jerk

plural jerks · alternative yark

1. A sudden, often uncontrolled movement, especially of the human body.

   A barrel-organ in the street suddenly sprang with a jerk into a jovial tune.

   1908, G[ilbert] K[eith] Chesterton, The Man Who Was Thursday: A Nightmare, Bristol: J[ames] W[illiams] Arrowsmith, […]; London: Simpkin, Marshall, Hamilton, Kent & Company, →OCLC, page 114

   1 more example

   1856, Gustave Flaubert, Madame Bovary, Part III Chapter X, translated by Eleanor Marx-Aveling The black cloth bestrewn with white beads blew up from time to time, laying bare the coffin. The tired bearers walked more slowly, and it advanced with constant jerks, like a boat that pitches with every wave.

   Synonyms: jolt, lurch, shudder, shake, jump, working

2. A quick pull on something.

   When I yell "OK," give the mooring line a good jerk!

   Synonyms: yank, tug

3. USderogatoryslangA person with unlikable or obnoxious qualities and behavior, typically mean, immoral, self-centered, or disagreeable.

   You really are a jerk sometimes.

   3 more examples

   I finally fired him, because he was being a real jerk to his customers, even to some of the staff.

   Oh, Raymond―don't be such a jerk. Go and get yourself a drink or a tranquilizer or something.

   1962, George Axelrod, 1:23:39 from the start, in The Manchurian Candidate, spoken by Eleanor Iselin (Angela Lansbury)

   And [Albert Fish] was dizzyingly happy about it, smiled as described the grizzly details of the tortures and the murders, appearing to the detectives and one of the detectives said "he appeared as the Devil himself." I mean this Albert F-, I mean this guy was a real jerk!

   2013, Norm Macdonald Live, season 1, episode 3, spoken by Norm Macdonald

   Synonyms: asshole, arsehole

4. USderogatoryslangA stupid person; an idiot or fool.

   Synonyms: alcatote, asshat, arsehole, asshole, bayard, berk, birdbrain, blither

5. hobbiesA lift in which the weight is taken with a quick motion from shoulder height to a position above the head with arms fully extended and held there for a brief time.
6. slangMasturbation.
   1. InternetslangAn act of satirizing behavior that is, to an extent, common in a community, especially in circlejerk subreddits.

      Jerk of the Year contender

7. preceded by definite articleA dance, popular in Western culture in the 1960s, in which the head and upper body is thrown forwards regularly to the beat of the music.

   Girls, hey, what's that you're doing Girl, girl, what's that you're doing You got to show me the steps to it Somehow, gonna learn how to do it Doing the jerk Hey, do the jerk Girl, come on and work Hey, do the jerk.

   1964, “The Jerk”, Don Julian (lyrics), performed by The Larks

8. engineeringThe rate of change in acceleration with respect to time.

   Synonyms: jolt, surge, lurch

9. USabbreviationellipsisobsoleteEllipsis of soda jerk.

present singular third person jerks · participle present jerking · participle past jerked · past jerked · alternative yark

1. intransitiveTo make a sudden uncontrolled movement.

   York came to me first, whilst the groom stood at Ginger's head. He drew my head back and fixed the rein so tight that it was almost intolerable; then he went to Ginger, who was impatiently jerking her head up and down against the bit, as was her way now.

   [1877], Anna Sewell, “A Strike for Liberty”, in Black Beauty: […], London: Jarrold and Sons, […], →OCLC, part II, page 106

2. transitiveTo give a quick, often unpleasant tug or shake.
3. USslangvulgarTo masturbate.

   Synonyms: beat it, wank, abuse, bash one out, bate, beat it, beat off, crank one out

   1. InternetUSslangvulgarTo satirize behavior that is, to an extent, common in a community, especially in circlejerk subreddits.

      This is jerking’s 9/11

      Synonyms: beat it, wank, abuse, bash one out, bate, beat it, beat off, crank one out

4. obsoleteTo beat, to hit.

   Synonyms: thump, strike, bang, baste, batter, beat, belabor, blow

5. obsoleteTo throw with a quick and suddenly arrested motion of the hand.

   to jerk a stone

   Synonyms: fling, shy, bung, cast, chuck, chunk, cook, dash

6. transitiveusuallyhobbiesTo lift using a jerk.
7. obsoleteTo flout with contempt.

alternative yark

1. CaribbeanJamaicauncountableA rich, spicy Jamaican marinade.

   Sunshine ranks high in the island's greates burger debate, while the chicken egg rolls with mango chutney and jerk mayo and fabulous fish tacos elevate pub grub to an art.

   2016, Fodor's Essential Caribbean, Fodor's Travel, →ISBN

2. CaribbeanJamaicauncountableMeat (or sometimes vegetables) cured by jerking, in which it is coated in spices and slow-cooked over a fire or grill traditionally composed of green pimento wood positioned over burning coals; charqui.

   Jerk chicken is a local favorite.

present singular third person jerks · participle present jerking · participle past jerked · past jerked · alternative yark

1. To cure (meat) by cutting it into strips and drying it, originally in the sun.

   This longtime West End eatery prepares chicken the way locals like it: curried, fried, jerked, and baked.

   2016, Fodor's Travel Guides, Fodor's Essential Caribbean, Fodor's Travel, →ISBN

   2 more examples

   Snow stalled him in the timber; his food was all but gone when he managed to kill an antelope and jerk a supply of venison.

   1954, Wallace Stegner, Beyond the Hundredth Meridian: John Wesley Powell and the Second Opening of the West, Houghton Mifflin, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 37

   The Lemakot in the north strangled widows and threw them into the cremation pyres of their dead husbands. If they defeated potential invaders the New Irish hanged the vanquished from banyan trees, flensed their windpipes, removed their heads, left their intestines to jerk in the sun.

   2011, Dominic Smith, Bright and Distant Shores, page 106

   Synonyms: jerky