backwater

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

1. n. Water held or pushed back by or as if by a dam or current.
2. n. A body of water thus formed.
3. n. A place or situation regarded as isolated, stagnant, or backward: "The running of family fortunes has always been a backwater—albeit a lucrative one—of the investment management business” ( Business Week).
4. n. A rowing or paddling stroke in which the oar or paddle is pushed forward, used to check a boat's forward motion or move it backward.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

1. n. 1. Water flowing in from behind.
2. n. Water thrown back by the turning of a water-wheel or the paddles of steamboats, etc.
3. n. Water held or forced back, as in a mill-race or in a tributary stream, in consequence of some obstruction, as a dam or flood.
4. n. An artificial accumulation of water obtained at high tide and reserved in reservoirs, to be discharged at low tide for clearing off deposits in channel-beds and tideways.
5. n. A creek or arm of the sea which runs parallel to the coast, having only a narrow slip of land between it and the sea, and communicating with the latter by barred entrances.

Wiktionary

1. n. The water held back by a dam or other obstruction
2. n. idiomatic A remote place; somewhere that remains unaffected by new events, progresses, ideas, etc.
3. n. A rowing stroke in which the oar is pushed forward to stop the boat; see back water
4. v. To row or paddle a backwater stroke.
5. v. idiomatic To vacillate on a long-held position.

GNU Webster's 1913

1. n. Water turned back in its course by an obstruction, an opposing current, or the flow of the tide, as in a sewer or river channel, or across a river bar.
2. n. An accumulation of water overflowing the low lands, caused by an obstruction.
3. n. Water thrown back by the turning of a waterwheel, or by the paddle wheels of a steamer.

WordNet 3.0

1. n. a body of water that was created by a flood or tide or by being held or forced back by a dam
2. n. a place or condition in which no development or progress is occurring