smoking
/ˈsmoʊkɪŋ/
Word Rarity
Uncommon
Frequency: Zipf frequency 4.52 in modern English
14
Scrabble Score
7
Letters
2
Syllables
7
Unique Chars
Meaning
adj
noun
The burning and inhalation of any drug, including tobacco, cannabis, cocaine, and others.
Countable; Uncountable
Example Sentences
- "Yet had the whole train and all its bombs gone, had the engine crew merely jumped from the train and run as simple self-preservation would have suggested, or unhitched just the engine to make their escape faster, the whole town would have gone and most of the people with it, leaving just a smoking wasteland. Hundreds would have died."
- "That woman is smoking!"
- "The band put on a smoking performance."
- "Smoking can lead to lung cancer."
- "He had the loudest voice of any drill sergeant, and seemed to enjoy the group smokings as well as the individual smokings."
Etymology
From Middle English smokynge, smokiende, from Old English smociende (“smoking”), from Proto-Germanic *smukōndz (“emitting smoke, smoking”), equivalent to smoke + -ing.
Origin
Word Breakdown
- Root: smokynge, smociende, *smukōndz, smokyng
Regional Pronunciation
- American English: /ˈsmoʊkɪŋ/
- British English: /ˈsməʊkɪŋ/