blackboard jungle
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of blackboard jungle
From the novel of the same name (1954) by American author Evan Hunter (1926–2005), on the model of asphalt jungle;
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Clearly, discussions of Clark's approach to taming the blackboard jungle run high with emotion.
From Time Magazine Archive
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A British expedition into the blackboard jungle, with Sidney Poitier investing subtle warmth into the part of a starchy teacher in a slum school.
From Time Magazine Archive
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This fall, divorced and shy of cash, she nervously switched the girls to what is supposed to be a "blackboard jungle" junior high school on the upper West Side.
From Time Magazine Archive
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The setting for this crime wave is not an inner-city blackboard jungle but suburban Evanston Township High School on Chicago's elm-shaded, affluent North Shore.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Only four years ago, Washington High would have matched most people's Hollywood image of the blackboard jungle.
From Time Magazine Archive
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Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.