hunch
verb /hʌntʃ/
/hʌntʃ/
[intransitive, transitive]Verb Forms
| present simple I / you / we / they hunch | /hʌntʃ/ /hʌntʃ/ |
| he / she / it hunches | /ˈhʌntʃɪz/ /ˈhʌntʃɪz/ |
| past simple hunched | /hʌntʃt/ /hʌntʃt/ |
| past participle hunched | /hʌntʃt/ /hʌntʃt/ |
| -ing form hunching | /ˈhʌntʃɪŋ/ /ˈhʌntʃɪŋ/ |
- to bend the top part of your body forward and raise your shoulders and back
- (+ adv./prep.) She leaned forward, hunching over the desk.
- hunch something He hunched his shoulders and thrust his hands deep into his pockets.
Extra ExamplesTopics Appearancec2- He hunched over the map.
- He hunched up his shoulders.
- She hunched forward to see the picture.
- She sat hunched on the bed all day.
Oxford Collocations DictionaryHunch is used with these nouns as the object:- back
- shoulder
Word Originlate 15th cent.: of unknown origin. The original meaning was ‘push, shove’ (noun and verb), a sense retained now in Scots as a noun, and in US dialect as a verb. This sense of the noun probably derives from a US sense of the verb ‘nudge someone in order to draw attention to something’.