Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A small, crudely built cabin; a shanty.
- v. To live or dwell: farm hands shacking in bunkhouses.
- idiom. shack up Slang To sleep together or live in sexual intimacy without being married.
- idiom. shack up Slang To live, room, or stay at a place: I'm shacking up with my cousin till I find a place of my own.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To be shed or fall, as corn at harvest.
- To feed on stubble, or upon the waste corn of the field.
- To hibernate, as an animal, especially the bear: also said of men who “lay up” or “hole up” for the winter, or go into winter quarters.
- n. Grain fallen from the ear and eaten by hogs, etc., after harvest; also, fallen mast or acorns.
- n. Liberty of winter pasturage.
- n. In the fisheries, bait picked up at sea by any means, as the flesh of porpoises or of sea-birds, refuse fish, etc., as distinguished from the regular stock of bait carried by the vessel or otherwise depended upon. Also shack-bait.
- n. [⟨ shack, verb, 3.] A very roughly built house or cabin, especially such a one as is put up for temporary occupation while securing a claim under the United States preëmption laws.
- To rove about, as a stroller or beggar.
- To go after, as a ball batted to a distance.
- n. A strolling vagabond; a shiftless or worthless fellow; a tramp.
- n. A seafaring catch of fish made up of hake, pollack, and other cheap varieties, especially those of the cod family.
- n. The right of common pasturage; the straying of cattle into public or on inclosed land.
- Relating to a catch of sea-fish of the cheaper varieties, or of shack-bait.
Wiktionary
- n. A crude, roughly built hut or cabin.
- n. Grain to the ground and left after harvest.
- n. Nuts which have fallen to the ground.
- n. Freedom to pasturage in order to feed upon shack.
- v. To live in or with; to shack up.
- v. To shed or fall, as corn or grain at harvest.
- v. To feed in stubble, or upon waste corn.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To shed or fall, as corn or grain at harvest.
- v. To feed in stubble, or upon waste corn.
- v. To wander as a vagabond or a tramp.
- n. a small simple dwelling, usually having only one room and of flimsy construction; a hut; a shanty; a cabin.
- n. The grain left after harvest or gleaning; also, nuts which have fallen to the ground.
- n. Liberty of winter pasturage.
- n. A shiftless fellow; a low, itinerant beggar; a vagabond; a tramp.
WordNet 3.0
- v. make one's home in a particular place or community
- n. small crude shelter used as a dwelling
- v. move, proceed, or walk draggingly or slowly
Etymologies
- Possibly from American Spanish jacal, from Nahuatl xacalli, adobe hut : xámitl, adobe + calli, house, hut.
Examples
“In sim, we pretend that the shack is a bubble and the path is a pressurized tunnel.”
“Instead of a dump, this shack is a mansion in an Eden-like garden where God, Jesus and the Holy Spirit embrace him.”
'Shack' opens doors, but critics call book 'scripturally incorrect'
“Mack's weekend at the shack is a compressed journey toward belief, forgiveness and acceptance.”
'Shack' opens doors, but critics call book 'scripturally incorrect'
“And they had what they called shack rousters then.”
“The story of Leslie, the woman who was forced to leave her nice home and live in a shack, is also very inspiring.”
“O master,' he said, 'we have laid by great wealth in molasses and sugar and flour, but our shack is yet mean, our clothes thin, and our sleeping furs mangy.”
“This shack is still the object of occasional pilgrimages by 21st-century science fiction writers.”
“Scene: Rib joint, one step up from a tin shack on the side of the road.”
“You never know, maybe if we can ever get Deeter outside of the mountain shack we may venture south as a group.”
“We saw that he could be invisible to some, inaudible to others, and that the perimeter of his shack is surrounded by some kind of lava-like ash substance.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘shack’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4084 more...
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Stuffie: Love
Love and all that stuff.
puppy, triangle, tough, first, in the third degree, handles, endless, bite, shack, bird, potion, tainted and 29 more...
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Nahuatl
"Spanish náhuatl, from Nahuatl, that which pleases the ear, from nahua-, audible, intelligent, clear."
- etymology from The American Heritage Dictionary
Nahuatl, Zapotec, Aztec, avocado, guacamole, amole, atlatl, axolotl, black sapote, cacao, cacomistle, chayote and 75 more...

JimG <http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004741.html> Jun 27, 2009
vanishedone Good point; but it's a phrasal verb, so the up has to be included. Jan 18, 2009
rolig To live with someone as a couple without the sanction of marriage is "to shack up" with that person. That at least is the first use of the verb "to shack" that comes to mind. The Weirdnet definitions are weird to me also. Jan 18, 2009
vanishedone Is use as a verb common? I don't think I've ever heard it, so I've applied the WeirdNet tag. Jan 18, 2009