Dictionary

blowback en · NOUN

Pronunciation

• /ˈbloʊˌbæk/ (General-American)
• (Australia) audio

Etymology

Deverbal from blow back.

Meanings

1. (countable, uncountable) A type of action where the pressure from the fired cartridge blows a sliding mechanism backward to extract the fired cartridge, chamber another cartridge, and cock the hammer.
   • The Israeli UZI submachine gun, one the most easily recognized examples of a blowback firearm, is well known for its simplicity, ease of manufacture, low maintenance, and utter reliability. 2012, Robert E. Walker, Cartridges and Firearm Identification, CRC Press, →ISBN, page 24:
2. (countable, figuratively, uncountable) An unintended adverse result, especially of covert political action.
   • During Congressional hearings on the agency in the mid-1970's, it was revealed that some of the agency's programs to plant false information in the foreign press had resulted in items being published by American news organizations. This phenomenon, known as blowback, was sharply criticized by the committees at the time, and the C.I.A. has since been required to take precautions so that such false information does not affect political debate in this country. 1986 October 2, Stephen Engelberg, “U.S. Plan Against Qaddafi Is Said To Intensify”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
   • All of the other retired C.I.A. officers who appeared before the subcommittee today acknowledged that the problem of the “domestic blowback” of agency propaganda had been a genuine problem, out most of them dismissed the mounting concern over C.I.A.'s past employment of American journalists as misguided. 1977 December 28, John M. Crewdson, “Colby Acknowledges U.S. Press Picked Up Bogus C.I.A. Accounts”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
   • It is a story about blowback from Sunni Islamist extremists who went to Syria from various Arab countries and were allowed to assemble there in the aftermath of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003. 2008 October 17, “Syria's blowback problem”, in The New York Times, →ISSN:
3. (countable, slang, uncountable) The act of shotgunning (inhaling from a pipe etc. and exhaling into another smoker's mouth).
   • Paranoid I was being ripped off, I 'tested' the potency of the skunk on a wasp by trapping it under a glass, and giving it a blowback. 2012, Caitlin Moran, Moranthology, Random House, →ISBN, page 41:
4. (countable, uncountable) On a steam locomotive, the reversal of exhaust gases when the regulator is closed without using the blower.
   • The Boulogne stop lasted a few minutes, during which I was surprised to see no use was made of the blower. In this country, if you shut the regulator without the blower on, the odds are there will be a blowback. 1961 February, ""Balmore"", “Driving and firing modern French steam locomotives”, in Trains Illustrated, page 109:
5. (countable, uncountable) Synonym of backscatter.

Forms

Deriveds

karmic blowback

Relateds

blow forward (firearm action)

Synonyms

fallout · backscatter

Translations (3)

de Rückdruck (firearms) · ru обратный удар (firearms) · es consecuencias negativas (an unintended adverse result, especially of covert political action)