shifter

[ shif-ter ]

/ ˈʃɪf tər /

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a person or thing that shifts.

Informal. shift lever.

QUIZZES

Apostrophes can be tricky; prove you know the difference between it’s and its in this crafty quiz!

Question 1 of 12

On the farm, the feed for chicks is significantly different from the roosters’; ______ not even comparable.

First recorded in 1545–55; shift + -er¹

He says that if you had a hot rod in Detroit in 1963, you had to have a Hurst shifter or you were nowhere.
Elmore Leonard’s Rocky Road to Fame and Fortune|Mike Lupica|September 13, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Ever the shape-shifter and opportunist, he ended his career as a high official in the very empire he had once helped defeat.
‘300’ Is a Misleading, Muscle-Bound Travesty of Ancient History|James Romm|March 13, 2014|DAILY BEAST
Malaria is a shape-shifter, like HIV, always reshuffling the deck to make a new pathogen.
Mosquitoes Love Some People More and Science Wants to Know Why|Josh Dzieza|August 6, 2013|DAILY BEAST
Kenney, by contrast, was a shape-shifter who tried on different personalities and never quite found a fit.
Funny Pages: How the National Lampoon Made American Humor|Nathaniel Stein|July 1, 2013|DAILY BEAST

"Correa will have to gauge his decision very carefully," says Shifter.
Ecuador Needs U.S. Aid. Will They Risk It All with Snowden?|Mac Margolis|June 26, 2013|DAILY BEAST
The effect is as unpleasant as that which is produced on the stage by the voice of a prompter or the entrance of a scene-shifter.
Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIII|John Lord
I must have the good-will of all, be obeyed by all, from prima donna to scene-shifter.
Great Italian and French Composers|George T. Ferris
To stop and start, the belts are shifted from the tight to the loose pulleys by a belt-shifter, f.
The Popular Science Monthly, October, 1900|Various
There was a hitch here somewhere; the scene-shifter was hardly up to his work, so that it was rather a failure.
Guy Livingstone;|George A. Lawrence
The note procured me an engagement as errand boy at the stage-door and later I rose to the dignity of scene-shifter.
The Strollers|Frederic S. Isham