slack¹

(slăk)

adj. slack·er, slack·est

1. Not tense or taut; loose: a slack rope; slack muscles. See Synonyms at loose.

a. Lacking in activity; not busy: a slack season for the travel business.

b. Moving slowly; sluggish: a slack pace.

3. Lacking in diligence or due care or concern; negligent: a slack worker. See Synonyms at negligent.

4. Flowing or blowing with little speed: a slack current; slack winds.

5. Linguistics Pronounced with the muscles of the tongue and jaw relatively relaxed; lax.

v. slacked, slack·ing, slacks

v.tr.

a. To make looser or less taut: slacked the sail.

b. To make slower: slacked our pace.

2. To be careless or remiss in doing: slack one's duty.

3. To slake (lime).

v.intr.

1. To be or become slack.

2. To be inactive or avoid work: slacked around the house all day.

1. A loose part, as of a rope or sail: hauled in the slack.

2. A period of little activity; a lull: a slack in business.

a. A cessation of movement in a current of air or water.

b. An area of still water.

4. Unused capacity: still some slack in the economy.

5. slacks Casual pants that are not part of a suit.

adv.

In a slack manner: a banner hanging slack.

Phrasal Verb:

slack off

1. To decrease in activity or intensity.

2. To work less intensely than is required or expected: slacked off at work and started surfing the internet.

Idiom:

cut/give (someone) some slack

Slang To make an allowance for (someone), as in allowing more time to finish something.

[Middle English slak, from Old English slæc; see slēg- in Indo-European roots.]

slack′ly adv.

slack′ness n.

slack²

(slăk)

A mixture of coal fragments, coal dust, and dirt that remains after screening coal.

[Middle English sleck.]

slack³

(slăk)

n. Chiefly British

1. A small dell or hollow.

2. A bog; a morass.

[Middle English slak, from Old Norse slakki.]

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fifth Edition. Copyright © 2016 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

slacks

(slæks)

pl n

(Clothing & Fashion) informal trousers worn by both sexes

Collins English Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged, 12th Edition 2014 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1994, 1998, 2000, 2003, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2011, 2014

slacks

(slæks)

n. (used with a pl. v.)

trousers for informal or casual wear.

[1815–25]

ThesaurusAntonymsRelated WordsSynonymsLegend:

Noun

slacks - (usually in the plural) pants for casual wear

trouser, pant - (usually in the plural) a garment extending from the waist to the knee or ankle, covering each leg separately; "he had a sharp crease in his trousers"

plural, plural form - the form of a word that is used to denote more than one

Translations

ألْبِسَه فَضْفاضَه مُتَراخِيَه

kalhoty

slacks

Freizeithose

falzarpantalon

hosszúnadrág

buxur

calzoni pantaloni

beinklær bukser

bol tip pantolon

便裤宽松的长裤

slacks

[slæks] NPL → pantalones mpl

Collins Spanish Dictionary - Complete and Unabridged 8th Edition 2005 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1971, 1988 © HarperCollins Publishers 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997, 2000, 2003, 2005

slacks

[ˈslæks] npl (old-fashioned) (= trousers) → pantalon m

Collins English/French Electronic Resource. © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

slacks

pl → Hose f

Collins German Dictionary – Complete and Unabridged 7th Edition 2005. © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1980 © HarperCollins Publishers 1991, 1997, 1999, 2004, 2005, 2007

slacks

[slæks] npl → pantaloni mpl casual inv

Collins Italian Dictionary 1st Edition © HarperCollins Publishers 1995

slack

(slӕk) adjective

1. loose; not firmly stretched. Leave the rope slack.

2. not firmly in position. He tightened a few slack screws.

3. not strict; careless. He is very slack about getting things done.

4. in industry etc, not busy; inactive. Business has been rather slack lately.

ˈslacken verb

(sometimes with off or up).

1. to make or become looser. She felt his grip on her arm slacken.

2. to make or become less busy, less active or less fast. The doctor told him to slacken up if he wanted to avoid a heart-attack.

ˈslackly adverb

ˈslackness noun

slacks noun plural

trousers, usually loose-fitting, worn informally by men or women. a pair of slacks.

Mentioned in

References in classic literature

Maud held the turn on the windlass and coiled down the slack.

View in context

A HUNTER who had lassoed a Bear was trying to disengage himself from the rope, but the slip-knot about his wrist would not yield, for the Bear was all the time pulling in the slack with his paws.

View in context

Discovering that his martingale had more slack in it than usual, he proceeded to give an exhibition of rearing and hind-leg walking.

View in context

I partly surmise also, that this wicked charge against whalers may be likewise imputed to the existence on the coast of Greenland, in former times, of a Dutch village called Schmerenburgh or Smeerenberg, which latter name is the one used by the learned Fogo Von Slack, in his great work on Smells, a textbook on that subject.

View in context

Hans paid out the rope, permitting no slack, while Pete kept it clear of coils.

View in context

All the mothers could (and did) dance, upon the slack wire and the tight-rope, and perform rapid acts on bare-backed steeds; none of them were at all particular in respect of showing their legs; and one of them, alone in a Greek chariot, drove six in hand into every town they came to.

View in context

Well, when the dark shut down, in the rugged hills, that poor little chap had been tearing around in the saddle all day, and I noticed by the slack knee-pressure that she was tired and tottery, and I got dreadfully afraid; but every time I tried to slow down and let her go to sleep, so I could stop, she hurried me up again; and so, sure enough, at last over she went!

View in context

The connections of the several sections of the raft are slack and pliant, so that the raft may be readily bent into any sort of curve required by the shape of the river.

View in context

So, with the cunning of a madman, I backed into the far corner of my cell when next I heard him approaching and gathering a little slack of the great chain which held me in my hand I waited his coming, crouching like some beast of prey.

View in context

I call to mind a winter landscape in Amsterdam - a flat foreground of waste land, with here and there stacks of timber, like the huts of a camp of some very miserable tribe; the long stretch of the Handelskade; cold, stone-faced quays, with the snow-sprinkled ground and the hard, frozen water of the canal, in which were set ships one behind another with their frosty mooring-ropes hanging slack and their decks idle and deserted, because, as the master stevedore (a gentle, pale person, with a few golden hairs on his chin and a reddened nose) informed me, their cargoes were frozen-in up-country on barges and schuyts.

View in context

It was attached to a stout cross-timber above his head and the slack fell to the level of his knees.

View in context

Denisov was angry with the Cossack because the saddle girths were too slack, reproved him, and mounted.

View in context

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