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Definitions

American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition

  1. adj. Having a reeling, lightheaded sensation; dizzy.
  2. adj. Causing or capable of causing dizziness: a giddy climb to the topmast.
  3. adj. Frivolous and lighthearted; flighty.
  4. v. To become or make giddy.

Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia

  1. Foolishly light or frivolous; governed by wild or thoughtless impulses; manifesting exuberant spirits or levity; flighty; heedless.
  2. Characterized by or indicating giddiness or levity of feeling.
  3. Affected with vertigo, or a swimming sensation in the head, causing liability to reel or fall; dizzy; reeling: as, to be giddy from fever or drunkenness, or in looking down from a great height.
  4. Adapted to cause or to suggest giddiness; of a dizzy or dizzying nature; acting or causing to act giddily.
  5. = Syn. 1 and 2. Careless, reckless, headlong, flighty, hare-brained, light-headed.
  6. To make dizzy or unsteady.
  7. To turn quickly; reel.

Wiktionary

  1. adj. dizzy, feeling dizzy or unsteady and as if about to fall down
  2. adj. causing dizziness: causing dizziness or a feeling of unsteadiness
  3. adj. lightheartedly silly, or joyfully elated

GNU Webster's 1913

  1. adj. Having in the head a sensation of whirling or reeling about; having lost the power of preserving the balance of the body, and therefore wavering and inclined to fall; lightheaded; dizzy.
  2. adj. Promoting or inducing giddiness
  3. adj. Bewildering on account of rapid turning; running round with celerity; gyratory; whirling.
  4. adj. Characterized by inconstancy; unstable; changeable; fickle; wild; thoughtless; heedless.
  5. v. To reel; to whirl.
  6. v. To make dizzy or unsteady.

WordNet 3.0

  1. adj. having or causing a whirling sensation; liable to falling
  2. adj. lacking seriousness; given to frivolity

Etymologies

  1. Middle English gidi, crazy, from Old English gidig; see gheu(ə)- in Indo-European roots.

Examples

  • “The word giddy has appeared in 287 New York Times articles in the past year, including on Oct. 23 in the book review, "The Radical Entertainment of Harry Belafonte", by Garrison Keillor:”

    NYT > Home Page

  • “Learn more about the word "giddy" and see usage examples across a range of subjects on the Vocabulary.com dictionary.”

    NYT > Home Page

  • “They're using tools, mixing concrete for the first time, and many are just plain giddy about how quickly the whole thing is coming together.”

    NPR: Entrepreneur's Local Partnerships Help Kids Play

  • “GOP strategists are again giddy at the prospect, as one GOP pollster put it: "People who have been part of our majority coalition are looking to come back to us.”

    The Huffington Post: Earl Ofari Hutchinson: The New Civil War Among Whites

  • “Oh, that IS modest (becomes half-term giddy half-termébouler)”

    Fictionaut: Kog Zadare, only living person...

  • “At the recent taping, he called a giddy thirty-something women up on stage.”

    The Wall Street Journal: How Far Can Her Universe Reach?

  • “Here's to happy writers in giddy garrets, as opposed to bleakness and misery!”

    ccfinlay: The Wages Of Happiness

  • “Now that you're all giddy from the links, why not go and Vote Mitchieville as Canada's Best Blog.”

    Archive 2007-11-01

  • “Playing twenty dollars per round, five bucks on each of the four hands dealt out, I harbored a certain giddy anticipation of making it to the fourth hand, hitting a royal flush, and bagging $32,000.”

    Sit and Spin

  • “Even though, yeah, my computer has the surround-sound speakers, there's something about sitting in giddy anticipation of the movie itself, wondering what sort of crackerjack treats you're going to get.”

    The Trailer Review

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‘giddy’ has been looked up 2269 times, loved by 3 people, added to 46 lists, and has a Scrabble score of 11.