nope
/noʊp/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.26 in modern English
6
Scrabble Score
4
Letters
1
Syllables
4
Unique Chars
Meaning
particle
No.
Informal
noun
An intensely undesirable thing, such as a circumstance or an animal, eliciting immediate repulsion without possibility of further consideration.
Slang
Example Sentences
- ""Is my son here, Clarence?" asked Roger Oakley. "Nope. The whistle ain't blowed yet.""
- ""No," from Tom, ending the word with so decided a pressure of the lips that it sounded like "nope.""
- "“Aunt Kat? And was Aunt Kat your only relation? Have you no father nor mother?” “Nope. Never had none ‘cept Aunt Kat. Her hull name was Katrina. She wuz Dutch she wuz.""
- "1: I will not dishonour my country's speech by leaving off the last syllables of words, 2: I will say a good American "yes" and "no" in place of an Indian grunt "um-hum" and "nup-um" or a foreign "ya" or "yeh" and "nope"[…]"
- "Nope. Don't know as I do."
- "I'll take that as a nope, then."
Etymology
Representing no pronounced with the mouth snapped closed at the end. Luick instead claims it represents a realisation of no with final [ʔ], with a purported reduction of /p/ to [ʔ] before syllabic liquids providing a model for the spelling of [ʔ] as -pe, but it is more parsimonious to assume that the -pe directly represents attested realisations with [p̚]. Therefore no + -p. Compare yep/yup.
Word Breakdown
- Suffix: no
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /noʊp/
- British English: /nəʊp/