Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. An uncouth person.
- n. A rowdy.
- n. A member of the crew of an oil rig other than the driller.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- n. See the extract.
Wiktionary
WordNet 3.0
- n. a cruel and brutal fellow
Etymologies
- rough + neck (Wiktionary)
Examples
“The name roughneck, which crews tend to embrace as a badge of honor, reflects the demanding and sometimes risky work that sustains them, and the cowboy mystique they bring from their hometowns in the South and West.”
“In the first three or four he was pretty crude; he was even defined as a roughneck somewhere.”
“Mr. Cornett has already taken a demotion from a driller to a "roughneck" oilfield slang for a floorman at a much lower salary to maintain a steady paycheck.”
The Wall Street Journal: Drilling Rules Shake-Up Puts New Regulator in Spotlight
“Mallick ridicules the entire Palin family calling husband Todd a "roughneck," son Track "terrified," and pregnant teenage daughter Bristol a "pramface," whatever that means.”
“An experienced "roughneck," the nickname for rig workers, can make $100,000 a year, and top white-collar engineers can make as much as $500,000 a year, industry analysts and officials said.”
The Wall Street Journal: Offshore Rig Workers Call the Shots
“And, of course, the only person who can save us is a burly oil driller played by Bruce Willis and his team of fellow "roughneck" drillers including the ever-annoying Ben Affleck.”
“He was correct in every detail and he thought complacently that he could not but contrast favourably with the appearance of that "roughneck" from”
“Similarly, I spent another summer working in the oil field as a "roughneck" for a company then partially owned by a young man just beginning his business career: George H.W. Bush.”
“• Michael Sarver, we all love saying the word "roughneck," so thank you for having a dangerous job with a name everyone enjoys discussing.”
“Idol's "roughneck" contestant, after all, has other things to think about these days.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘roughneck’.
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FUN - fish can be...
Compound adjectives - based on the FAO ASFIS list of waterborne species.
arc-eye, ox-eyed, U-spot, U-mark, X-ray, big-eyed, big-eye, big-claw, Y-prickleback, big-head, big-lip, big-scale and 509 more...
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WF - nominal compounds (concrete)
foodstuff, banknote, crankshaft, earphone, fibreboard, fishplate, forklift, glassware, guardrail, handicraft, headband, kitchenware and 181 more...
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Poetic
the blue hour, dinner-pail, long-drawn, pettifog, spoonmeat, crawler, eructate, voiced, medial, tessellated, eyeballs, amphigory and 48 more...
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Nightmare Alley
From the novel by William Lindsay Gresham
geek, mark, rubber, calliope, booze-fool, rummy, the horrors, the crawling snakes, equalizer, bubbies, grubstake, softshoe and 99 more...
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Oofy
States of being
seeress, honey bucket, donkeyman, poopyhead, halfwit, vixenish, galoot, hoity toity, shitkicker, miserabilist, wanker, clueless and 261 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for roughneck.
yarb 'The rain had slackened to a drizzle. In the lights of headlamps the roughnecks were busy tearing canvas from the trucks. Stan threw his slicker over his shoulders, went around to open the rear doors of the truck. He crawled in and gently shook Pete by the ankle. "Pete, wake up. We're here. We've got to put up."'
- Nightmare Alley, William Lindsay Gresham Jul 1, 2012