malinger

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He stated that his chief anxiety which led him to malinger was that he might be given additional sentences for his inability to get along in the penitentiary, and he thought the only way to avoid this would be to be pronounced insane.

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Definitions (4)

Toggle American Heritage definitions American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. intransitive verb To feign illness or other incapacity in order to avoid duty or work.

Toggle Century definitions Century Dictionary (1)

Toggle GNU Webster definitions GNU Webster's 1913 (1)

Toggle WordNet definitions WordNet (1)

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Examples (22)

  • It was an O.E.O. program, and you got $1.35 an hour and ended up as a file clerk or stock-room boy in some federal office or some foundation-hell, they didn't even need one half the people they already had working for them, and so all you learned was how to make work, fake work, and malinger out by the Xerox machine. —  VDARE.com: Blog Articles
  • I don't often give myself a reason to malinger from my iron schedule, but this weekend a streaming cold has given me an excuse for utter blokeish self-indulgence. —  British Blogs
  • He stated that his chief anxiety which led him to malinger was that he might be given additional sentences for his inability to get along in the penitentiary, and he thought the only way to avoid this would be to be pronounced insane. —  Studies in Forensic Psychiatry
  • No man ever essayed to malinger or to shirk a duty to which he had been allotted by the doctor. —  Sixteen Months in Four German Prisons Wesel, Sennelager, Klingelputz, Ruhleben
  • Old Haji Wali, probably frightened by the Arabs, and maddened by the idea that, during his absence in the thick of the cotton season, the Fellahs of Zagбzig would neglect to pay their various debts, began to "malinger" with such intensity of purpose, that I feared lest he would kill himself to spite us. —  The Land of Midian — Volume 1
 

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This word has been looked up 140 times.

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Etymologies (2)

Toggle American Heritage etymologies American Heritage Dictionary (1)

  1. From French malingre, sickly.

Toggle Century etymologies Century Dictionary (1)

  1. from French malingrer, a slang word meaning ‘suffer,’ but prob. also at one time ‘pretend to be ill,’ cf. malingreux, weak, sickly, formerly applied to beggars who feigned to be sick or injured in order to excite compassion, from malingre, “sore, scabby, ugly, loath-some” (Cotgrave), now ailing, poor, weakly, from mal-, badly, + (prob.) Old French haingre, heingre, thin, emaciated, French dial. haingre, ailing, poorly, prob. from Latin æger (ægr-), sick, ill. The sense is perhaps affected by association with F. malin, evil, malign, and gré, inclination (cf. malgre, maugre).
 

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/məˈlɪŋgər/
by American Heritage

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