kink

• IPA^(key): /kɪŋk/

• Audio (US):

  (file)

• Audio (General Australian):

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• Rhymes: -ɪŋk

From Middle English kinken, kynken, from Old English *cincian (attested in cincung), from Proto-West Germanic *kinkōn, from Proto-Germanic *kinkōną (“to laugh”), from Proto-Indo-European *gang- (“to mock, jeer, deride”), related to Old English canc (“jeering, scorn, derision”). Cognate with Dutch kinken (“to kink, cough”).

• chink

kink (third-person singular simple present kinks, present participle kinking, simple past and past participle kinked)

1. To laugh loudly.
2. To gasp for breath as in a severe fit of coughing.

kink (plural kinks)

1. (Scotland, dialect) A convulsive fit of coughing or laughter; a sonorous indraft of breath; a whoop; a gasp of breath caused by laughing, coughing, or crying.

From Dutch kink (“a twist or curl in a rope”),^[1] from Proto-Germanic *kenk-, *keng- (“to bend, turn”), from Proto-Indo-European *gengʰ- (“to turn, wind, braid, weave”). Compare Middle Low German kinke (“spiral screw, coil”), Old Norse kikna (“to bend backwards, sink at the knee”), Icelandic kengur (“a bend or bight; a metal crook”). Probably related to kick.

• k1nk, k!nk, k/nk, k*nk (bowdlerizations)

kink (countable and uncountable, plural kinks)

1. A tight curl, twist, or bend in a length of thin material, hair etc.

   We couldn't get enough water to put out the fire because of a kink in the hose.

2. A difficulty or flaw that is likely to impede operation, as in a plan or system.

   They had planned to open another shop downtown, but their plan had a few kinks.

3. An unreasonable notion; a crotchet; a whim; a caprice.
   • 1856, Frederick Swartwout Cozzens, The Sparrowgrass Papers:

     Never a Yankee was born or bred / Without that peculiar kink in his head / By which he could turn the smallest amount / Of whatever he had to the best account.

   • 1950, Norman Lindsay, Dust or Polish?, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, page 17:

     "Still, boozers can be worked sometimes. Most people can, if you encourage their kink. One old woman staked me for three months because she got such a kick out of scandalmongering the neighbours to me."

4. (informal, countable or uncountable) Peculiarity or deviation in sexual behaviour or taste.

   Synonym: paraphilia

   Antonym: normophilia

   • 2013, Alison Tyler, H Is for Hardcore, page 13:

     To top it all off, Lynn is into kink. Last night she was really into kink. It's a good thing that today is my day off because I need the time to recuperate and think things over.

5. (informal, countable) A person with peculiar sexual tastes.

   Synonym: kinkster

   • 1985, John Dann MacDonald, Five Complete Travis McGee Novels, page 254:

     "What do they think you know?"
     "No more than I've told you. That he's a kink. He rapes people and kills people and spends too much money and flies grass in."

   • 2013, James Hadley Chase, A Can of Worms:

     “He's a kink. All I have to do is toss off my clothes and dance around his apartment while he sits and drools.”

6. (mathematics) A positive 1-soliton solution to the sine-Gordon equation.

• BDSM
• fetish

kink (third-person singular simple present kinks, present participle kinking, simple past and past participle kinked)

1. (transitive) To form a kink or twist.
2. (intransitive) To be formed into a kink or twist.

• Knik

From Middle Dutch *kinc.

• IPA^(key): /kɪŋk/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Hyphenation: kink
• Rhymes: -ɪŋk

kink f (plural kinken, diminutive kinkje n)

1. kink (curl, twist, or bend)

   Er zat een kink in de kabel.

   There was a twist in the cable.

• een kink in de kabel
• kinkhoorn

• Afrikaans: kink
• → Papiamentu: kènk, kenku

From Low German schenke.

kink (genitive kingi, partitive kinki)

1. gift
2. favour/favor

• jõulukink

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.) Cognate to dialectal Finnish kenkku.

kink (genitive kingu, partitive kinku)

1. small mound, knoll

• häbemekink

From ki (“who”) +‎ -nk (“our, of ours”, possessive suffix).

• IPA^(key): [ˈkiŋk]
• Hyphenation: kink

kink

1. first-person plural single-possession possessive of ki

A nasal form from Middle English kyken. Compare also robunkshough (“roebuck forest”).

• IPA^(key): /kɪŋk/^[1]

kink (simple past kinket)

1. to toss or trip, kick^[2]