different between yuck vs yack

English

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /j?k/
• Homophone: yuk
• Rhymes: -?k

Etymology 1

Perhaps imitative. Akin to Dutch jak (“disgusting”). First appeared in the 1960s.

Interjection

yuck

1. Uttered to indicate disgust usually toward an objectionable taste or odour. [from 1966]

   Antonym: yum

Synonyms

• See Thesaurus:yuck

Derived terms

• yucky

Translations

Noun

yuck (plural yucks)

1. (uncountable) Something disgusting.
   • 2003, The New Yorker, 8 Dec 2003

     I fetched an orange from a basket and peeled it […] “Make sure you peel as much of the yuck off as possible,” she said. “I hate the yuck."

2. (countable) The sound made by a laugh.
   • 2000, The New Yorker, 13 March 2000

     Given this insecurity, the creators of “The Simpsons” took an extraordinary risk: they decided not to use a laugh track. On almost all other sitcoms, dialogue was interrupted repeatedly by crescendos of phony guffaws (or by the electronically enhanced laughter of live audiences), creating the unreal ebb and flow of sitcom conversation, in which a typical character’s initial reaction to an ostensibly humorous remark could only be to smile archly or look around while waiting for the yucks to die down.

See also

• yuk

Etymology 2

Compare German jucken, Dutch jeuken, and see itch.

Verb

yuck (third-person singular simple present yucks, present participle yucking, simple past and past participle yucked)

1. (obsolete) To itch.

   (Can we find and add a quotation of Grose to this entry?)

Scots

Etymology

Presumably of the same roots as English chuck, itself from Anglo-Norman choque (compare modern Norman chouque), from Gaulish *?okka (compare Breton soc'h (“thick”), Old Irish tócht (“part, piece”).

Verb

yuck (third-person singular present yuck, present participle yuckin, past yuckit, past participle yuckit)

1. to chuck, to throw

Noun

yuck (plural yucks)

1. a throw
2. a small stone that can be thrown

English

Etymology 1

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /jæk/
• Rhymes: -æk
• Homophone: yak

Noun

yack (plural yacks)

1. Alternative form of yak (“chatter; talk”)

Verb

yack (third-person singular simple present yacks, present participle yacking, simple past and past participle yacked)

1. Alternative form of yak (“talk; vomit”)

   I moved to another carriage on the train because the first one was full of people yacking on mobile phones.

Etymology 2

Dialectal form.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /jak/

Noun

yack (plural yacks)

1. (England, dialectal, possibly obsolete) An oak.
   • 1877, Gibson, Leg. and Notes 50:

     If 't ash tree buds before 't yack, […]

   • 1878, John Castillo, Poems in the North Yorkshire Dialect, 25:

     Awd stiff yack nut eeasy bended, […]

Anagrams

• YKCA, caky, cyka

French

Alternative forms

• yak

Etymology

From Tibetan ??? (g.yag), from Proto-Sino-Tibetan *g-jak ~ g-ja?.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /jak/

Noun

yack m (plural yacks)

1. yak (ox-like mammal)

Further reading

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