job
From Wiktionary, the free dictionary
Pronunciation
- (Received Pronunciation) enPR: jŏb, IPA(key): /d͡ʒɒb/
- (General American) enPR: jŏb, IPA(key): /d͡ʒɑb/
Audio (UK): (file) Audio (US): (file) Audio (Southern England): (file) - Rhymes: -ɒb
Etymology 1
From the phrase jobbe of work (“piece of work”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps from a variant of Middle English gobbe (“mass, lump”); or perhaps related to Middle English jobben (“to jab, thrust, peck”), or Middle English choppe (“piece, bargain”). More at gob, jab, chop.
Noun
job (plural jobs)
- A task.
- I've got a job for you - could you wash the dishes?
- 1996, Cameron Crowe, Jerry Maguire:
- An economic role for which a person is paid.
- That surgeon has a great job.
- He's been out of a job since being made redundant in January.
- 1984, Johnny Marr & Morrissey (lyrics and music), “Heaven Knows I'm Miserable Now”, in Hatful of Hollow, performed by The Smiths:
- I was looking for a job and then I found a job / And heaven knows I'm miserable now
- 2013 August 10, Schumpeter, “Cronies and capitols”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848:
- Policing the relationship between government and business in a free society is difficult. Businesspeople have every right to lobby governments, and civil servants to take jobs in the private sector.
- 2016, VOA Learning English (public domain)
- (in noun compounds) Plastic surgery.
- He had a nose job.
- (in noun compounds) A sex act.
- 2000 August 6, “Easy Come, Easy Go”, in Sex and the City, season 3, episode 9, spoken by Samantha:
- You men have no idea what we're dealing with down there. Teeth placement, and jaw stress, and suction, and gag reflex, and all the while bobbing up and down, moaning and trying to breathe through our noses. Easy? Honey, they don't call it a job for nothing.
- (computing) A task, or series of tasks, carried out in batch mode (especially on a mainframe computer).
- A public transaction done for private profit; something performed ostensibly as a part of official duty, but really for private gain; a corrupt official business.
- (informal) A robbery or heist.
- a bank job
- 2010, J. Lamar, Honor, Deception and Justice, page 53:
- This freak Vernon got the intelligence on the safe job and passed it on to some other freak, a guy that hears voices in his head and talks back to them. […] We don't think [Vernon's squeeze] is in on the heist, but she apparently is in love with this creep who is laying the pipe in her trough!
- Any affair or event which affects one, whether fortunately or unfortunately.
- (colloquial) A thing or whatsit (often used in a vague way to refer to something whose name one cannot recall).
- Synonyms: see Thesaurus:thingy
- Pass me that little job with the screw thread on it.
- 1936, Proceedings of the annual meeting of the American Warehousemen's Association, volume 45, page 376:
- One of them was about nine years ago when I stood in white tie and tails beside a little blonde job (laughter and applause) down in front of the First Methodist Church of Birmingham, […]
- (UK, slang, law enforcement) The police as a profession, act of policing, or an individual police officer.[1]
- 2018 February 11, Colin Dexter, Russell Lewis, 14:17 from the start, in Endeavour(Cartouche), season 5, episode 2 (TV series), spoken by DS Endeavour Morse (Shaun Evans):
- “He was ex-job, Beavis. Detective sergeant out of County, Banbury, retired in ‘59.”
- 2018 July 24, Chris Merritt, Last Witness:A Gripping Crime Thriller You Won’t Be Able To Put Down:
- But there it was on the screen: The personal details of his old colleague from Kennington station in the late nineties. […] She’s job. We used to work together.
- 2022 February 9, Daragh Carville, Richard Clark, Furquan Akhtar, 01:33 from the start, in The Bay, season 3, episode 5, spoken by D.S Jenn Townsend (Marsha Thomason):
- “I’m job, D.S Townsend. I have to report a missing person.”
Usage notes
Collocations
- Adjectives often applied to "job": easy, hard, poor, good, great, excellent, decent, low-paying, steady, stable, secure, challenging, demanding, rewarding, boring, thankless, stressful, horrible, lousy, satisfying, industrial, educational, academic.
Descendants
Translations
task
|
economic role for which a person is paid
|
plastic surgery
|
computing: task(s) carried out in batch mode
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Verb
job (third-person singular simple present jobs, present participle jobbing, simple past and past participle jobbed)
- (intransitive) To do odd jobs or occasional work for hire.
- a. 1852, Thomas Moore, Literary Advertisement:
- Authors of all work, to job for the season.
- (intransitive) To work as a jobber.
- (intransitive, professional wrestling slang) To take the loss, usually in a demeaning or submissive manner.
- (transitive, trading) To buy and sell for profit, as securities; to speculate in.
- (transitive, often with out) To subcontract a project or delivery in small portions to a number of contractors.
- We wanted to sell a turnkey plant, but they jobbed out the contract to small firms.
- (intransitive) To seek private gain under pretence of public service; to turn public matters to private advantage.
- 1733, Alexander Pope, Epistle to Bathurst:
- And judges job, and bishops bite the town.
- To hire or let in periods of service.
- to job a carriage
- 1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC:
- […] ...and a pair of handsome horses were jobbed, with which Jos drove about in state in the park...
Translations
to do odd jobs
|
- The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
Derived terms
Terms derived from the noun or verb job
- 3D job
- bad job
- bag job
- batch job
- black bag job
- bladejob
- blowjob, blow job
- blue job
- bob-a-job
- bob-job
- bodge job
- boob job
- botch job
- brown job
- by the job
- cronjob
- day job
- desk job
- don't give up the day job, don't give up your day job, don't quit your day job
- do one's job
- do the job
- double-jobbing
- dump job
- fang job
- flex job
- foot job
- get the job done
- give something up as a bad job
- gob job
- good job
- great job
- gum job
- hack job
- handjob, hand job
- hatchet job
- have a job to
- hitjob
- I'm looking for a job
- inside job
- job action
- job advertisement, job ad, job advert
- job aid
- job analysis
- job and finish
- job and knock
- job application
- job backwards
- jobber
- jobbery
- jobbie
- jobbish
- job center, job centre, Jobcentre
- Jobclub
- job club
- job control
- job creator
- jobday
- job description
- job fair
- jobforce, job force
- jobholder
- jobholding
- job-hop, job-hopper, job-hopping
- jobhour
- jobhunter
- job-hunt, job hunting
- job interview
- job jar
- jobless
- joblife
- joblike
- job lock
- job lot
- jobmaker
- job market
- job master
- jobmate
- jobmistress
- jobname
- job offer
- job of work
- job op
- job order
- job posting
- job printer
- job production
- job queue
- job rotation
- job's a good 'un
- job satisfaction
- job scheduler
- jobsearch
- job searching
- job security
- jobseeker
- jobseeking
- jobs for the boys
- job-shadow
- jobshare
- job-sharing
- job shop
- jobsite
- jobster
- jobsware
- jobsworth
- job title
- jobweek
- joe job, Joe job
- junk job
- just the job
- knob job
- lace job
- lawn job
- lazy girl job
- lie down on the job
- lifetime job
- little brown job
- lube job
- make the best of a bad job
- make-work job
- McJob
- mouth job
- nonjob
- nose job, nose-job
- note job
- nut job
- odd job, odd-job
- office job
- on job
- on the job, on-the-job
- out of a job
- outside job
- paint job
- paper bag job
- prejob
- proper job
- provisional job
- put-up job
- ream job
- rimjob, rim job, rim-job
- rush job, rush-job
- screwjob
- send a boy to do a man's job
- shackjob
- side job
- skin job
- snow job, snow-job
- straight job
- summer job
- the job is oxo
- titjob
- toe job
- tonguejob
- toss job
- troll job
- union job
- wankjob
- wet job
- whack job
- what is your job, what's your job
- you had one job
See also
Etymology 2
Imitative.
Verb
job (third-person singular simple present jobs, present participle jobbing, simple past and past participle jobbed)
- (intransitive, now rare, regional) To peck (of a bird); (more generally) to poke or prod (at, into). [from 15th c.]
- 1692, Roger L’Estrange, “ (please specify the fable number.) (please specify the name of the fable.)”, in Fables, of Æsop and Other Eminent Mythologists: […], London: […] R[ichard] Sare, […], →OCLC:
- a raven pitch'd upon him, and there sate, jobbing of the sore
- (transitive) To pierce or poke (someone or something), typically with a sharp or pointed object; to stab. [from 16th c.]
- 1844, Charles Dickens, chapter 33, in Martin Chuzzlewit:
- He had ‘jobbed out’ the eye of one gentleman.
- (transitive, now Australia) To hit (someone) with a quick, sharp punch; to jab. [from 19th c.]
- 2001, Richard Flanagan, Gould's Book of Fish, Vintage, published 2016, page 40:
- A stranger jobbed me in the mug so hard that I fell off my chair.
Noun
job (plural jobs)
References
- Eric Partridge (2013) “job”, in Tom Dalzell and Terry Victor, editors, The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English, 2nd edition, volumes I–II, Abingdon, Oxon., New York, N.Y.: Routledge, →ISBN, page 1274: “the job¶ the police (as a profession) UK”
Anagrams
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