gawk

[gawk] /gɔk/

verb (used without object)

to stare stupidly; gape:

The onlookers gawked at arriving celebrities.

noun

an awkward, foolish person.

Origin

1775-85; apparently representing OE word meaning fool, equivalent to ga(gol) foolish + -oc -ock; used attributively in gawk hand, gallock hand left hand

Synonyms

1. peer, ogle, gaze, goggle, rubberneck.

Examples from the web for gawk

But even while you may gawk in amazement at this show, it starts to wear thin.
They put him in their chicken coop, where villagers pay to gawk.
They are monuments for spiritual travelers, who often came great distances, to gawk at and be stirred by.
The players had the look of two contest winners trying not to gawk at their five-star hotel.
Durning asks the other shoppers, who have gathered to gawk.
Or you can play until the wine bottles are drained, and it's time to go outside to gawk at the stars.
The hyperbole is comforting, and offers the viewer a safe distance from which to point and gawk.
But when the snow stopped, residents ventured outside on foot to gawk at the mountains of snow.
Participants are, of course, tethered while they walk and gawk at the city below.
One afternoon at the river camp three settlers appeared in a dugout canoe, drawn by the universal impulse to gawk at disaster.

British Dictionary definitions for gawk

gawk

/ɡɔːk/

noun

a clumsy stupid person; lout

verb

(intransitive) to stare in a stupid way; gape

Word Origin

C18: from Old Danish gaukr; probably related to gape

Word Origin and History for gawk

1785, American English, perhaps from gaw, a survival from Middle English gowen "to stare" (c.1200), from a Scandinavian source akin to Old Norse ga "to heed," from Proto-Germanic *gawon-, from PIE *ghow-e- "to honor, revere, worship" (see favor (n.)); and altered perhaps by gawk hand (see gawky). Liberman writes that it "need not have been derived from gowk. It is possibly another independent imitative formation with the structure g-k. Related: Gawked; gawking.

Slang definitions & phrases for gawk

gawk

verb

To stare; gape stupidly: locals gathered to gawk at strange lights/ They went in and out of the garage to gawk at the body

[1785+; fr dialect gawk, gouk, ''fool, idiot,'' literally ''cuckoo'']

gawk in Technology

tool, language
GNU awk. Gawk is a superset of standard awk and includes some Plan 9 features.
David Trueman and Arnold Robbins of Georgia Institute of Technology were developing it in 1993. It has been ported to Unix, MS-DOS, Macintosh, and Archimedes.
Latest version: 2.15.3, as of 1993-11-08.
Available by FTP from your nearest GNU archive site.
Mac version (ftp://archive.umich.edu/mac/utilities/developerhelps/macgawk2.11.cpt.hqx).
(2000-10-21)