snakehead

snakehead

English

Etymology

snake +‎ head

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

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Noun

snakehead (plural snakeheads)

1. (zoology) A family of perciform fish native to Africa and Asia, Channidae.
   • 2015, Labodalih Sembiring, translating Eka Kurniawan, Man Tiger, Verso 2015, p. 1:

     Through this plantation ran a creek full of snakeheads and eels, its overflow swelling the swamp around it.

2. (slang) A Chinese smuggler, especially one who smuggles people
   • 2008, Frozen River, 00:33:10

     Why would they want to run? -- To get away from the snakeheads. -- What's that? -- The snakeheads pay to get them here and then they gotta work off what they owe.

3. (derogatory, slang, ethnic slur, US) A black person.
4. A showy perennial plant, Chelone glabra, found in North American marshlands; the turtlehead
5. A loose, bent-up end of one of the strap rails, or flat rails, formerly used on American railroads. It was sometimes so bent by the passage of a train as to slip over a wheel and pierce the bottom of a car.
6. The guinea-hen flower, Fritillaria meleagris.

Translations

fish

Assamese: শ’ল (xöl) (large), গৰৈ (goroi) (small) Burmese: ငါးရံ့ (my) (nga:ram.) Chinese: Mandarin: 鱧 (zh), 鳢 (zh) (lǐ) Eastern Cham: ꨌꨰꨆꨵꩀ (chaklaik), ꨁꨆꩆ ꨌꨰꨆꨵꩀ (ikan chaklaik) Finnish: käärmeenpää (fi) French: ophicéphale (fr) German: Schlangenkopffisch m Indonesian: gabus (id), haruan (id) Japanese: ライギョ (raigyo), 雷魚 (らいぎょ, raigyo) Malay: haruan (ms) Russian: змееголо́вая ры́ба f (zmejegolóvaja rýba), змееголов (ru) (zmejegolov) Thai: ปลาช่อน (th) Vietnamese: cá chuối, cá đô, cá lóc, cá sộp, cá tràu (vi), cá xộp, cá quả

smuggler

French: passeur (fr)