Skip to content
ontologydriven
Sign out

Dictionary

Words, grammatical forms and meanings linked to the ontology.

hooch en · NOUN · etymology 1

Pronunciation

  • /huːt͡ʃ/
  • (Australia) audio

Etymology

Abbreviation of hoochinoo, name of a specific liquor, from Tlingit Xutsnoowú Ḵwáan, the group that produced it, from Hutsnuwu (“grizzly bear fort”), the name of the village on Admiralty Island in which they lived. From Tlingit xóots (“grizzly bear”).

Meanings

  1. (Canada, US, countable, informal, uncountable) An alcoholic beverage, especially an inferior or illicit one and especially liquor such as whisky.
    • Bring on the free hooch! 1997, Kevin Smith, Chasing Amy, spoken by Banky Edwards (Jason Lee):
    • he was so grief-stricken that he literally drowned his sorrow in “hootch-i-noo,” the native equivalent of whiskey. […] Had he not been so sad he would not have drunk the “hootch,” and if he had not drunk the hootch he would not have died: a perfectly reasonable and logical argument. c. 1910, O.M. Salisbury, chapter 3, in Quoth the raven: A little journey into the primitive, Seattle: Superior Publishing Company, published 1962, page 17:

Forms

SpellingFeaturesLabelsSource
hooches Number=Plur lexicographic
hootch alternative lexicographic

Deriveds

prison hooch · hoochhead

Hyponyms

moonshine

Relateds

jail juice · rotgut

Translations (8)

pl gorzała (inferior liquor) · cs samohonka (inferior liquor) · cs kořalka (inferior liquor) · de Fusel (inferior liquor) · cs (domácí) pálenka (inferior liquor) · pl bimber (inferior liquor) · pl samogon (inferior liquor) · pt zurrapa (inferior liquor)

hooch en · NOUN · etymology 2

Pronunciation

  • /huːt͡ʃ/
  • (Australia) audio

Etymology

First attested in the 1950s, probably borrowed from Japanese 家(うち) (uchi, “house”), especially the dialectal form with an initial h- used on the Ryukyu islands where many American soldiers were based.

Meanings

  1. (qualifier:Vietnam War-era military slang) A thatched hut, CHU, or any simple dwelling.
    • Burn the hooches. 2022 December 6, Avatar: The Way of Water, spoken by Miles Quaritch (Stephen Lang):

Forms

SpellingFeaturesLabelsSource
hooches Number=Plur lexicographic
hootch alternative lexicographic

Deriveds

hooch maid · hooch girl

hooch en · NOUN · etymology 3

Pronunciation

  • /huːt͡ʃ/
  • (Australia) audio

Meanings

  1. (alt-of, alternative, uncountable) Alternative form of hoosh (“type of stew”).
    alt of hoosh