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View synonyms for garbage

garbage

[ gahr-bij ]

noun

  1. discarded animal and vegetable matter, as from a kitchen; refuse.
  2. any matter that is no longer wanted or needed; trash.
  3. a bin or other receptacle for discarded matter, especially kitchen waste; garbage can:

    Hey, who threw my leftover pizza in the garbage?

    Synonyms: taradiddle, malarkey, hogwash, claptrap, bunkum, nonsense, waste, trash, rubbish, junk, refuse, litter

  4. anything that is contemptibly worthless, inferior, or vile:

    There's nothing but garbage on TV tonight.

  5. worthless talk; lies; foolishness.
  6. Informal. any unnecessary item added to something else, as for appearance only; garnish:

    I'll have an Old Fashioned, but without the garbage.

  7. useless artificial satellites or parts of rockets floating in space, as satellites that are no longer transmitting information or rocket boosters jettisoned in flight.
  8. Computers. meaningless or unwanted data:

    That program was not properly debugged and produced nothing but garbage.



garbage

/ ˈɡɑːbɪdʒ /

noun

  1. worthless, useless, or unwanted matter
  2. Also calledrubbish discarded or waste matter; refuse
  3. computing invalid data
  4. informal.
    nonsense
“Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged” 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012


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Word History and Origins

Origin of garbage1

First recorded in 1400–50; Middle English garbage, gabage “discarded parts of butchered fowls; entrails of fowls used for human food”; compare with Middle English garbelage “removal of refuse from spices,” Middle English garbelure “refuse found in spices,” and Old French garbage (also jarbage ) “tax on sheaves of grain,” but the shift of sense here is unclear; further origin uncertain; garble, -age
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Word History and Origins

Origin of garbage1

C15: probably from Anglo-French garbelage removal of discarded matter, of uncertain origin; compare Old Italian garbuglio confusion
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Example Sentences

Since the spring, the 54-year-old Montgomery County man has spent his daily walks into the District collecting garbage around the city, usually filling at least two trash bags with waste.

There’s a certain sense of accomplishment that comes from dutifully sorting soda bottles, plastic bags and yogurt cups from the rest of the garbage.

Separating food waste from your garbage can mean more space at the landfill, so governments won’t have to spend money and land on a new one.

So, if someone’s in a restaurant with me, and they eat a hamburger and they only eat half of it, I, in principle, will eat it, because it’s going to go in the garbage.

Don’t attempt to burn or bury it, either, as food waste and garbage is more difficult to burn than you think, and fire pits are one of the first areas wildlife investigate.

“Angry Birds is a small fun game plus a lot of pointless garbage,” Smith tells me.

“At worst, Eric picked up a garbage can, was told by police to put it down, and did,” his lawyer, Martin Stoler, insisted.

Brabner talked about the “MTV people” coming to Cleveland to get pictures of Pekar emptying the garbage and going bowling.

The kid moved again, slowly across the parking lot to the garbage bin.

Then he took the chicken and walked over to his spot near the garbage and sat down to eat it.

Above all, the doctor—the doctor and the purulent trash and garbage of his pharmacopoeia!

Foiled in this attempt they began to pelt them with garbage, so that soon their white robes were stained and filthy.

He would give me such words as "combustion," "garbage disposal," "bonded indebtedness" and so on.

The pigsties have no more smell than the stables, because the manure is removed, and no garbage is allowed to accumulate.

He had a couple of dingy wash-boilers which he had picked up from the big garbage-dump near the race-track.

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