shanghai

present singular third person shanghais · participle present shanghaiing · participle past shanghaied · past shanghaied · participle past shanghai'd · past shanghai'd · alternative shanghae · alternative shangeye

1. transitiveTo force or trick someone to go somewhere or do something against their will or interest, particularly

   1974 September 30, ‘Final Report on the Activities of the Children of God', Oftentimes the approach is to shanghai an unsuspecting victim.

   4 more examples

   Their power had a flaw to it. They could be shanghaied in toilets.

   1985, Margaret Atwood, “Birth Day”, in The Handmaid’s Tale, Toronto, Ont.: McClelland and Stewart, →ISBN, page 143

   Woody: 'While I was out, I got me some sushi! Assume the position, fish boy!' / Squid Lips: 'Arr, and who are you calling "fish boy", matey? I've been shanghaied by a darn splinter!'

   1995, Sega Multimedia Studio, Wild Woody, Sega

   1999 June 24, ‘The Resurrection of Tom Waits’, in Rolling Stone, quoted in Innocent When You Dream, Orion (2006), page 256, It was the strangest galley: the sounds, the steam, he's screaming at his coworkers. I felt like I'd been shanghaied.

   Petitioner strenuously objects to this free-rider label. He argues that he is not a free rider on a bus headed for a destination that he wishes to reach but is more like a person shanghaied for an unwanted voyage.

   2018 Janus v. AFSCME, Council 31, 138 S. Ct. 2448

2. To force or trick someone to go somewhere or do something against their will or interest
   1. transitiveTo press-gang sailors, especially (historical) for shipping or fishing work.

      Peter Edwards was bragging all around the little port about his boy, shanghaied off to sea on his first voyage and coming home skipper of a bung-full spouter.

      1930, Captain Dingle, “In Conclusion” (chapter 34), in Seaworthy, Cambridge, Mass.: The Riverside Press, page 270

      1 more example

      By this time I hadn't much doubt of the nature of the trap and the identity of the trapping vessel. The faint smell of alcohol in the forehold told the story. I had been sandbagged and taken aboard a bootlegging craft, shanghaied in good old-fashioned style; and the vessel was probably now on its way to the Bahamas for a cargo of spirits.

      1923, Francis Lynde, chapter 2, in Somewhere in the Caribbean

   2. USslangtransitivegovernmentTo trick a suspect into entering a jurisdiction in which they can be lawfully arrested.
   3. USslangtransitivegovernmentTo transfer a serviceman against their will.

      “Why, if you so loved and cherished the armed guard,” Captain Banning continued, “did you arrange for transfer?” “I never, sir! ... But he shanghaied me out of the armed guard pronto.”

      Eugene Cunningham, "A One-Man Navy"

      1 more example

      There was a urologist for his urine, a lymphologist for his lymph, an endocrinologist for his endocrines, a psychologist for his psyche, a dermatologist for his derma; there was a pathologist for his pathos, a cystologist for his cysts, and a bald and pedantic cetologist from the zoology department at Harvard who had been shanghaied ruthlessly into the Medical Corps by a faulty anode in an I.B.M. machine and spent his sessions with the dying colonel trying to discuss Moby Dick with him.

      Joseph Heller, Catch-22

3. transitiveTo commandeer, hijack, or otherwise (usually wrongfully) appropriate a place or thing.

   Let's see if we can shanghai a room for a couple of hours.

plural shanghais · alternative shanghae · alternative shangeye

1. capitalizeddatedoftenA breed of chicken with large bodies, long legs, and feathered shanks.

   Cochins or Shanghaes.

   1853, W.B. Tegetmeier, Profitable Poultry, page 19

2. USobsoleteA kind of daub.

   The ‘shanghai’ is the glaring daub required by some frame-makers for cheap auctions. They are turned out at so much by the day's labor, or at from $12 to $24 a dozen, by the piece.

   1880 Jan., Scribner's Monthly, p. 365

3. USobsoleteA tall dandy.
4. capitalizedoftendartsA kind of dart game in which players are gradually eliminated ("shanghaied"), usually either by failing to reach a certain score in 3 quick throws or during a competition to hit a certain prechosen number and then be the first to hit the prechosen numbers of the other players.

   ‘Shanghai’ may be played by teams of 8, in pairs, individually, or, in fact, any number.

   1930, Anchor Magazine, page 196

   1 more example

   The hot twenty—including local favourites George Simmons, Tony Brown, Mick Norris and Lew Walker—have to sweat through nineteen 501s, one 1,001, one 2,001, one round-the-board-on-doubles, one shanghai and one halve-it.

   1977 May 10, Daily Mirror, p. 30

plural shanghais · alternative shanghae · alternative shangeye

1. AustraliaNew ZealandSynonym of slingshot.

   Turn, turn thy shang~hay dread aside, Nor touch that little bird

   1863 Oct. 24, Leader, p. 17

   3 more examples

   ‘Terry Madison. Instead of fiddling with that shanghai, give us a thought.’ ‘It’s a gongai,’ Swiftie said. ‘I mean that’s the name for a shanghai which is another name for a catapult...that Mr Delarue calls a slingshot.’

   1982, Paul Radley, My Blue-Checker Corker and Me, Sydney: Fontana/Collins, page 61

   They scrounged around the camp […] and held out their filthy wings to the feeble sun, making themselves an easy target for Charles's shanghai.

   1985, Peter Carey, Illywhacker, Faber and Faber, published 2003, page 206

   However, certain objects are excluded from being treated as a gun. These include a longbow, crossbow, slingshot or shanghai even though it is capable of propelling a projectile by means of an explosive force.

   2020, Parliament of Singapore, “Guns, Explosives and Weapons Control Bill”, in Republic of Singapore Government Gazette, page 161

   Synonyms: slingshot

present singular third person shanghais · participle present shanghaiing · participle past shanghaied · past shanghaied · alternative shanghae · alternative shangeye

1. AustraliaNew ZealandTo hit with a slingshot.

alternative obsolete Shang-hai · alternative obsolete Shanghae · alternative obsolete Shang-hae · alternative obsolete Shanhae · alternative obsolete Chang-hai

1. A major port city and direct-administered municipality of China, the largest urban area in China.

   4 more examples

   SHANGHAI (the emporium of Nanking) is the first town of any importance on the coast of Kiangnan province.[…]If, however, these difficulties were surmounted, and suitable precautions taken against existing dangers, the embouchure of this river would be one of the most eligible points for the establishment of British commerce in the whole empire. Be this as it may, however, certain it is that even now Shanghai carries on the greatest native trade of any port on the coast.[…] The city of Shanghai is built on the left bank, some distance from the mouth. It is laid out with sufficient elegance, and numerous temples.

   1840 September 12, “IX.—From Shanghai to Pekin.”, in The Penny Magazine, number 542, Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge, →OCLC, page 358, column 2

   In January 1901, we reached Japan where Mrs. Hoover remained for the winter while I went to Shanghai in search of a method of reaching North China. The Port of Taku being frozen and there being then no railway connection between Shanghai and the north, all communication had been suspended for the winter.

   1951, Herbert Hoover, “Engineering in China—1899–1902”, in The Memoirs of Herbert Hoover, Years of Adventure 1874-1920, New York: Macmillan Company, →OCLC, →OL, page 55

   By the year 2000, Shanghai is scheduled to become an international center of commerce and finance; economic strategists predict that by 2010 the city will have become the world's largest trading center. This "secret capital" of China has set some ambitious goals for itself. The population is proudly celebrating their collective "coming out," and business is booming.

   1999, “Shanghai”, in The Book of the World, 2nd United States edition (Atlas), Macmillan, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 411, column 1

   Victor Li is determined to get married soon, but like many other young Chinese grappling with an uncertain economic outlook, the well-heeled Shanghai entrepreneur isn't sure he can afford to. "It's very expensive for us to get married, especially in a big city like Shanghai," the 32-year-old said, as he took a break from a ticketed networking event for wealthier, top university-educated singles at an upmarket Shanghai jazz bar.

   2024 January 17, Nicoco Chan, “Some Shanghai singles struggle to get married as economy slows”, in Reuters, archived from the original on 21 Jan 2024, China

   Synonyms: Paris of the East

2. A major international port including the eastern coast of Shanghai Municipality and the northeastern islands of Zhejiang Province.

plural Shanghais · alternative obsolete Shang-hai · alternative obsolete Shanghae · alternative obsolete Shang-hae · alternative obsolete Shanhae · alternative obsolete Chang-hai

1. Alternative letter-case form of shanghai in its various senses derived from the Chinese city.