skewer

[skyoo-er] /ˈskyu ər/
noun
1.
a long pin of wood or metal for inserting through meat or other food to hold or bind it in cooking.
2.
any similar pin for fastening or holding an item in place.
verb (used with object)
3.
to fasten with or as if with a skewer.
Origin of skewer
1670-80; earlier skiver < ?
Related forms
unskewered, adjective
Can be confused
skew, skewer.

skew

[skyoo] /skyu/
verb (used without object)
1.
to turn aside or swerve; take an oblique course.
2.
to look obliquely; squint.
verb (used with object)
3.
to give an oblique direction to; shape, form, or cut obliquely.
4.
Slang. to make conform to a specific concept, attitude, or planned result; slant:
The television show is skewed to the young teenager.
5.
to distort; depict unfairly.
adjective
6.
having an oblique direction or position; slanting.
7.
having a part that deviates from a straight line, right angle, etc.:
skew gearing.
8.
Mathematics. (of a dyad or dyadic) equal to the negative of its conjugate.
9.
(of an arch, bridge, etc.) having the centerline of its opening forming an oblique angle with the direction in which its spanning structure is built.
10.
Statistics. (of a distribution) having skewness.
noun
11.
an oblique movement, direction, or position.
12.
Also called skew chisel. a wood chisel having a cutting edge set obliquely.
Origin
1350-1400; (v.) Middle English skewen to slip away, swerve < Middle Dutch schuwen to get out of the way, shun, derivative of schu (Dutch schuw) shy1; (adj.) derivative of the v. (probably influenced by askew); (noun) derivative of the v. and adj.
Related forms
unskewed, adjective
Can be confused
skew, skewer.
Examples from the web for skewer
British Dictionary definitions for skewer

skewer

/ˈskjʊə/
noun
1.
a long pin for holding meat in position while being cooked, etc
2.
a similar pin having some other function
3.
(chess) a tactical manoeuvre in which an attacked man is made to move and expose another man to capture
verb
4.
(transitive) to drive a skewer through or fasten with a skewer
Word Origin
C17: probably from dialect skiver

skew

/skjuː/
adjective
1.
placed in or turning into an oblique position or course
2.
(machinery) having a component that is at an angle to the main axis of an assembly or is in some other way asymmetrical: a skew bevel gear
3.
(maths)
  1. composed of or being elements that are neither parallel nor intersecting as, for example, two lines not lying in the same plane in a three-dimensional space
  2. (of a curve) not lying in a plane
4.
(of a statistical distribution) not having equal probabilities above and below the mean; non-normal
5.
distorted or biased
noun
6.
an oblique, slanting, or indirect course or position
7.
(psychol) the system of relationships in a family in which one parent is extremely dominating while the other parent tends to be meekly compliant
verb
8.
to take or cause to take an oblique course or direction
9.
(intransitive) to look sideways; squint
10.
(transitive) to place at an angle
11.
(transitive) to distort or bias
Word Origin
C14: from Old Norman French escuer to shun, of Germanic origin; compare Middle Dutch schuwen to avoid
Word Origin and History for skewer
n.

1670s, variant of dialectal skiver (1660s), perhaps from a Scandinavian source, cf. Old Norse skifa "a cut, slice" (of bread, etc.), Swedish skifer "a slate," which are related to shiver (n.1) "small piece."

v.

1701, from the noun. Related: Skewered; skewering.

skew

v.

late 15c., "to turn aside" (intransitive), from Old North French eskiuer "shy away from, avoid," Old French eschiver (see eschew). Transitive sense of "turn (something) aside" is from 1570s. Meaning "depict unfairly" first recorded 1872, on notion of being "give oblique direction to," hence "to distort, to make slant." Statistical sense dates from 1929. Related: Skewed; skewing. The adjectival meaning "slanting, turned to one side" is recorded from c.1600, from the verb; noun meaning "slant, deviation" first attested 1680s.

skewer in Science
skew
  (sky)   
A transformation of coordinates in which one coordinate is displaced in one direction in proportion to its distance from a coordinate plane or axis. A rectangle, for example, that undergoes skew is transformed into a parallelogram. Also called shear.