Definitions
Wiktionary
- adj. Excellent, impressive.
- adj. big, strong, durable, reliable, trustworthy, doughty
- n. An evil spirit or woodland monster/giant
- n. a type of doll based on the mythical woodland monster
Etymologies
- First attested in 1825–35. From Chinook Jargon, from Lower Chehalis. (Wiktionary)
Examples
“And we teach LG to use "skookum" in everyday conversation.”
“March 14, 2010, 3: 22 am jukeboxgrad says: skookum:”
The Volokh Conspiracy » Judge Reinhardt’s Dig on Sarah Palin
“But he knew that Dave Walsh was a big man, worth lots of money, a hi-yu skookum chief.”
“Here, take the axe, shinny up the hill, and lug me down some _skookum_ dry wood.”
“Him say you no skookum, no strong, all the same very soft like little baby.”
“He is, Shorty exclaims, the "hi-yu skookum top chief of the whole caboodle," and the caboodle is 20,000 square miles of wilderness, home to a hundred thousand caribou hunted by a people using bone-barbed arrows and bone knives.”
“Actually… he sitting like that cause those cats were bred to tripod and look over tall grass. i cant remember why but i assure you hes not uncomfortable. i happen to have one. and hes never had any issues except he thinks hes a dog. mines a hybrid of this though… a skookum.”
but when the goggie does - Lolcats 'n' Funny Pictures of Cats - I Can Has Cheezburger?
“Diary of a Bluestocking: dawn chorus now available to read in skookum boom skip to main”
“Yeah, you got to look out for those skookum women, I mean, floods ...”
“Eventually we bought a skookum new stand and Christmas was saved, no lasting harm done.”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘skookum’.
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respelt
'He spent the greater part of his life campaigning to have respelt those words that LOOK as though they are spelt wrongly but aren't.'
Re Otto Tibbit's father, fourteen times Scrabble champio...skiing, vacuum, freest, eczema, gnu, diarrhoea, taxiing, piing, safariing, qamchiing, dooziing, hongiing and 49 more...
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Canadianisms
Canuck, timbit, Timbit, inukshuk, Canadianism, spiked, hyderize, canuckistan, Canuckistan, hoser, double double, Triumf and 373 more...
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S is for sionnach
shunamitism, snipsnapsnorum, skookum, scabilonian, sacheverell, sandapile, saulie, schnappszahl, sophrosyne, snup, snurl, snurt and 110 more...
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eesome
Includes any intangible conceivable independently of Hom. Sap.
depthless, overspire, unsteady, thitherward, rile, munchable, covet, pastinaceous, mirtle, slonk, tink, inerrarable and 345 more...
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Listless
Nowhere else to put these yet.
sibilant, cloying, pithy, apologia, odyssey, amanuensis, pleasantries, ginormous, burnish, sojourn, quonset, over-under and 217 more...
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Encountered while reading
snatiation, urodynamics, cadaverine, putrescine, ferret emesis, dracula fish, psychedelic frogfish, mangkorn chomphoo, sengi, blonde-ginger bat, symplectic camel, zeolite and 312 more...
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C. S. Bird – Grandiloquent Dictionary
All the words from the Grandiloquent Dictionary.
946 of these 2700 words do not yield any results in six different dictionaries, hence many of them might be misspellings.
More in...abacinate, abcedarian, abderian, ablegate, abligurition, ablutophobia, abnormous, acarophobia, acathasia, accipitrine, accidia, accubitus and 2690 more...
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British Columbian terms
BC Specific terms.
Ogopogo, BCAA, Evergreen Line, Millennium Line, Highway of Tears, Sea to Sky, 604, Lotus Land, Kootenays, SkyTrain, Canada Line, Sea to Sky highway and 129 more...
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unpack your adjectives
and adverbs
walrusine, slipshod, bemused, inscrutable, bombastic, cattywampus, copacetic, famished, crackpot, flailsome, lugubrious, scalesome and 102 more...
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Lexophilia
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Driftology
Words combed from 'Moby-Duck: The True Story of 28,800 Bath Toys Lost at Sea and of the Beachcombers, Oceanographers, Environmentalists, and Fools, Including the Author,Who Went in Search of Them.'
driftology, beachcomber, skookum, wrack, jackstraw, driftologist, garbage patch, ghost net, autodumbfoundment, phytoplankton, gyre, hindcast and 58 more...
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A Warm Dry Wind? A people?
mowich, klattawa, skookum, cultus, chinook, mimaloos, kopayawa, klootchman, kloshe, tillicum, boston, lakamass and 6 more...
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Beyond Fair To Middling
words or expressions which, when used with and in the sense of "it's _____" or "it's a _____" mean simply good. Or better :-)
balltearer, beauty, ripper, all good, going swimmingly, snorter, ripsnorter, cracker, belter, corker, jaffa, nifty and 44 more...
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lingo
. .
hungry whatsit, kebbups, cackleberries, goozlum, skookum, bellypopper, cold drink, newtnie, the, snack, snacky, cher and 15 more...
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perhapsolutely's Words
polyradiculoneuro..., abulia, abubble, abscission, abaft, zareba, abatis, abigail, abiogenesis, ablate, ablaut, abo and 1705 more...
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Truly American Words
American words with deep native roots...
wendigo, Podunk, adirondack, wigwam, caribou, chipmunk, poncho, pecan, moccasin, muskrat, moose, persimmon and 46 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for skookum.
hernesheir Skookumchuck Creek is a tributary of the Salmon River in Idaho. Feb 4, 2013
alexz From an old Chinook glossary
"Skoo kum or Skoo koom n adj Chihalis Skukum A ghost an evil spirit or demon strong Skookum tumtum brave skookum chuck a rapid " http://goo.gl/AJEyW
Feb 4, 2013
MomA "Skookum" is an expression unique to the Pacific Northwestern culture, based probably on Native American translation, for someone who has knowledge about a particular thing, idea, or concept. For example, "He's really skookum about wood carving." Sep 14, 2009
oroboros Makes me think of a bunch of cannibals building a fire for the Missionary Soup they anticipate. "Hey, skookum!" :-) Apr 30, 2009
slumry from the Chinook Jargon Widely used in the Pacific Northwest Jun 15, 2007
trivet a lovely, all purpose positive adjective meaning: well done, large, good, strong, genuine, cool, etc. Mar 14, 2007