Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A striptease artist.
Wiktionary
- n. An erotic dancer who removes their clothes as a form of entertainment; a stripper.
WordNet 3.0
- n. a performer who provides erotic entertainment by undressing to music
Etymologies
- From ecdysis.
Examples
“The two decades mentioned saw articles and books by H.L. Mencken, who reflected a modern, mature view of language (and who coined the word ecdysiast for”
“So distinct was her wit and elegant striptease, that H.L. Mencken coined the term "ecdysiast" to describe her high-class act.”
Fern Siegel: Stage Door Theater Reviews: In Praise Of Patti LuPone, Gypsy, And South Pacific
“Considering that the roots of the word "ecdysiast" have to do with molting, this is particularly charming to me.”
“Mencken is the one who coined the word 'ecdysiast' in her honor, Abbott says.”
“Who ever thought the music that's supposed to signal it's time to take off your shirt, line up with the gym bunnies and unleash your inner ecdysiast would be played for CHILDREN.”
“Evie Lovelle, with long dark hair and a "corps sublime," is an ecdysiast in the classic Gypsy Rose Lee tradition, wearing hour-glass corsets, whipping off her long gloves à la Rita Hayworth in "Gilda," and playing hide-and-seek behind huge feather fans.”
“All attention was focused overhead as the ermine ecdysiast began to toy with the clasps securing one veil.”
“In any case, the turgid screen adaptation of "The Time Traveler's Wife" stars Eric Bana as Henry, the accidental ecdysiast, and Rachel McAdams as Clare, the long-suffering but patient-as-Penelope title character.”
The Wall Street Journal: No Time's Right for 'Traveler's Wife'
“Please welcome several fellow bloggers to the sidebar: Kevin Kelly (author of the article I from the other day that I liked), Elizabeth Castro (whose book -- Publishing a Blog With Blogger -- I use often), The Radical Academy, Thomas "She Blinded Me With Science" Dolby, Steven Johnson (whose book I just finished and loved), blog historian Rebecca Blood, and literary ecdysiast Diablo Cody.”
“Just in case anyone is tempted to confuse Ecstasky Airlines with the competition, a company ecdysiast -- that's a fancy word for a striptease artist -- named Rachel recently told an L.A. morning show that "we have hooters, but we're not with Hooters.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘ecdysiast’.
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Naked
Words relating to getting naked, being naked, the commonly naked, nakedness (partial or complete), and similar.
denude, strip, stripper, harlot, Cyprian, fancy woman, lady of pleasure, hooker, divest, unfrock, unclothe, disrobe and 112 more...
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Ayatollah's list
Trinkets of lexical goodness.
floccinaucinihili..., quomodocunquize, curmudgeon, illaqueate, ipsissimosity, heterochthonous, hakenkreuz, forisfamiliate, appropinquate, apodyopsis, baryphony, cachinnate and 146 more...
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Latin
exempli gratia, deus ex machina, prolix, sisyphean, minatory, empyrean, cicatrix, demulcent, effulgence, emulsion, garum, ablative and 12 more...
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Fetishes, Erotica & Descriptive Smut
Sexually charged words, or those that could be. Sexual innuendos are mighty welcome.
lubricious, turgid, tumescent, tumid, feverish, mons, mons veneris, prurient, ophidian, houri, cyprian, licentious and 41 more...
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Slam Fodder
Those words that will inevitable end up in a Slam Poem
feel free to challenge me!:)bumptious, gamekeeper, slamily, burbuliatorius, cryptomnesia, paradox, pulchritudinous, mimetic, anhedonia, skelf, rampike, furlough and 84 more...
frindley Coined by H.L. Mencken, c./pre-1940 from ecdysis, Greek word referring to the shedding of an outer layer of skin in snakes, crustaceans and insects; or moulting.
Gypsy Rose Lee took an objection apparently:
"Ecdysiast, he calls me! Why, the man Mencken…has been reading books! Dictionaries! We don't wear feathers and molt them off…What does he know about stripping?"
(Clearly she'd been reading a dictionary or two herself.) Mar 29, 2009
smeggo Now THAT's entertainment. Oct 13, 2008