illy

Translations

Adjective

whack (comparative whacker, superlative whackest)

1. Alternative form of wack (“crazy”)

   That's whack, yo!

   • 2007, Joyce E. Davis, Can't Stop The Shine, page 51:

     As they joked about the big butts on female celebrities and what rappers had the whackest lyrics, Malcolm paid little attention to Kalia besides squeezing her hand or grabbing her arm to hold himself up […]

References

• Oxford English Dictionary, 1st ed. "whack, n." Oxford University Press (Oxford), 1923.