shanty
1 Americannoun
adjective
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of, relating to, or constituting a shanty or shanties.
a shanty quarter outside the town walls.
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of a low economic or social class, especially when living in a shanty.
shanty people.
verb (used without object)
noun
noun
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a ramshackle hut; crude dwelling
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a public house, esp an unlicensed one
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a log bunkhouse at a lumber camp
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the camp itself
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noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of shanty1
1810–20; probably < Canadian French chantier lumber camp, hut; French: yard, depot, gantry, stand for barrels < Latin cant ( h ) ērius rafter, prop, literally, horse in poor condition, nag < Greek kanthḗlios pack ass
Origin of shanty2
First recorded 1855–60; alteration of French chanter “to sing”; see origin at chant
Explanation
A shanty is a small, rough shelter or dwelling. Modern shanties are commonly found in shantytowns, informal neighborhoods made up of crude, homemade shelters. A crude, run-down shack can be called a shanty, and the temporary, portable structures that ice fishermen set up for shelter are also shanties. This sense of shanty derives from the French Canadian chantier, or "lumberjack's headquarters." Shanty can also refer to a song that sailors sing while they work. This meaning comes from chanty, "boisterous sailor song," from the French chanter, "to sing."
Vocabulary lists containing shanty
A Long Walk to Water
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There's No Word Like Home
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
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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:
OSHKOSH, Wis.—Peter and Lisa Smith sit inside a fishing shanty on the frozen waters of Lake Winnebago and stare for hours into the murky depths.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 20, 2026
Despite the archaic language, it has the simplicity of a sea shanty.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 16, 2026
The blaze broke out in the early hours of the morning in Guryong village, often described as one of the South Korean capital's last remaining shanty towns.
From Barron's ● Jan. 16, 2026
"My family has been torn apart," Ms Khatun says, as she sits in her parent's one-room shanty in West Bengal.
From BBC ● Dec. 18, 2025
The headlights fell on a shanty of unpainted wood, patched at the bot-tom with a rusting Dr Pepper sign.
From "Black Like Me" by John Howard Griffin
Even in shanties and makeshift homes, residents pay huge rents.
From Barron's ● Jan. 16, 2026
The concert ended with the traditional programme of sea shanties and patriotic songs like Jerusalem and Land of Hope and Glory - as the audience waved flags, set off party poppers and waved stuffed toys.
From BBC ● Sep. 13, 2025
In Gurugram, an upscale suburb just outside Delhi, gleaming SUVs, futuristic skyscrapers and neat apartments stand in stark contrast to nearby mosquito swarms, trash heaps and tarpaulin shanties.
From BBC ● Aug. 7, 2025
Wise had picked up two or three CDs of sea shanties, along with an album of barrel organ tunes, for inspiration.
From New York Times ● Nov. 19, 2024
All around, low to the ground, the shacks and shanties of La Saline.
From "Taste of Salt: A Story of Modern Haiti" by Frances Temple
I shantied for a week with Crop, under the shadow of Mount Marcy.
From Wild Northern Scenes Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod by Hammond, S. H. (Samuel H.)
We shantied together on the Muddywaski, and a better man than John Burton never rode a log in the Ottaway country, which is sayin’ a good deal.
From The Bail Jumper by Stead, Robert J. C.
They shantied on the outlet, just at the foot of the lake, below the high rocky bluff round which the little bay there sweeps.
From Wild Northern Scenes Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod by Hammond, S. H. (Samuel H.)
Alistair Beaton's script is not so much a play as a series of sketches; Anthony Neilson's production is remorselessly larky, with lots of arch posturing and yo-ho-ho shantying.
From The Guardian ● Aug. 28, 2010
He had been working his farm for a spell and had gone back reluctantly to shantying because he needed the money in a slack season.
From Children of the Tenements by Relyea, C. M. (Charles Mark)
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.
