chop-chop
adverb
with haste; quickly.
chop-chop
American
[chop-chop]
/ ˈtʃɒpˈtʃɒp /
adverb
chop chop
British
adverb
Etymology
Origin of chop-chop
1825–35; repetitive compound based on Chinese Pidgin English chop quick, of uncertain origin
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.
See Examples For:
He does screenplays at the same chop-chop pace.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 5, 2018
In four or five chop-chop years, the mill town became “The Shingle Capital of the World,” and more often than not, it smelled like cedar.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 8, 2017
From the urgent chop-chop of a loudspeaker in a nearby village, Adams could tell that his landing had been spotted and that a search party was being organized.
From Time Magazine Archive
Finally, the moment nears "to do chop-chop," as M'sieur Pierre puts it childishly; and childishly, too, the prisoner seeks to save his last shred of self-respect as he mutters: "By myself, by myself."
From Time Magazine Archive
Talent does not understand such a process; it is mechanical, unvarying, chop-chop, day in and day out.
From Murder in Any Degree by Owen Johnson
“It was just chop, chop, chop,” Canady said.
From Washington Times ● Apr. 5, 2020
So you haven't anymore got that chop chop chop of the keys – you've got an almost silent process so you can hear the rhythm in your head better.
From The Guardian ● Mar. 26, 2011
She weeded the fields carefully with her hoe—chop, chop, chop.
From "A Girl Named Disaster" by Nancy Farmer
But Jog was deaf—chop, chop, chop was all the answer Mr. Sponge got.
From Mr. Sponge's Sporting Tour by Robert Smith Surtees
Even now their only tools are a felling-axe, a hatchet, and a small adze; and there they sit, chop, chop, chopping, for three, six, or nine months it may be, until the house is finished.
From Samoa, A Hundred Years Ago And Long Before by George Turner
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.
