Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. Slang A very important person.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. A great man; a person of consequence; one high in authority or rank.
Wiktionary
- n. jocose A person of importance to a group or organization
GNU Webster's 1913
- n. Jocose A person of consequence.
WordNet 3.0
- n. the most important person in a group or undertaking
Etymologies
- big + wig This definition is lacking an etymology or has an incomplete etymology. You can help Wiktionary by giving it a proper etymology. English people used to wear wigs which denote their position in the government. The size of the wig varies with the position and the one with higher position will have a bigger wig. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“Apparantly, a bigwig from the matrix is supposed to make the ghostrider sound ultra creepy, seen from wikipedia”
EXTRALIFE – By Scott Johnson - Ghost Rider: Gonna be lame or good?
“She tells me the stocky guy is some kind of bigwig shady ticket broker.”
“There was some kind of bigwig in the store, so all the supervisors and managers were following him around like trained dogs ... and I was all standing around scratching my head all day.”
“Once a year some 'bigwig' comes from Bangalore to review them.”
“People such as Dehring's countryman, Mike Fennel, an Olympic 'bigwig' and Barbadian Steve Stoute, another top dog in the OG.”
“Among those friends were hedge funder Paul Tudor Jones II, music industry bigwig Tommy Mottola, the actor Michael J. Fox, and, of course, Ms. Dubin's husband, Glenn Dubin, the philanthropist and founder of Highbridge Capital Management LLC.”
“You write about the evil Israelis making load noises in the ears of Palestinian children but you seem to care little about those children if some Hamas bigwig straps a bomb to their tiny backs and points them toward an Israeli bus.”
Matthew Yglesias » Blankley Calls for Comprehensive Press Censorship
“Then, every Republican Party bigwig, in an effort to explain away their own failings, or the failure of the policies they advocated, will say, "Oh, well, let's remember, it was a pretty weak field.”
The Huffington Post: The 2012 Speculatron Weekly Roundup For Aug. 26, 2011
“We have seen that scene repeated so many times that it is refreshing to see that there are still a wife of a political bigwig who does not compromise her personal integrity to keep her husband's political career afloat.”
“We ran into bigwig screenwriter, producer, director Paul Haggis who is a big fan of the filmmakers.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘bigwig’.
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Programming Languages
The last time someone tried this theme, it was a closed list with only two words; time to make amends. Scripting languages, etc. are also fair game...
c, c++, java, pascal, delphi, python, perl, lisp, algol, cobol, ada, apl and 121 more...
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POL - people in power
daredevil, tzar, king, boss, master, commander, chief, kingpin, top banana, bigwig, big cheese, big wheel and 452 more...
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WF - nominal compounds (figurative)
An extensive list I have been working on for quite some time. Feel free to add more of the kind if you miss any.
brainstorming, upside, downside, goldplating, bikeshedding, mudslinging, downgrading, headhunter, streamlining, mainstreaming, gerrymandering, frontloading and 503 more...
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Wig
Wiggery. Even though kalayzich got there first with the list called wigs.
paresseuse, nob-thatcher, rogerian, bob-jerom, gregorian, pigeonwing, pulvil, bagwig, vallancy, tye-wig, Bob, bob-wig and 33 more...
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POL - cool compounds
scaremongering, facelifting, mudslinging, gerrymandering, goldplating, muscleflexing, headway, pinpointing, hobby-horse, barnstorming, grandfathering, finger-wagging and 31 more...
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Choi inspired
Fun words my friend loves and others I introduced to him.
Namby-pamby, Niminy piminy, Nitpick, Nit-wit, Piggly-wiggly, Ping-pong, Pitter-patter, Raggle-taggle, Riff-raff, zoot suit, zig-zag, wishy-washy and 73 more...
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Words I will probably never use
décolleté, pendragon, amerce, viviparous, dragoon, brigand, outlaw, outlawry, lugubrious, boor, contretemps, decrepit and 151 more...
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As soon as I finish this chapter
x
procrastination, drily, rheumatism, rheum, suint, tiresome, wearisome, tiring, suboptimal, subpar, subprime, grange and 190 more...
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oddball
wackadoodlery.
( personal list )
related (from me):
http://www.wordnik.com/lists/onomatopoeias--1
bric-a-brac, succotash, humbucker, skedaddle, scallywag, sassafras, gadzooks, humdinger, hoity-toity, wishy-washy, namby-pamby, ding dong and 436 more...
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St. Trinian's (2007)
Words from a 2007 'St. Trinian's' film.
wreath, lully, insufferable, pikey, ugly betty, posh totty, nitwit, dosser, concoction, teetotal, blight, namby-pamby and 21 more...
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Climbing the company ladder
No job is too small.
blue-collar worker, dogsbody, blackleg, drudge, white-collar worker, worker-bee, bottom dog, cog, salaryman, pen-pusher, pencil pusher, paper-pusher and 26 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for bigwig.
hernesheir See buzz-wig. Jan 6, 2013